After a multi-year program of developing new safety regulations that would protect poor and elderly Americans in section 8 housing, the Department of Housing and Urban Development has decided to just say “no” … to safety. As in, after spending all this time developing the new regulations, HUD has spent the last year backing away from actually implementing them.
Safety inspections are nobody’s favorite thing. It’s hard to get enthusiastic about someone coming around with a form and a clipboard, marking up violations for a set of regulations that can be confusing and apparently contradictory. But in this case, the regulations don’t seem to be arcane or overly picky.
These are regulations like there should be at least one fire extinguisher on every floor of an apartment building. Or that there should be a minimum number of electrical outlets so that residents aren’t forced to cram dozens of extension cords and power strips into a single overloaded circuit. Or that outlets near water should be grounded to prevent electrocution. Or that bathrooms should have some form of ventilation to prevent mold.
In fact, most of the things that HUD proposed were the same kind of thing that any homeowner would be expected to pass when a home was inspected before a sale. The regulations should provide residents in public housing a minimum set of safety standards similar to those that are already in place, and enforced, for people living in private housing. But, thanks to pressure from housing industry groups, HUD has been backing away from those requirements since 2020. And just because Joe Biden has moved into the White House, it doesn’t seem to be getting any better.
As NBC News reports, the lengthy process of reevaluating safety requirements was supposed to strengthen HUD’s inspection system for subsidized housing. That includes inspections of traditional public housing, as well as section 8 rentals and homes for low income elderly. However, industry groups have pushed back through the whole process, declaring that the new requirements were “too burdensome for landlords.”
Last year, rather than fully implement the new rules, HUD began to weaken them and make alterations that have lead to some genuinely nonsensical results. For example, a building that has no fire extinguishers will not be cited for missing extinguishers. But a building that has no fire extinguishers but does have hooks for hanging extinguishers, will get cited.
The new regulations came after the 2017 Marco Polo fire in Honolulu, in which over 200 apartments were damaged and 4 people were killed in a building that had no sprinklers; another 2017 fire in the Bronx where 13 people died after fire spread quickly up an open staircase; a massive fire at the Grenfell Tower public housing development in the U.K. left 72 dead; and a fire at a public housing high rise in Minneapolis left five dead and dozens homeless. It also came after a 2018 fire at Trump Tower in New York left one man dead and six firefighters injured. Trump had successfully pushed to block a law that would have required installation of a sprinkler system in his building. There was no functioning smoke detector. (Extra cruelty sauce: the man who died in the Trump Tower fire was later sued by Trump for failure to pay his condo fees.)
That this weakening of the new rules started under the deregulatory climate of the Trump White House isn’t surprising. However, it is surprising—and disappointing—that under President Biden HUD continues to place the convenience of landlords over the safety of tenants. In how it has relaxed the requirements, HUD seemed to be listening much more to advocates for building owners, like Trump, and much less to organizations that advocate for residents of public housing.
Fortunately, many state and local codes have already been tightened—for example, in New York City where a pair of bills were passed following the Bronx fire to make building safer. Those local regulations should make the lack of enforcement from HUD less consequential in some areas. But it means that both landlords and tenants are subject to a patchwork of regulations that are much less certain, and potentially much less safe.
Safety inspections are nobody’s favorite thing. It’s hard to get enthusiastic about someone coming around with a form and a clipboard, marking up violations for a set of regulations that can be confusing and apparently contradictory. But in this case, the regulations don’t seem to be arcane or overly picky.
These are regulations like there should be at least one fire extinguisher on every floor of an apartment building. Or that there should be a minimum number of electrical outlets so that residents aren’t forced to cram dozens of extension cords and power strips into a single overloaded circuit. Or that outlets near water should be grounded to prevent electrocution. Or that bathrooms should have some form of ventilation to prevent mold.
In fact, most of the things that HUD proposed were the same kind of thing that any homeowner would be expected to pass when a home was inspected before a sale. The regulations should provide residents in public housing a minimum set of safety standards similar to those that are already in place, and enforced, for people living in private housing. But, thanks to pressure from housing industry groups, HUD has been backing away from those requirements since 2020. And just because Joe Biden has moved into the White House, it doesn’t seem to be getting any better.
As NBC News reports, the lengthy process of reevaluating safety requirements was supposed to strengthen HUD’s inspection system for subsidized housing. That includes inspections of traditional public housing, as well as section 8 rentals and homes for low income elderly. However, industry groups have pushed back through the whole process, declaring that the new requirements were “too burdensome for landlords.”
Last year, rather than fully implement the new rules, HUD began to weaken them and make alterations that have lead to some genuinely nonsensical results. For example, a building that has no fire extinguishers will not be cited for missing extinguishers. But a building that has no fire extinguishers but does have hooks for hanging extinguishers, will get cited.
The new regulations came after the 2017 Marco Polo fire in Honolulu, in which over 200 apartments were damaged and 4 people were killed in a building that had no sprinklers; another 2017 fire in the Bronx where 13 people died after fire spread quickly up an open staircase; a massive fire at the Grenfell Tower public housing development in the U.K. left 72 dead; and a fire at a public housing high rise in Minneapolis left five dead and dozens homeless. It also came after a 2018 fire at Trump Tower in New York left one man dead and six firefighters injured. Trump had successfully pushed to block a law that would have required installation of a sprinkler system in his building. There was no functioning smoke detector. (Extra cruelty sauce: the man who died in the Trump Tower fire was later sued by Trump for failure to pay his condo fees.)
That this weakening of the new rules started under the deregulatory climate of the Trump White House isn’t surprising. However, it is surprising—and disappointing—that under President Biden HUD continues to place the convenience of landlords over the safety of tenants. In how it has relaxed the requirements, HUD seemed to be listening much more to advocates for building owners, like Trump, and much less to organizations that advocate for residents of public housing.
Fortunately, many state and local codes have already been tightened—for example, in New York City where a pair of bills were passed following the Bronx fire to make building safer. Those local regulations should make the lack of enforcement from HUD less consequential in some areas. But it means that both landlords and tenants are subject to a patchwork of regulations that are much less certain, and potentially much less safe.