That means we can blog directly onto our own web page.  Please join the conversation there!

You can find your polling place at www.harrisvotes.org.

When you head to the polls, please consider the following Houston Apartment Association Better Government Fund endorsed candidates.  Also, please share the following sample ballot with your family, friends and colleagues!

HAABGF endorsed candidates:

Mayor – Gene Locke

Controller – Ronald Green

At Large 1 – Stephen Costello

At Large 2 – Sue Lovell

At Large 5 – Jolanda “Jo” Jones

District A – Brenda Stardig

District F – Mike Laster

For more information on the candidates, check out our previous post here.

• New Houston Registration Requirement – Houston’s new property inspection ordinance requires every apartment property in Houston’s city limits (threeplexes and up) to register with the city. If you already registered a couple of years ago for the crime ordinance, you still have to register again. It’s free of charge, but here’s what you’ll need:
  • The HCAD account number for the property (you can get that from the HCAD website); and
  • The Certificate of Occupancy number for each building on the property (if the property has eight buildings, you need eight CO numbers). CO’s are supposed to be posted in the management office at every property. If CO’s have been issued (life safety inspections were completed back in the ’90′s, etc.) but are simply missing, you can purchase replacements from the Occupancy Inspection Section.
  • Register any time between now and January 31, 2010, at www.HoustonMultifamily.org.  If you have any trouble with registration, please let the City know and copy us at govaffairs@haaonline.org.
• New Houston Property Directory Requirement – This isn’t required until January 1, 2011, but Houston properties will be required to have a property directory at every vehicular entrance (you should already have one at your “principle entrance”). Put it within 8 feet of your driveway, where ambulance drivers and pizza delivery guys can see it.
• Ban on Attention Getting Devices in Houston  – The Houston City Council passed an ordinance in 2008 which bans several types of “attention getting devices,” including:  balloons, streamers, giant inflatables.  Check here for exceptions and more information about this law.
• Utility Disconnections – Under a law passed earlier this year, starting January 1, 2010, utilities can only be disconnected for “bona fide repairs, construction or emergencies.” This has long been the case for water, but will now apply to electricity as well, so disconnecting electricity for non-payment in a mastermetered property will no longer be allowed.
• Visual Smoke Detectors – Under another new law, an apartment owner must provide a visual smoke detector at the owner’s expense for a hearing-impaired resident.
• Lease Termination for Sexual Assault – This law creates lease termination rights for certain crime victims if an assault occurred within the previous 6 months at the property and specific documentation is provided.
• Lease Guarantors – The new TAA lease will reflect this, but another new state law prevents lease guarantors from being obligated beyond the initial lease term under certain circumstances.

Make it your New Year’s Resolution to incorporate these new requirements into your business plan for 2010.  As always, if you are a member of the Houston Apartment Association and have any government related questions, please contact HAA at govaffairs@haaonline.org.

When you head to the polls, please consider the following Houston Apartment Association Better Government Fund endorsed candidates.

Sample Ballot:

Mayor – Gene Locke

Controller – Ronald Green

At Large 1 – Stephen Costello

At Large 2 – Sue Lovell

At Large 5 – Jolanda “Jo” Jones

District A – Brenda Stardig

District F – Mike Laster

For more information on the candidates, check out our previous post here.

The program featured three panelists, Director for Corporate Security for Centerpoint Energy - Lewis Griffith, Director of Public Relations for Crime Stoppers of Houston - Amy Smith, and HAA General Counsel – Howard Bookstaff. 

Griffith started his presentation by describing the increases in electric diversions that CenterPoint has seen over the past few years.  In 2004, CenterPoint confirmed 2,980 cases of electricity diversions, but this year over 14,000 cases have already been confirmed.  People may steal electricity in a few ways.

They may illegally slow their meter down to register less electricity than is actually being used, reconnect a meter after it has been disconnected for non-payment, or hook into a meter that does not belong to them.

Tampering with a meter can be dangerous and is illegal.  In fact, some meter tamperers are charged with a felony! That is why HAA is partnering with Crime Stoppers to encourage apartment residents to report electricity thieves! Download this flier to share information with your community on reporting electricity theft.

