Even with rent control in place, the policy had no teeth. Photo by Getty Images.
The mess that is St. Paul’s rent control ordinance was in the news again recently. The Star Tribune reported that the city granted a rent control carve-out late last year to Sherman Associates on a favored project. Sherman Associates is converting Landmark Towers, a downtown office space, into market-rate apartments, and the city is providing subsidies in the form of tax increment financing.
The project is currently covered by the rent control ordinance’s 20-year exemption for new construction, meaning the developer isn’t bound by the 3% cap on annual rent increases. To alleviate concerns from the developer about potential changes to the ordinance, the city agreed to substantially increase the tax subsidy for the project if a future city council vote removed its exemption from rent control.
City Council President Mitra Jalali, who championed the original rent control ordinance in 2021 that at the time contained no exemption for new construction, voted for the agreement.