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DESCRIPTION OF THE STRATEGY
Cities, states, and community-based organizations can work to create lead-safe housing registries. These registries allow prospective homeowners or tenants to identify those properties that have been deemed “lead-safe” because a lead hazard evaluation performed by an independent, certified person has found that they comply with federal and state lead laws and regulations. Some of these registries are searchable on the Internet. Pilot projects are also exploring the feasibility of creating a networked, nationwide lead-safe housing registry that would be fully integrated and user-friendly on the web. Other published lists also exist, described in the “Publicize Problem Property Owners” building block.
BENEFITS
Immediate/Direct
Results:
Establishing a lead-safe housing registry allows prospective tenants and buyers quick, free access to information about properties that are lead-safe.
Public Health
Benefits:
By directing prospective tenants and homeowners to properties that are lead-safe, a registry can steer families with young children toward healthy housing and away from properties that contain lead hazards. This prevents children from being exposed to home-based lead hazards and reduces lead poisoning risks.
Other
Indirect/Collateral Benefits:
Property owners who are part of the lead-safe housing registry can market their properties as safe for children and families, attract more tenants and homebuyers, and ultimately obtain higher rents and purchase prices.
Scope of Potential Impact
Statewide Regional (e.g. multi-county) City - or - County - Wide
PRIMARY ACTOR(S)
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KEY PARTNER(S)
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Health Department
Housing Agency
Community Development Agency
Community-based Organizations
| Rental Property Owners
Homeowners
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CRITICAL ELEMENTS
Staff
requirements:
In most instances, existing staff in a local or state health, housing, or community development department or a community-based organization can create and maintain the lead-safe housing registry. Overall, between 0.25 and 0.5 FTE is needed for this strategy, including ongoing monitoring to ensure that properties listed remain lead-safe if they are not lead-free or fully abated.
Other resource requirements:
Institutional
capacity required:
Any agency that receives reports of the lead-safe status of rental properties is positioned to create a registry, although publishing this information in a registry may require specific authorizing legislation.
Cost
considerations:
Costs to administer this strategy will be moderate; many local lead-safe housing registries have been started as part of a HUD Lead Hazard Control grant. A large portion of costs will be felt at start-up; the costs to maintain the housing registry should be low.
Timing issues:
There are no distinct timing issues with this strategy.
Feasibility of
Implementation:
This strategy should be moderately easy to implement and administer.
Potential Obstacles/Barriers
Some resistance from landlords and realtors may occur, in objection to the use of public resources to the benefit of owners of lead-safe properties and to the disadvantage of property owners not on the list (or who will have to undergo costly renovations and repairs to qualify). However, public health concerns should outweigh these arguments.
Additional Resources
1. | http://www.LeadSafeHomes.info - An example of an interactive online housing registry tool that combines information on lead-safe housing with data on housing containing known lead hazards. |
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