Momentum: 35 Years of Housing Action

35 Years of Housing Action
utilities, records, & repairs:
protecting
tenants
across illinois
ESTHER PATT
Champaign-Urbana Tenant Union (founding organization)
Since our founding, Housing Action has mobilized advocates
to speak up for statewide change
“The Champaign-Urbana Tenant Union
has been a member of Housing Action
since its creation. Housing Action is our
only vehicle for our staying connected
with activity in the legislature that will
improve or diminish tenants’ rights.”
STOPPING UNFAIR UTILITY CHARGES
In 1990, a few leaders from Housing Action Illinois met with people
in Champaign-Urbana for ideas about what statewide legislation
was needed to support tenant rights.
I shared a few stories from Champaign-Urbana Tenant Union
clients about discovering that their individually-metered public
utility bills included service to areas outside their units. Complaints
come up every year.
We hear about duplexes where one tenant’s lease says heat is
included in the rent, but another tenant is unknowingly paying for it.
From time to time, we hear from a tenant of a basement apartment
who finds the “individual” meter for their unit is the building meter
that includes hallway lights and operation of washers and dryers
in the laundry room.
We worked with Housing Action to draft a bill, and Housing Action
staff found legislators to sponsor the bill and organized support
for its passage. Since 1992, tenants across Illinois have benefited
from Housing Action’s work to win amendments to the Rental
Property Utility Service Act that include a penalty of three times
actual damages.
PROTECTIONS FOR RENTERS
WITH RECORDS IN URBANA
A smaller but important victory for those of us living in the East-
Central Illinois city of Urbana was defeating a bill that would have
invalidated the Urbana Human Rights Ordinance’s prohibition of
housing discrimination based on “prior arrest or conviction record.”
Since 1979, Urbana law has said that disparate treatment or denial
of housing based on criminal record is an unlawful violation of
city code—just as it would be if the reason were race, disability,
religion, or any other protected class.
In 2005, then-State Representative Chapin Rose introduced a
bill that granted landlords the right to use criminal records to
screen applicants and would preempt any local laws prohibiting
such discrimination. Urbana was not in Representative Rose’s
district, and I would not have even heard about the bill if I had
not been contacted by Housing Action. A city council member
from Urbana, the lobbyist from the Illinois Municipal League, and
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