State Agencies & Govt'l Affairs-Senate
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Bills discussed (1)
| Bill | Title | Sponsor | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
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SB165
Act 155
· 3 mentions in chapter, transcript, agenda
Matched: “SB165 J. Hendren TO AMEND THE LAW CONCERNING THE TERMINATION AND…”
|
TO AMEND THE LAW CONCERNING THE TERMINATION AND CANCELLATION OF A RESIDENTIAL LEASE UNDER THE … | J. Hendren | Notification that SB165 is now Act 155 |
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Thank you, members, for being here. Can you hear me okay? All right. Members, we have one bill on the agenda today. Just to, I will make sure to mention, we've got a lot of bills coming in probably on Thursday. So if you could please be here Thursday because we're going to have a pretty good stack. I will make mention I appreciate all of the discussion regarding Senator Dismane, the bill that he was running. and he actually has pulled that down to talk with Graham about making some adjustments now.
We've all had a little further time to talk about it, and I just want to acknowledge appreciating him for taking a little time. At first blush, I don't think we all were quite prepared for all that, and if I had known it, I would have talked to him earlier. So I really want to acknowledge and say thank you to him for that. I think he's going to be coming back. With that, members, do you have any questions or concerns before we get started? I want to thank you. I will ask that if you have got any input at all regarding the redistricting.
We've heard today the possibility that there may now be some delay in some of the information, so I'm going to be trying to verify that, but I know that's pending for all of us toward the end of session. With that, with no objection, I'd like to recognize Senator Jim Hendren for presentation of SB 165. Senator, you're recognized. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Members of the committee, this is a
Senator Jim Hendren
Unverified
1:22
bill that was brought to me by the National Guard folks. As you all know, I retired from that, so I still know a lot of those guys, and I'm familiar with the circumstances that we're talking about here.
Basically, this is extending to the Guard a similar protection that we have for the active duty when a soldier gets activated or gets rift, honorably discharged because of a reduction in forces. again the process the history of this is when I was active duty all the and it has to do with being able to get out of a real estate a rental lease for your residence even prior to the airman civil relief act almost all military landlords have military clauses in their lease with this
provision in it. But nevertheless, this just gives the protection that if somebody is activated for more than 180 days or they're moved more than 50 miles from their primary residence due to a PCS, permanent change of station, or if they're discharged after having served at least six months, then they can basically be relieved from that real estate rental lease just as the active duty is. Okay. Members have any questions?
Senator Garner? I think you need to hit yours, Senator. Now let his come on. Hit it one more time. It may be out of juice. There
Senator Trent Garner
Unverified
3:00
you go. I now see you. There you go. Senator Hennar, I think this is a great bill. I respect it. I know that some people have gone on. The only issue I see is we're adding in a definition for primary residence.
I'm fearful that in the prior law, it just kind of has that general definition of primary residence. With this, you're having to have six months, at least in the aggregate, before you're allowed to use this protection. My worry would be if a Joe moves into an apartment three months, that he's been there for three months and wants to break the lease, which he should be able to, that under this new primary resident definition, they wouldn't actually be able to do that. Can you address that
Senator Jim Hendren
Unverified
3:41
concern? Yeah, I didn't look at the technical definition of legal there.
I think the purpose there, again, is that this should not be happening within 30 days of acquiring a lease. And this is basically saying you have to have demonstrated that you didn't just go rent a place to get free lodging for 30 days and then PCS or change out. I think that's the purpose of the six months aggregate. And again, I know you have experience, and so do I, that it's, you don't PCS somebody for less than six months. If somebody's going to be changed to a duty station under a permanent change of station order, it's always at least a year.
Senator Trent Garner
Unverified
4:19
I understand that. This isn't post the deployment. This is pre-deployment. So if I was a landlord who didn't want to break the lease and wanted to hold the soldier obligated, if he had been there for three months, I could say under this, assuming he doesn't get the National Guard allowance, that he can't break this lease because it's not a primary residence because he hadn't been there in the aggregate for six months of the last year. And for those three months, under the way it's written, he would be obligated to pay that before he could break the lease. That's my understanding of
Senator Jim Hendren
Unverified
4:48
it. Again, you could be right, and this is the language that they provided
and were comfortable with. I think they're still, as I said, my experience is most landlords provide a military clause regardless. So I think this is, it's clearly better than no protection than what they have now. Does it need to be, that definition need to be tweaked? I don't know. Okay.
Senator Jane English
Unverified
5:16
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Senator English. So I'm thinking back to the Soldiers and Sailors Relief Act. So most of that was pretty much for active duty people.
