SitemapThe campaign led by city activists to end predatory land contracts took a small step forward Monday night during a meeting of Youngstown’s Housing, Community and Economic Development committee.
City Prosecutor Dana Lantz presented the committee with a rough draft of an upcoming piece of legislation that would give the city the authority to require interior and exterior inspections of a property before it could be sold using a land-installment contract.
Members of the Alliance for Congregational Transformation Influencing our Neighborhoods (ACTION) and various neighborhood organizations attended the meeting and have largely led the local charge against land-contract companies. The groups have been working to see a piece of legislation introduced to city council since October.
After Lantz and Patricia Dougan, a lawyer with Community Legal Aid, revise the current draft, the legislation will go before council for a first reading the first week of January. After that, the legislation will be brought before ACTION members and other activists who will be able to review it and ensure it addresses their concerns, after which it will proceed to second and third readings, with a potential passage sometime in mid-to-late February.
Lantz said the city would have to train inspectors to conduct both interior and exterior inspections, but that noncity inspectors could be used by prospective home vendors so long as they are approved by the city. She emphasized that for such an inspection program to exist, it would have to be financially self-sustaining.
The current legislation only addresses land-installment contracts. Rent-to-own land contracts will be the next piece of legislation the city and activist groups aim to pass.
Under rent-to-own land contracts, prospective owners pay rent to a seller for a predetermined number of years before having the option to purchase the property. To read the full story from The Vindicator, click here.