Landlords Flub Rent Control Attack
While Ypsi landlords won a partial victory over city controls, Ann Arbor tenants swept round one in the struggle for a rent control law. A challenge by individuals from realty and property management firms to keep the proposal off the April ballot failed to materialize.
The local landlords attempted to challenge the validity of signatures on the Human Rights Party petitions to put the proposal up for a vote, but City Clerk Jerome Wisss ruled that most challenges were invalid. The rent control proposal, along with funding for day care and door-to-door voter registration now go off to Lansing for a working check by the state Attorney General's office.
With their first round defeat, landlords can be expected to begin backroom plotting to defeat the measure in April. Last year, they succeeded in destroying a similar proposal by spending over $35,000 in a massive campaign against rent control. A similar sum, which ultimately comes out of the tenants' pockets, is likely to be used again this year to stop a proposal which would force just such expenses to come out of the landlords' pockets.
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Freeing John Sinclair
Old News
Ann Arbor Sun