In the wake of a string of deadly fires, investigative journalists from the Chicago Tribune and the Better Government Association uncovered a pattern of failed political will on building code enforcement that stretches back to 1871. Ordinances are watered down and routinely abandoned. Given this history, tenant protections are in desperate need of an overhaul.
“Fires killed 61 Chicagoans from 2014 through 2019 in buildings where the city had been warned about fire safety problems yet failed to adequately address them. The majority of those fires were in low-income neighborhoods mostly populated by Black and Latino residents.”
Chicago has tried keeping problem landlord lists and enacting fines for failure to provide tamper-proof smoke detectors. Each step was hampered by slack enforcement, making the efforts all but completely ineffective. Instead of implementing proactive inspection, as some cities have, Chicago takes a reactive approach, using a complaint-based model. This approach puts the onus on tenants to report their landlords for building code violations; however, reporters have found that even when violations are reported, inspections are not completed in a timely manner — and sometimes not at all.
The article states, “Fires killed 61 Chicagoans from 2014 through 2019 in buildings where the city had been warned about fire safety problems yet failed to adequately address them. The majority of those fires were in low-income neighborhoods mostly populated by Black and Latino residents.”
"Letting those landlords get away with doing what they're doing and issuing them notice, that is the worst outcome. You've effectively done nothing." ―Gregory Miao
Gregory Miao, a senior attorney at ChangeLab Solutions, says in the article that any successful fire inspection program should strongly enforce consistent rules, opposing the patchwork of enforcement found in Chicago. He says, "Letting those landlords get away with doing what they're doing and issuing them notice, that is the worst outcome. You've effectively done nothing."
Webinar Event: The Failures Before the Fires
On Wednesday, May 12, 4:00pm PT / 7:00pm ET, reporters Cecilia Reyes and Madison Hopkins will be hosting a discussion on the findings of this article as part of the investigation into the politics of fire safety and tenant protections in Chicago. ChangeLab Solutions senior attorney Gregory Miao will be on the panel along with Eric Patton Smith, activist for housing safety, and Mark Limanni, litigator and legal advisor to the City of Chicago.
4/23/2021