Several landlords peppered Palmerton Borough Council last week with concerns about a proposed rental ordinance.

Judy Bollinger, who owns properties in the borough, told council she understands there’s a concern about renters.

However, Bollinger said she believes the borough has a huge problem outside of the rental, and questioned why the borough wasn’t addressing these matters through zoning.

Landlord John Dunn noted that when he looked at the ordinance, he noticed the borough doesn’t have a borough employee inspector.

Councilwoman Holly Hausman-Sell said, “We are allowed to make minor changes, and that’s what we did. We advertised it.”

Hausman-Sell read the minor changes that were proposed after the advertisement of rental ordinances. The version provided at meeting has changes incorporated.

• Intent was for every other year inspection by a third party. Bi-annual was changed to biennial to reflect this throughout the ordinance.

• Inspection is to be completed by a certified building code official. The list is no longer provided by borough so any certified building code official can be utilized.

• Inspection form from the borough may be used or any equivalent form may be used.

• Release of documents was made consistent with the Right to Know Law.

Dunn then questioned what certification does a building inspector have to have.

Hausman Sell said it’s a certified building code official.

Dunn then asked what if the building inspector is wrong, and asked why they won’t hire a borough employee to be an inspector.

Councilman Kris Hoffner noted the borough has been working on this ordinance for over four years.

Dunn then told borough council that if it were to pass the ordinance, he would do whatever he could to comply with it.

“These changes don’t seem to be minor changes,” Dunn said.

Garrett Kistler of Lehighton said he owns a rental property in Palmerton and noted he’s a fully compliant landlord.

“Some of the issues I see is there’s a lot of gray area,” Kistler said. “This step process is very vague.”

Further, Kistler added it’s not a very tight ordinance, and believes it needs to be addressed.

Nick Masington said he owns several rental properties in town, and suggested that borough council hear out Dunn, who has a high level of expertise on the subject.

Asher Schiavone, Government Affairs Director of the Greater Lehigh Valley Realtors expressed concerns with the ordinance, such as disruptive conduct.

“We’ve certainly seen where it can spiral out of control really quickly,” Schiavone said.

Afterward, a vote to adopt the rental ordinance failed to pass,

Council President Terry Costenbader said he believes the ordinance should be tabled and looked at again before being brought back to borough council.

“I know there’s been a lot of work put into it,” Costenbader said. “I feel maybe we can clean it up a little bit.”

Last month, borough council approved the first reading of a rental ordinance, and authorized to advertise.

The matter had previously been discussed at its meeting in March following a complaint from a borough resident.

In October 2021, council discussed joining other local municipalities in an attempt to regulate rental units.

At that time, the borough had 700 units.

Officials said at that time the rental unit registration and inspection program would pertain to property maintenance as dictated by the International Property Maintenance Code.

The goal was to promote safe and sanitary conditions of rental housing, and that the borough believed this would increase property values, as well as encourage landlord and tenant responsibility for the condition of properties.

The borough had been made aware that an increasing number of calls to the police come from rental units, and the revenue from the registrations may be used to help fund additional police staffing and training to meet the demand.