Many ASU students who rent homes with friends are unknowingly breaking the law - but Tempe is looking at updating the rule, aligning it with those of neighboring communities.
A Tempe city ordinance makes it illegal to house more than three unrelated residents in a single-family home.
"[The law] doesn't make a lot of sense to me when a house is plenty big," said Ed Hermes, an ASU student who helped form recommendations for the City Council.
The proposed change would not cap unrelated roommates at any specific number. Instead, the cap would be tied to the square footage of the house, allowing larger homes to accommodate more residents.
Tempe's Ad Hoc Rental Housing Task Force developed this recommendation among others during five meetings last fall. They are now under review by the City Council and its subcommittees.
The Development Review Commission will go over the unrelated-resident cap in October before forwarding the proposal to the entire Council.
"The current law is just so incredibly hard to enforce," said Hermes, a task force member who was selected to represent Tempe's renters. "I think we should have laws on the book in Tempe that make sense and are enforceable."
The task force's other recommendations are still in the process of being approved.
In June, the council adopted one recommendation eliminating a tax loophole for landlords.
The loophole allowed landlords to own one rental unit tax-free. Landlords who owned more than one rental unit were required to pay a sales tax on each unit.
Effective October 1, all Tempe rental units are subject to the same 1.8 percent sales task. The change eliminates a landlord's ability to own multiple homes under different company names to circumvent the tax.
The task force also requested that the city work with ASU to better inform students about noise ordinances and other neighborhood laws.
Task force members requested that city staff "help develop a code of conduct that imposes a means of accountability at the University level for misbehaviors within the community," said a memo to the City Council.
"They wanted ASU to somehow punish students who misbehave off-campus," said Hermes, a political science senior.
He said ASU and Tempe should be responsible for enforcing their own rules and regulations.
"We pay our tuition at ASU to get our education," he said. "We don't pay our tuition so that ASU can enforce Tempe laws."
ASU's community outreach liaison, Stephanie Salazar, said in an e-mail that the Arizona Board of Regents Code of Conduct "can be applied to off-campus behavior when it is determined that a student's behavior poses a danger or threat to the campus community.
"Any incident that may affect the safety of ASU students, whether on- or off-campus, may be addressed by ASU," she said.
She said ASU is sometimes notified of incidents that occur off-campus.
"Typically, if the incident is minor, the Community Outreach Department will bring the students in as a courtesy visit to address their behavior," Salazar said. "However, if the incident is high level the student will be referred to Student Judicial Affairs."
Shauna Warner, Tempe's Neighborhood Services director, said the proposal was about "working together as a partnership" and working within ASU's Student Code of Conduct to apply the University's current conduct standards to community incidents.
The task force's last meeting was in January. Warner said the task force would reconvene in about six months, assess the success of its work and decide if more work is needed.
"It could be the end, it could be more work," she said. "They won't know until they revisit it."
The task force was established last fall to address homeowners' concerns about rental property in neighborhoods.
It was initially created without representation from renters or students, sparking controversy on campus since many students rent Tempe homes.
When Hermes and another ASU student, David Eck, were later added to the task force, Hermes said he worked hard to dispel some of the stereotypes about students and renters.
"Once I was actually placed on the committee ... I think it helped the task force members realize that there are good and bad renters just like there are good and bad homeowners," he said.
"The people in the community really love Tempe. Students have a lot of pride in Tempe, too. We're here to enrich
Tempe."
Reach the reporter at jonathan.cooper@asu.edu
