Open Thread: Tell us your thoughts on the ‘good cause’ bill

Late Thursday afternoon City Council members unanimously voted to pass a “good cause” eviction bill, ensuring that landlords would need a viable reason to evict tenants.

The bill, which passed in a 17-0 vote Thursday, protects tenants from eviction unless they have broken the terms of the lease, habitually refused to pay rent, become a nuisance, or been involved in other, similar situations.

It’s an amended version of a bill that Councilman Curtis Jones put forth a year ago. Rather than protecting all tenants, the new bill only applies to tenants who have had less than a year-long lease, namely, month-to-month tenants.

Prior to the decision, the bill was met with a lot of support from evicted residents and activists, many of whom came to speak at Thursday’s council meeting, telling stories of their own unfair evictions, and the burden it placed on their families.

Now, with the decision finalized, we want to turn it over to you. What do you think of this bill? Would you have preferred the unamended version? What would you like to see changed about the bill as-is? Is there another way to go about protecting tenants from unfair evictions?

Let us know in the comments below. If you’d like more details on the bill, you can read it here.