LANSING, Mich. (WLNS) – Both on air and online, 6 News has been sharing stories about poor living conditions found inside housing units throughout Lansing, and many people living in those places say their landlords are doing little about it.
The National Low Income Housing Coalition estimates that Michigan is short nearly 205,000 units for people in low-income households. Lansing is no different.
“The problem right now is there is nowhere to put folks. We need more. We need affordable housing, we need more of all kinds of housing. We have a shortage of housing just like about every community in the state and in the nation,” said Lansing Mayor Andy Schor.
Schor also expressed the importance of improving existing homes. He says it starts with holding landlords accountable.
“We need to make sure they are re-housed in a safe place and right now, if taxpayers are paying for that I would rather the management company pay for that, but we can’t do that under law. And we are hoping the legislature will change the law to allow us to keep those landlords that are bad landlords responsible,” said Schor.
Schor says the city is currently moving forward with many proposals to create more affordable housing, one of which is the rental rehab program that will reward good landlords.
“I’m not interested in us giving tax benefits to those that are bad actor landlords, but I’m interested in helping out those that are good landlords to create more and better rental housing,” said Schor.
As Lansing creates more housing, Schor wants to remind people living in tagged units to put their money in escrow.
“People have to keep paying rent, but if you’re living in a pink-tagged property, you can pay rent into escrow and we can prevent landlords from leasing any units that become available until they fix them,” said Schor.
If you would like to see free legal services that you can use to help improve your housing. You can find more information by clicking here.
