Overland Park landlords to face inspections, fees starting in July 2017

Beginning in July 2017, landlords of Overland Park’s roughly 30,000 rental properties will begin paying the city’s new inspection fee, which has been set at $60 per building per year.

The city council gave its final approval Monday on the inspection fee for a program that was created in February in an effort to keep a closer eye on the maintenance of rental property. The fee is expected to cover the cost of inspections, which is estimated at $330,000.

The $60 fee is for each rental dwelling under common ownership, but there are some differences in how it is applied when there are different owners within a building, according to the examples listed in the resolution. For instance, rental of a duplex with one owner would be $60, but the city would be able to collect $120 — or $60 each owner — for a duplex with two different owners.

An apartment complex under one owner would be $60 per building. And an apartment clubhouse would not be assessed the fee unless it has a rental unit.

The council’s discussion of the fee schedule primarily took place at a committee meeting April 11. There was no discussion at the full meeting on Monday. In fact, the council members voted by proxy, through their stand-ins on this year’s Overland Park Teen Council.

The Teen Council is a program in which selected students spend a school year attending committee meetings, learning about city departments and doing service projects. At Monday’s council meeting, those high schoolers sat at the dais and — with the city council members prompting them over their shoulders — conducted the entire meeting.

They not only approved the rental license fee but OK’d a $9,000 raise for City Manager William Ebel, increasing his salary to $206,000 beginning July 1 and sending some to his retirement. They also extended some building deadlines for The Vue redevelopment project on the southeast corner of 80^th and Marty Streets. There was little to no discussion on the agenda items, and the teenagers had the entire agenda cleared and the meeting adjourned before a half hour had passed.

Mayor Carl Gerlach said afterward that the council checked with its counsel ahead of time to make sure the actions would be considered legal.

The action on The Vue extends by three months some of the deadlines set by the city for demolition and construction. The developers, HMMU1, Inc., now have until July 31 of this year to begin demolition of the existing buildings. Construction must start by Oct. 1, 2016 and end by Oct. 1, 2018.

The Vue, a mixed-use building in downtown Overland Park, will feature 216 apartment units, 10,000 square feet of retail space and a 324-space parking garage. The delay was requested by John Petersen, the developers’ representative, to allow more time to finalize an agreement with the general contractor.

This story was originally published May 3, 2016 at 12:11 PM with the headline "Overland Park landlords to face inspections, fees starting in July 2017."