Jul, 10, 2008
Time for a proper city home zoning law
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THE BELLINGHAM HERALD
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Doug Lomas (“Whatcom View,” July 3) complains about the City Council’s unwillingness to enforce the single family zoning ordinance of no more than three unrelated people living in a household in a single-family zone.
This leaves us, he says, at the mercy of unscrupulous landlords who buy up properties, stuff them with tenants, and thereby degrade neighborhoods.
What Lomas ignores is that there are important reasons for not enforcing this antiquated ordinance, and finding other ways to solve the problem.
Enforcing the ordinance will put Bellingham police in the position of sticking their noses into people’s houses to document who lives where and who is related to whom. Our police chief has stated that he has no intention of asking officers to do this.
Enforcing the ordinance will place the city in violation of Washington’s anti-discrimination laws, and the ordinance may be unconstitutional, exposing the city to the possibility of expensive legal action should it decide to enforce that law.
Lomas is right that there is no meaningful distinction between a three-unrelated and fourunrelated law. It’s time to stop postponing the hard work of constructing a zoning ordinance that can protect property, but also preserve our civil liberties in the process.
Daniel Larner
Bellingham
