Rents are soaring across Miami-Dade County, and a new proposal could have voters deciding whether to impose a temporary freeze on some housing costs.
New legislation introduced by a Miami-Dade commissioner is the first step to the county triggering an obscure Florida law that lets local governments ask voters to endorse emergency “rent control” measures that would determine how much some landlords could charge tenants for one year.
Florida law provides enough political, legal and practical hurdles to rent control that Miami-Dade tenants shouldn’t expect flat housing costs any time soon.
But the proposal by Commissioner Kionne McGhee that’s scheduled for a Thursday hearing is galvanizing advocacy groups pushing Miami-Dade to get more aggressive on housing costs.
“We’ve talked about rent control for years. It’s something we’ve been trying to do since 2017,” said Adrian Madriz, executive director of SMASH, a housing-justice group holding a rally outside of County Hall when the full commission meets next Tuesday. “This is clearly a very extreme situation we’re going through now.”
The McGhee legislation is set for a hearing at the 9 a.m. meeting of the commission’s Public Housing and Community Services committee. The resolution instructs Mayor Daniella Levine Cava’s administration to conduct a study to determine if a “housing emergency” exists in Miami-Dade that’s “so grave” it requires stabilizing rents.
If the study determines there is a housing emergency, the commission could declare one, pass rent-control legislation and then call for the referendum required under Florida law. If voters endorse the plan, it would then go into effect but would still be subject to court challenges from landlords.
Rent controls can only last 12 months before the process must be repeated to extend the measures.
What would those controls mean in Miami-Dade? That’s unclear for now, but they could result in a cap on the percent increase a landlord could charge for rent on an affected residence.
Why St. Petersburg backed off rent control
A recent bid for rent control in St. Petersburg offers a look at the limitations ahead for advocates of the McGhee legislation.
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Last month, the city council there balked at a rent-control proposal after government lawyers walked elected leaders through the potential pitfalls embedded in Florida law governing local housing emergencies.
One involved the referendum requirement. While voters might be willing to freeze rents, the timing of scheduling an election would allow landlords to raise rents ahead of new controls getting approved.
The other hurdle centers on the price cap written into the 1977 state law passed to extinguish Miami Beach’s rent-control ordinance. That part of the law exempts “luxury apartment buildings.” Forty-five years ago, Florida lawmakers defined that as any apartment renting for more than $250 a month.
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Using the Labor Department’s inflation adjuster, that would equate to about $1,200 in 2022 dollars. That cap would exclude a large chunk of Miami-Dade’s existing rental market. An analysis by the apartment-listing site Redfin pegged average rent at close to $3,000 in last year’s rental offerings for South Florida.
The ceiling also would give landlords in the affordable-housing market a target for avoiding rent controls ahead of a referendum.
“I could see it doing more damage than good,” Gina Driscoll, chair of the St. Petersburg City Council, said in an interview Thursday. “It’s really extremely risky to move forward with that kind of a measure.”
Driscoll said the council is instead pursuing changes in city zoning to allow more housing on existing lots, including loosening rules on building duplexes, triplexes and separate living quarters often called “mother-in-law suites.”
“We have many other tools in our toolbox we are discussing,” she said.
Levine Cava backs the McGhee legislation, but hasn’t said whether she supports rent control. “This study is just the first step in a long process to learn more about the causes of our housing crisis and what are the best long-term solutions we can establish and implement to tackle the problem,” she said in a statement.
McGhee wasn’t available for an interview Thursday. In a press release announcing his legislation, he said Miami-Dade needs to quickly intervene on rents.
“Our residents shouldn’t have to choose between being able to feed their family or paying their rent,” he said. “We must enact legislation to limit how much landlords can charge residential tenants to help curb this housing shortage and emergency affecting our residents.”
