Some Export landlords unhappy with rental license fee proposal
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Several Export rental property owners — including two with seats on borough council — have taken issue with a proposal to charge a $200 annual rental licensing fee as part of the 2022 budget.
Mayor Joe Zaccagnini, who owns several rental properties in Export, proposed the fee last month in part to help plug a roughly $38,000 deficit in next year’s budget, but also to address a longstanding issue with some local landlords.
“We have a problem with landlords not wanting to get an occupancy permit,” Zaccagnini said. “And to get around it, they move people in and out without telling us.”
That allows a landlord to skirt the $100 occupancy permit fee, Zaccagnini said. It also prevents the accompanying inspection by the borough’s code enforcement officer, as well as the ability to collect the proper earned income tax from tenants. Export has roughly 300 rental units.
“We send out letters to all landlords every year, asking for their tenants’ names and addresses so we can report that to the tax collector and they can assess the proper earned income tax,” Zaccagnini said. “We get about a third of them back.”
Several landlords who attended Tuesday’s council meeting asked why the budget couldn’t be balanced with a tax hike that affects all borough residents equally. The borough has not raised taxes since the 1990s, and its last tax-related move was to lower them from 16 to the current 14 mills.
Zaccagnini said he did not feel it was proper to raise taxes on senior residents with fixed incomes.
Councilman John Nagoda, who owns 10 rental properties, asked why the borough couldn’t plug the budget gap using more than $40,000 in American Rescue Plan money that is sitting in a borough account. The borough will ultimately receive about $87,000 in ARP funding.
But both Zaccagnini and solicitor Wes Long said they are not yet certain how that money can be spent, and they are not alone. Murrysville council members last month hired a consultant to help them determine how nearly $2 million in ARP funding could be properly used.
Long added that the $200 licensing fee — which also mandates that rental properties be inspected once every two years — gives the borough more leverage in dealing with derelict landlords, especially those who live out of state.
“We believe this licensing fee will improve and promote better maintenance of rented properties in the borough,” Long said.
Nagoda, along with fellow councilman and rental-property owner Joe Ferri, said the fee would amount to little more than a burden to good landlords, while not solving the problems with bad ones.
“My problem is that the people who are currently not following the rules are still not going to follow new rules,” Ferri said.
Nagoda said the fee amounted to nothing but a tax, which would be passed on from landlords to tenants.
“We should be talking about fines, not a tax,” he said.
Long said that by creating the fee through an ordinance, the borough can impose a lien on properties if a landlord does not pay it.
Leins cannot be placed on unpaid fines, he said.
Council will hold a special meeting at 6:30 p.m. Dec. 28, when both the rental licensing fee and the 2022 budget will be up for a vote.