Didn't really include the Guard and Reserve. I don't know if that does now or not. This should. But active duty people know pretty much in advance, six months. But isn't it possible that a guardsman would not know that they were going to be deployed someplace? I've not known two weeks in advance. Yeah.
Senator Jane English
Unverified
5:46
have a short tour overseas or something like that. Right. But I
think sometimes we don't think about the active duty is totally different than the Guard and Reserve.
Speaker 17
5:57
No, it is. And I think the other thing that this bill addresses that I had
Senator Jim Hendren
Unverified
6:02
not thought of because I read an article this week about the change in the dynamics of the active duty. And this applies to them as well is because of the reduction in force, because the retention rate is so high now due to the economy that unlike where we've been desperately short for troops before, in some categories we're overage. So, again, I think this is, it's really putting in place the same protections for the guardsmen that we've had for years for the active duty.
Senator Jane English
Unverified
6:31
So wouldn't that six months make a difference?
Senator Jim Hendren
Unverified
6:35
Again, I don't have a problem with pulling it down and seeing if we want to change that definition. I've been trying to get a hold of Colonel Wood just today. He's got out of town, I think. Yeah, that figures. But again, I don't have a problem with pulling down and looking and see if they want to change that definition or we can change it on the other side. I guess what I would say is, again, this language came from
them and what they have now is nothing. Senator, when I was looking at this too, and also that clause by using or basically negates the whole six months.
it says, because it says, or for which rent is paid using the housing allowance issued to the soldier or airman by the Arkansas National Guard. So basically that clause basically completely negates the whole six months. Yeah. If they're using housing. Yeah, that's a
Senator Jim Hendren
Unverified
7:26
very good point, Mr. Chair. If you're getting paid by the government for that housing, then you qualify. Yeah. Senator, you want to
Senator Trent Garner
Unverified
7:40
this, but I don't think most normal part-time National Guard soldiers get a housing allowance. I might be incorrect about
that. If you're a full-time AGR like my dad was, you would, you'd get a housing allowance, but I do not believe in their two weeks, or the weekend pay, there's actually a housing allowance which would fall under this. If I'm wrong about that, I will
Senator Jim Hendren
Unverified
8:01
completely change. You are correct that traditional guardsmen do not. AGR do. But most of the times, and I think that's why there's the either or, because it's not going to cover a traditional guardsman potentially if he hasn't lived in a place for six months, whereas an AGR, somebody who's
basically active duty guard and reserve, as long as they're getting BOQ or whatever housing allowance, then it would be covered. Thank you. Members, any other
questions? Senator, anything else? We do have one person that signed up that wants to speak on the No, the only thing I'll do is,
Senator Jim Hendren
Unverified
8:39
since I couldn't talk to Colonel Wood, I will address the definition, and if they're not comfortable with this, we'll fix it on the other end, but I'd like to get it rolling since we're kind of pressed for stuff.
Okay, so you want to continue on with it then, Senator Garner? Thank
Senator Trent Garner
Unverified
8:56
you. If you've had the assurance that on the House end, if they can tweak it, this might match the federal law. I haven't looked that up, and
if that's true, this apparently is an issue. If not, then if they can tweak it, I'll
trust your word. We'll do it on the House end. Okay, Senator, we've got one person that signed up to speak. So, Mr. Paul Calvert, if you would approach the witness chair, and we'd be glad to have your testimony, sir.
If you would, please state your name and who you represent
for the record. make sure to punch your mic
Paul Calvert
Unverified
9:45
it should be on the bottom there there you go my name is Paul Calvert I'm not representing anyone today other than myself obviously I hate to do this but I feel like somebody needs to say something here let me just start off I'm a landlord that's what I do for a living
could you speak up or pull it closer Sorry about that. So I'm a landlord. That's what I do for a living. I probably have about maybe 30, 35% of my income comes from veterans right now. I try to be gentle with people, whether it's a single mom or somebody has issues that they need to get out of the lease. I try to be pretty reasonable in that regard, and I'm pretty gentle with my tenants and lenient. But I think it's a little bit of a problem when the state is going to tell a landlord that they must be charitable when someone moves out and let them break a lease.