Here are signs that management and maintenance personnel should look for to determine if someone is tampering with meters on their property:

• Cut wires on the plastic closure tags on the meter cover. Meters should have little plastic and metal tags installed by CenterPoint.  The gray tag means that the meter is connected and receiving electricity.  A red tag means that the meter has been disconnected.
• Holes or metal in the plastic meter cover.  Foreign objects may cause the meter’s gears to slow down and not count electricity appropriately.
• A meter cover that is pried up from the meter box.  A loose meter cover may indicate that someone has tried to tamper with wiring behind the meter face.

Meter tampering is a big problem for apartment owners because the cost of repairing a meter or going after electricity that has been stolen is often borne by the owner.  If money is owed for use of a particular meter, headaches in getting power turned on can cause trouble for future residents. 

To report meter issues, contact CenterPoint:

• Emergency Response: Call 713-207-2222 or 1-800-332-7143. Select language, wait for prompt, enter 1, wait for prompt, enter 0.  CNP electric personnel will be dispatched ASAP.
• Non-emergency cases: call CNP Revenue Protection Meter Diversion at 713-207-7225.  Response is usually within 4-7 days.
• Corporate Security: Call 713-207-7423 or toll free 1-877-232-4911.

HAA General Counsel Howard Bookstaff warned managers to keep an eye out when signing Continuing Service Agreements with Retail Electric Providers, to ensure that damages are not sought from owners for stolen electricity.

CenterPoint says that the new Smart Meters should help detect tampering, but until they are installed throughout the city, we need your help in fighting electricity tampering!

Check out this blog post by Nancy Sarnoff for more information on the program.

Our thanks go to HAA members Direct Energy, TXU Energy, REPower, BLUTrend, and Gexa Energy for being at this event and sharing their knowledge with attendees!

Please consider voting for thier picks….

(i) denotes incumbent

Mayor – Gene Locke

Controller – Ronald Green

At Large 1 – Stephen Costello

At Large 2 – Sue Lovell (i)

At Large 5 – Jolanda “Jo” Jones (i)

District A – Brenda Stardig

District F – Mike Laster

For previous posts on this topic, please click here for a sample ballot from the November 4 election or here for more background on the seats and links to candidate websites.

Also, click here for an interview with Gene Locke that was published in ABODE magazine.

The annual program features a Q & A with some of the industry’s leading company executives. Questions ran the gamut from anticipated market conditions in 2010 to employee compensation and even bedbugs.  Clay Hicks, Director of Operations for Greystar, feels that despite a new learning curve, there’s great opportunity out there for those companies that can meet the challenge. “Clients are changing because of the foreclosures. The styles of properties are totally different from what we’re used to, but as an industry that’s how we can grow as we haven’t ever before.”

Always a popular topic at this program, it didn’t take long for the questions regarding salaries and compensation trends to crop up. The consensus among the panel was that companies will reward performance via results-based bonuses, rather than cost of living adjustments. 

Though many acknowledged the challenge in motivating employees in difficult economic conditions, Matthew Summers, Director of Operations for Kaplan Management, shared that their company is cultivating employee loyalty via a new standard medical benefit package that is available at no cost to their employees.  Still others indicated a 2010 budget that reflects a two percent increase to salaries, although the distribution of those funds will not be implemented “across the board.” 

The topic of crime and property safety was also on the minds of many supervisors. Summers, a former police officer, shared an interesting experience and offered good advice on how best to work with local authorities.

Additional panelists included Stephanie Graves, Marketing and Training Director for Asset Plus, and Matt Anderson, Regional Director of Maintenance for Southhampton Management.

If you’re a management company executive, property supervisor or marketing director and would like to learn more about the SOAPS programs at HAA, email the education department at educ@haaonline.org for an application.

The magnets are available for FREE to HAA member properties.  Our latest shipment of magnets was produced with the kind sponsorship of Maintenance Supply Headquarters and TXU Energy!  In addition, Great American Business Products provided printing consideration to help make the magnets possible. 

Over the past two years, HAA and its partners have distributed 50,000 magnets to renters in the greater Houston area. 

Stop by the HAA office to pick up a box for your property today, or contact Aimee at AArrington@haaonline.org for more information.

We will be providing extensive information about these new city policies to HAA members in the coming weeks, but here is an early overview.

Property Inspections

As proposed, this ordinance had teams of inspectors at every apartment property in the city looking at a long list of possible offenses – major and otherwise – in common areas and in the interiors of a fixed percentage of units.

As passed, the property inspection ordinance is basically as follows.

