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Source: Pioneer Press, St.迷你倉最平 Paul, Minn.Dec. 27--A company that owns 17 low-income apartments in St. Paul is challenging the city's right to demolish the rentals or force housing improvements.The premise, which has been repeated by several landlords since at least 2004 in various courts, is that strict code enforcement makes it too expensive to provide affordable housing to the city's poor.Raven Financial, which owns rental units in eight St. Paul properties, recently filed a federal complaint with the Department of Housing and Urban Development against St. Paul, the Minnesota Housing Finance Agency and the Payne-Phalen District 5 Planning Council.The landlord is challenging the city's order in early 2013 to either improve or tear down a six-bedroom duplex on Maryland Avenue.The complaint also contests orders issued for three other rentals, including two homes that remain vacant because they do not meet city housing standards.According to the complaint, three licensed contractors and a state building official estimated that the Maryland Avenue duplex needed from $5,000 to $16,450 in improvements in order to meet the state building code.The city, however, ordered at least $45,000 in repairs, and when the improvements, were not made, it ordered the duplex demolished.The properties are on Maryland, Maria and Reaney avenues, as well as Burr Street -- East Side areas with high concentrations of poverty.The costs of unnecessary repairs would be passed on to tenants through rent increases or the units would be demolished or sold, hurting rather than helping the poor, according to the complaint."The city's housing policies act as a major disincentive to continuing to provide low-income housing in St. Paul," Raven Financial's attorney, John Shoemaker, said in a statement.More than a quarter of St. Paul's population lives in poverty, according to the complaint filed Nov. 20.In response to previous lawsuits, Mayor Chris Coleman and other city officials have maintained that city housing inspectors have found too many rental units with no heat, mice infestations and other evidence that the poor are being taken advantage of by unscrupulous landlords eager to get federal housing vouchers.City officials said many of the properties in the latest complaint have been notorious problems for years."If you Google any of these addresses, you'll get the full (city) council files on all of these properties," said City Attorney Sara Grewing, who said she had yet to receive a copy of the complaint."We have spent thousands of hours and countless city resources defending against the landlords who retain Mr. Shoemaker."An order issued in December 2012 declared the duplex at 758 Maryland Ave. an official nuisance property and ordered Raven Financial to make more than 50 improvements, from tuck pointing the house's exterior to installing smoke and carbon monoxide detectors that meet state codes. The duplex was ultimately ordered demolished.Al Oertwig, president of the Payne-Phalen planning council, said many residents believe the city is still too easy on owners of East Side problem properties."My feeling is they don't come down hard enough," Oertwig said.But Raven Financial says city standards far exceed state standards and are among the most rigorous in the country. The company says the result is increased housing costs and fewer affordable rentals available to people identified as vulnerable under federal law -- "protected class" residents such as low-income minorities.To make its case, Raven Financial pointed to recent legal decisions and fees.In response to a complaint from the Builders Association of Minnesota, for example, the state Court of Appeals last year determined that St. Paul's standards for egress windows ran contrary to the state building code.State rules allow homeowners to replace windows with "the largest size that will fit into the existing frame or rough opening," but the St. Paul Safety and Inspections Department in 2009 adopted minimum sizes for replacement egress windows that are in迷你倉many cases larger than those found in the city's century-old housing stock.In addition, the appeals court determined in 2010 that a demolition order against a low-income rental home owned by Bee and Lamena Vue was "arbitrary and capricious."Raven Financial's complaint also challenges the city's building and housing code fee and assessment system."St. Paul issues heavy fees on low-income housing providers for inspections, vacant building fees, code compliance inspection fees, administrative fees, fees for claimed clean-up, fees for claimed excessive services, and other miscellaneous fees," Shoemaker wrote.Raven Financial says it has sold off rental units in order to keep up with repair costs, fees and property taxes."In just the last two years, Raven has been required to pay to St. Paul over $20,000 in fees and assessments," Shoemaker wrote. "This is in addition to the costs of materials and labor for the city-forced renovations to Raven's older homes and other regular maintenance and repair costs to the rental units."Since 2009, the city has received federal Neighborhood Stabilization Program grants through the Minnesota Housing Finance Agency.The agency "as a recipient of (federal) NSP funds must monitor the planning, analysis and performance of its participating jurisdictions, including St. Paul, and take appropriate actions," according to Shoemaker, who believes the state agency has fallen out of compliance.The St. Paul Public Housing Agency had 8,622 families on its waiting list for public housing as of Sept. 30, up from 5,790 in July 2011.This isn't the first time that property owners have complained that strict code enforcement actually hurts rather than helps the poor.In September 2010, the 8th Circuit of the U.S. Court of Appeals ruled in a similar housing lawsuit against the city of St. Paul, Magner v. Gallagher.Recognizing sufficient evidence to go to trial, the court found that a group of landlords could proceed with the legal argument that the city's housing policies and code enforcement had a "disparate impact" upon St. Paul's low-income residents and minorities, a violation of the Federal Fair Housing Act.St. Paul challenged the ruling in the U.S. Supreme Court in 2011 but took widespread criticism from housing advocates and withdrew the challenge in February 2012, 20 days before oral arguments were scheduled to begin.Legal observers, including Walter Mondale -- the original author of the Fair Housing Act when he served in the Senate -- had worried that the more conservative members of the Supreme Court would use the opportunity to gut the act, eliminating "disparate impact" as a legal protection for minorities in housing, lending and other areas of federal law.Rather than going to trial, the case was put on hold while a similar case in New Jersey moved forward. That case, Township of Mount Holly v. Mount Holly Gardens, was recently settled, opening the door for Magner v. Gallagher to proceed to trial.Shoemaker says the Minnesota Housing Finance Agency failed to include the September 2010 decision in Magner v. Gallagher in its analysis of housing policies the next year, the 2011 "Minnesota Analysis of Impediments to Fair Housing Choice," even though a landlord case from Detroit Lakes, Minn., was included.The analysis mentioned that the Gallagher lawsuit was dismissed in December 2008, but not that the dismissal was later overturned.Shoemaker pointed to two other lawsuits filed against the city in the past two years, both of which allege violations of the federal False Claims Act. Ellis v. City of Minneapolis and City of St. Paul challenges St. Paul's right to millions of dollars in federal housing grants. The case is pending in U.S. District Court, and a hearing on motions to dismiss is scheduled for Jan. 7.Frederick Melo can be reached at 651-228-2172. Follow him at twitter.com/FrederickMelo.Copyright: ___ (c)2013 the Pioneer Press (St. Paul, Minn.) Visit the Pioneer Press (St. Paul, Minn.) at .twincities.com Distributed by MCT Information Servicesmini storage