LITTLE ROCK – The Arkansas Health Impact of Housing Project is an initiative led by the Arkansas Community Institute, the Central Arkansas Re-Entry Coalition and other community partners to study how Arkansas’s residential landlord tenant policies impact the health of individuals and communities. On February 16 the project convened a diverse group of Little Rock residents to review a summary of the literature on housing and health and a proposed bill, HB1166, that would establish a “Quality of Habitability” law for the state’s rental property. The process used for this review is called a Health Impact Assessment (HIA). The group, which included landlords, renters, code enforcement officials, attorneys, health professionals and community members, concluded that the bill did not address the harmful health impacts of substandard housing on renters and their families.
Arkansas is the only state in the country without an Implied Warranty of Habitability for rental property that sets forth basic standards for the property and gives renters the ability to break a lease, sue or withhold rent when those standards are not met. HB 1166 appears to be a very limited effort to bring some balance to Arkansas landlord tenant laws by allowing renters to break a lease after 30 days if a landlord does not maintain a small set of basic standards. However, the bill places conditions on this small set of basic standards that could make the law ineffective or even create conditions that may end up being worse for renters than under the current law.
The report provides evidence that there is a significant link between the condition of housing and health outcomes and states that “Poor quality and inadequate housing contributes to health problems such as infectious and chronic diseases, injuries, and poor childhood development.”
The report finds that “HB1166 only guarantees its basic standards if they were working properly at the beginning of a lease or at installment,” “only landlords can determine what is in compliance” and “standards do not apply in the event of a natural disaster”.
The preliminary HIA concludes that: “House Bill 1166 … does not address many of the hazards found in substandard housing that contribute to poor health.”
Members of the HIA team have found that both landlords and renters have rights and responsibilities and that balancing those rights and responsibilities would create a healthier environment.
Since the February 16 meeting, the sponsor of HB1166 has amended the bill to provide fewer protections for renters by lengthening the time a landlord has to make repairs from 14 days to 30 days and eliminating protections that tenants may find in common law.
The project will continue its work through the fall and will release a detailed report in October 2017. The project is funded by the Pew Charitable Trust, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and Kresge Foundation.
For more information, call Arkansas Health Impact of Housing Project, Project Director Neil Sealy, at (501) 376-7151.