Thousands of people rent in the City of Erie and now a local church is pushing to have their rights as renters more clearly defined.
Wednesday night, Erie City Council members passed their first read of the “Tenant Bill of Rights,” a list of laws that informs tenants and landlords of their renting rights and responsibilities.
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Erie renters have defined laws to protect their rights, but many people don’t necessarily know what those laws are.
The Erie Spiritual Coalition recently drafted a document pulling all those laws into one place to make it easier for people to know exactly what rights they have as tenants.
“You could go read like an 80-page something document that’s available to people, but let’s face it, a lot of folks don’t have time to do that. And certainly, if you’re one of our new American families, you may not even have the skills to read those documents, so part of the benefit is, this is a front and back. It’s clarity, it summarizes each one and cites the law. It’s been reviewed by housing attorneys,” said Very Rev. Melinda Hall, of the Erie Spiritual Coalition.