Naperville may ban boarding houses in residential areas

Naperville eventually may keep boarding houses out of residential areas.

Doing so is one of a handful of suggested restrictions city staff members have come up with to better regulate boarding houses and boarding rooms to address crime and safety concerns.

Residents such as East Central Homeowners Organization President Carol Schmidt have called such houses a "blight on our neighborhood."

"The core issue we have is ... we have a class of landlords who are essentially parasites," Naperville resident Mark DiMaria said. "They make a living off the neighborhood by renting to bad tenants."

The city has found some boarding houses burden water and electric services, present safety hazards, create parking and garbage collection problems and tend to have a higher incidence of police calls than other residential properties.

Among city staff's suggestions is to keep boarding houses out of residential areas. Current legal boarding houses would be amortized for two years and then be required to comply. The city also hopes to better define boarding houses and boarding rooms.

"It's the specificity of those definitions that's going to give us a lot more tools to be able to enforce these issues," said Marcie Schatz, director of transportation, engineering and development.

In addition, staff is calling for a requirement that property owners who rent out a room in their home actually live there themselves as well as increased cross-department communication in the city, increased use of citations and educational material for landlords, tenants and neighbors.

If those moves don't work, staff said future options could include a licensing program or increasing the penalties for properties deemed to be a chronic nuisance.

The city council will continue to discuss the proposals when it meets July 20.