%$^#!

After waiting for 3.5 year for the Department of Agriculture Trade and Consumer Protection to update their landlord regulations, to be consistent with tenant-landlord laws passed by the state legislature – apparently they have . . . and apparently, the went a little further than just making their laws consistent! And apparently (how embarrassing) the laws became effective 11-1-15 and I just figured it out yesterday!

In my defense, we were in the middle of our “funding crisis” at the TRC and I assumed that others were doing their jobs (where they get paid to do this stuff) and following this and would let me know if there were issues. But I got burned. Duly noted. I should have done it myself . . . but it was just supposed to be making the laws and regulations consistent.

What irks me to no end, is that some of the things removed, were things I participated in getting into the regulations back in 1998. At least one extremely crucial item . . . when tenants now get their security deposit checks back . . . if its a partial payment . . . and the tenant cashes it . . . it could be considered acceptance of that amount and construed to mean that you give up your rights to the remaining portion of the security deposit. So, you’d have to not cash the check and wait until you go to small claims court (which could be anywhere from 1 – 6 months to get it settled, meanwhile, the check might expire.

Now I have to do legal research to find out if and how the laws changed since 1998 to see if the above is still true. Then I have to update all our materials, the website, the brochures, the housing counseling training guide and tell the staff and volunteers. And, how do you get the word out to tenants? Press won’t care, its not news. (It shouldn’t be news, unless you want to do a “Brenda screwed up story” and with this press – the editors not the writers and broadcasters – they might.)

Add it to the list of things to do with the new set of laws potentially changing and the shutting down of the Housing Help Desk. You know where I’ll be . . . chained to my desk . . . or taking time off to work on state legislative matters . . . which I would leave to someone else, but who?