Now, I'm fully sympathetic with the idea of a National Guardsman having to fork over $1,500, $2,000, whatever it is, to break a lease. But I think the reasonable approach to that is to have the state treasury foot that bill rather than landlords, because it's like an eminent domain type taking. And when, say we take land for a road
or for some other type of government project, we don't just take it from the property owner, we pay them for it. At fair market value, you don't give them more than fair market value, but you give them fair market value, You don't just take it from them. I feel like this is an act of taking without payment. But I think it's a reasonable thing to give to the guardsmen. Pay them for it. Pay them to help them get out of their lease. But don't make individuals have to take the load
all by themselves. I think that's, one, I think it's a, it's just kind of a violation of the simple principle of fairness. And I think it's just not the right approach, but I think it is a good idea to let these guardsmen out of their lease so they're not having to foot this big bill when they're going off to save us from getting our throats cut by communists or Nazis or whoever it is, but don't point-load landlords right now,
especially right now with landlords having so many tenants who are not paying rent from this COVID business and the mandates that prevent us from evicting our tenants. I've got, I don't know, I've probably got three or four right now that haven't paid this month. I mean, and that may sound like a whole lot, but that's, I don't know, 10, 15% of my tenants, and they haven't paid this month, and I've got quite a few that haven't paid for probably, I don't know, three or four months, or maybe six months in some cases. But I try to be lenient with my tenants whenever they need to get out of a lease.
I try to be gentle and whatnot. I don't know that I've ever charged anybody a fee for breaking a lease. but I just don't think this is the right approach but I think it is the right approach and it is the right thing to do to not make these guardsmen pay these fees when they're having to go off and save our bacon but I think it should come from the state treasury and not from individuals on this like an imminent domain taking pay them for it pay the people for the services they're giving to these people
because like if one of my tenants right now in a house, decides to move out, or no, he's called into service and he has to move out and it takes me a month or maybe two months to get it re-rented out, that could be a couple thousand dollars or more that I have to eat on top of the other tenants who aren't paying because of COVID-19. And so I think it's a good idea that what Mr. Hendren is doing here, but I think it should be paid by the state and not just by the individual landlord who has to eat it by himself.
So anyway, I appreciate it. Okay, is there any questions for Mr. Calvert, from anybody on the committee? Anything that you'd like to, I see that you maybe have a comment there, Senator.
Senator Jim Hendren
Unverified
14:15
No, I appreciate the concern, and let me just say, I rented from a lot, I was a tenant for a lot of landlords over my eight years in six or seven states of active duty. And I will tell you that landlords love to rent to the military because they know we're going to pay our bills,
because they know if we don't, one letter to our commander, and we're going to pay our bills. This is not just them showing up one day and walking out without paying this month's rent. If you look at the end of the bill, the current law is they have to show up with written notice, pay this month's rent, and next month's rent. So it's not, again, to me that is a whole lot fairer to the landlord than sometimes the government is being to the guardsmen or to the troops that are being activated. So I don't think it's too unreasonable.
Most of the time landlords are happy if somebody leaves paying this month's rent and next month's rent, and that's what they're
Speaker 47
15:11
doing. Mr. Calvert, you got a closing remark? Well, so I would agree with that statement perfectly. If
Paul Calvert
Unverified
15:15
I got a tenant that tells me I've got to leave for whatever reason, if they'll come and tell me, man, I'd be tickled in most cases because a lot of times people leave, oh, in six months' rent. Maybe that's just my fault because I'm too lenient, but I would be tickled in most cases, but that's just me. But I agree with him on that point, but I still don't think that the state should force landlords to eat this by themselves.
Senator Trent Garner
Unverified
15:42
Mr. Chairman, motion for immediate consideration at the proper time.
Speaker 50
15:47
All right. Anything further, Mr. Calvert? No, sir.
Thank you for coming and making an effort to be here during this time. We appreciate your comments. Senator, you close for your bill? All right. Members, seeing no other questions, I have a motion from Senator Garner. Do pass. I have a second from Senator Tucker. All those in favor say aye. Aye. All opposed, no. Bill passes. Thank you, Senator.
Thank you, committee. Again, we've got a pretty large agenda coming for Thursday, I think, so we'll see you then. Thank you. We're adjourned.
Agenda
CALL TO ORDER
SB165 J. Hendren TO AMEND THE LAW CONCERNING THE TERMINATION AND CANCELLATION OF A RESIDENTIAL LEASE UNDER THE ARKANSAS SOLDIERS' AND AIRMEN'S CIVIL RELIEF ACT.
ADJOURNMENT
Documents
| Title | Type | Pages | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Agenda — STATE AGENCIES & GOVT'L AFFAIRS-SENATE, Jan 26, 2021 | Agenda | 1 | Official source ↗ |
Speakers
Senator Jason Rapert Chair
Unverified
Senator Jim Hendren
Unverified
Senator Trent Garner
Unverified
Senator Jane English
Unverified
Speaker 17
Speaker 31
Paul Calvert
Unverified
Speaker 47
Speaker 50