• Every multifamily property in the city (3 units or more) has to register with the city. Registration is free, and replaces the registration previously required for 10+ unit properties under the crime ordinance.  Single-family and condominium rental properties are not included in this ordinance.  Re-registration of properties must be completed between Dec. 1, 2009 and Jan. 31, 2010.
• Every property will be inspected for compliance with items included on this draft checklist. Inspectors cannot search individual units except upon the written request of a resident. A list of all properties in Houston will be followed, starting with properties that never received their life safety inspections, then properties with a history of complaints, then continuing to the end of the list.
• A fee of $4 per unit, with a $100 minimum (plus a $10 administrative fee per property) is required each time the property is inspected, which cannot be more often than every four years unless citations have been issued.
• The Fire Department’s inspection program, with an emphasis on attic draft stops, will continue as is, but the Neighborhood Protection Corps will no longer have jurisdiction over apartment properties. The Fire Department’s checklist is unchanged.

Lint Traps

In August, a Plumbing Code amendment proposed by HAA was adopted unanimously by city council, saying that an underground lint trap is not required for an apartment property laundry room unless that laundry room has more than 10 washing machines. That solved the problem of health inspectors attempting to require the retroactive installation of lint traps at existing properties. It did NOT solve our other problem, the provision that requires existing lint traps to be permitted ($50/year) and to be pumped every 90 days (approx. $250 per cleaning).

Last week, city officials acknowledged that current ordinance language allows exceptions to the “every 90 days” rule for “interceptors,” but that a provision saying the exception can’t be longer than 180 days only applies to “grease traps” – meaning the department can grant an exception for lint traps for as long as necessary as long as the gunk in the bottom of the trap is “less than 25% of the wetted height of the entire grease trap or interceptor, as measured from the bottom of the device to the invert of the outlet pipe.” On small laundry rooms, we think that might take several years. The attorney that handles this issue for the Health Department is preparing specific written guidance on this issue, which we hope to have in the next few weeks.

Bottom line: Properties with existing lint traps will still buy the $50 annual permit, and will be required to pump their traps “as needed,” which will depend on the number of washers, frequency of use, size of the trap, etc. Owners with no laundry rooms with more than 10 washers will also have the option of removing the trap altogether (actually, filling it with sand and piping around it), which costs about $2000, but solves the problem permanently.

Numbering

Proposed years ago by HAA and the Fire Department, this ordinance requires new properties to illuminate building numbers (not unit numbers, just the numbers on the ends of buildings). New and existing properties will have to have a property directory at every vehicular entrance, rather than just at the “primary entrance” as is currently required.

• New buildings (under construction) must comply with this ordinance beginning on January 1, 2010.
• Existing buildings must comply with this ordinance no later than January 1, 2011.

Life Safety Deadline

The original Life Safety Appendix passed in the early 1990s said that, once you had your Life Safety Compliance inspection, you had two years to complete any required repairs. Properties were required to have completed all this over a decade ago, but some have been able to slip through the cracks because of poor city recordkeeping and other means. The ordinance adopted this week shortens the deadline to six months for those properties that have been able to successfully evade compliance until now.

This is an executive summary only. We will be providing more extensive information to HAA members on all issues in the coming weeks.

Click here for our previous post on this topic.

The surprise of the night was City Councilman Peter Brown, who spent more than any other candidate, led consistently in the polls, yet finished third – barely ahead of Roy Morales, who raised and spent almost no money.

Incumbents endorsed by HAABGF did well, with most winning outright. At-large councilmembers Sue Lovell and Jolanda Jones were held below 50%, and will face runoffs next month. Jones will face former State Board of Education member Jack Christie. Lovell will face perennial candidate Andrew Burks.

Controller candidate Ronald Green faces a runoff with fellow council member M. J. Khan.

In At-large Position 1, HAABGF-endorsed candidate Steve Costello finished first and is headed to a runoff with Karen Derr.

It At-large Position 4, former Police Chief C. O. Bradford won outright over a 4-way field.

In Spring Branch-area District A, Brenda Stardig and Lane Lewis head to a runoff. HAABGF-endorsed candidate Jeff Downing finished fourth.

In Alief-area District F, a 7-candidate race produced a runoff between Mike Laster and Al Hoang.

In Memorial-area District G, HAABGF-endorsed candidate Oliver Pennington won outright, taking nearly 60% in a 5-way race.

All 11 proposed amendments to the Texas Constitution passed, including key appraisal reform measures backed by the Texas Apartment Association.

Find complete election results from the Houston Chronicle here.