Charleroi landlords protest larger fee

The Washington County Redevelopment Authority – with 146 units, likely the largest-single landlord in Charleroi – is looking at a huge increase in rental license fees for its two buildings in the borough under a change that was included in the 2016 budget.
Until this year, landlords were paying a $50 rental license fee per building, but that went up to $100 per unit, with a cap of 31 units per property.
The redevelopment authority, which owns two properties that house the low-income elderly, became aware of the fee increase a few weeks ago. Under the old $50-per-building fee, the authority had been paying a yearly total of $100 for two buildings: the 104-unit, high-rise Char House on Ninth Street and the 42-unit Crest Avenue Apartments for the Elderly. The rental license fee, under the 2016 budget ordinance, is now $6,200.
Jim Hott, director of senior housing at the redevelopment authority, and several landlords attended a borough council meeting Thursday night to protest the rising rental fee.
“I just think the fee is outrageous,” Hott said. “We pay property taxes,” even though the redevelopment authority is a nonprofit entity.
“It is never our position to go into a community and not pay our share,” Hott said Friday.
The federal Department of Housing and Urban Development, by contract, sets the rents for the units in Char House, where tenants pay 30 percent of their adjusted monthly income for rent and allowed utilities. Excluded from the definition of utilities are cable television, phone and Internet service. The redevelopment authority is unable to pass along any increase in rental license fees to tenants.
The annual income limit for Crest Avenue Apartment residents is $29,220. At Char House, the income limit is $38,950, but the vast majority of residents don’t reach the limit, Hott said, and rents are higher there than at Crest Avenue.
Although the word “fee” was used in connection with the increase because the borough said it will cover public safety and municipal services, “To me, that sounds like a tax,” said Hott, who sees the need to register both landlords and tenants and realizes Charleroi has a declining tax base.
Char House opened in 1979, and Crest Avenue, a former school building, opened in 1996.
“The school district donated it to us, and we converted it. It was not on the tax rolls. We put it on the tax rolls,” Hott said Friday.
He was just one of many people who packed the Charleroi Borough Council meeting Thursday to discuss the $100 per unit fee imposed on landlords this year.
Councilman Larry Celaschi said the fee was to help keep track of renters in the community and to offset costs of police, fire and ambulance services. Landlords echoed Hott’s sentiments in saying it was nothing more than a tax on them. Landlords who were paying $50 a year and own more than one building with several units now could be paying thousands.
Celaschi said the fee was built into the budget for the cost of the police, fire and ambulance services and other municipal services.
Bonnie Halinka, a realtor for Northwood Realty Services in Belle Vernon, said most of the homes being purchased in Charleroi are by landlords planning to rent them. “This is a renters’ community,” she told council. “You should embrace these landlords, not impose this fee on them. They are buying these homes and providing a tax base.”
She opined the community lost half of its population and if the landlords begin forsaking the borough because of the fees, homes could degrade to dilapidated shells occupied only by drug users.
Halinka said the landlords not only provide a service to the community, but they are responsible for all of the bills related to these properties.
Landlord Carl Miklos pays taxes that go toward police, fire and ambulance services.
“If this money is going into the general fund for the whole community, then everyone should pay,” Miklos said. “We shouldn’t be singled out.”
Miklos said a 2-mill tax increase would generate more money and be fairer to everyone.
Neal Rubin invested $500,000 in his family’s business, Cotromano’s Restaurant, but he thinks the fees will drive businesses out of the community.
“I want to be here in this community,” Rubin told council.
Carlton Stern, owner of Rhythm House Records and Jingles recording studio, hopes to become a first-time property owner when he purchases the building that houses his business, but he said this fee would be a hardship for him.
Council agreed to revisit the issue at the next agenda meeting on Thursday, Feb. 4.