CHICAGO Residential Landlord and Tenant Ordinance

[Paul Bernstein]

You can read the Chicago Residential Landlord and Tenant Ordinance at the home page of the Metropolitan Tenants Organization, at the following URL:

http://www.tenants-rights.org/ordinance.html

The Ordinance is much more complex then it would seem and, to be sure, one of the purposes of these forums is to explore the ins and outs of the ordinance and court cases that have interpreted the Ordinance.

 

[Paul Bernstein]

The very first section of the Chicago Residential Landlord and Tenant Ordinance (Section 5-12-010) entitled:

"Title, Purpose And Scope" quickly gives one and all a flavor of where the City of Chicago is "coming from" and it reads as follows:

"This chapter shall be known and may be cited as the Residential Landlord and Tenant Ordinance, and shall be liberally construed and applied to promote its purposes and policies.

It is the purpose of this Chapter and the policy of the City, in order to protect and promote the public health, safety and welfare of its citizens, to establish the rights and obligations of the landlord and the tenant in the rental of dwelling units, and to encourage the landlord and the tenant to maintain and improve the quality of housing.

This chapter applies to, regulates and determines rights, obligations and remedies under every rental agreement entered into or to be performed after the effective date of this chapter, for a dwelling unit located within the City of Chicago, regardless of where the agreement is made, subject only to the limitations contained in Section 5-12-020. This chapter applies specifically to rental agreements for dwelling units operated under subsidy programs of agencies of the United States and/or the state of Illinois, including specifically programs operated or subsidized by the Chicago Housing Authority and/or the Illinois Housing Development Authority to the extent that this chapter is not in direct conflict with statutory or regulatory provisions governing such programs."

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[Paul Bernstein]

Legal fees in Chicago Ordinance cases

The Chicago Ordinance provides in Section 5-12-180, that the "prevailing plaintiff" in an action arising out of the application of the rights or remedies made available under the ordinance is entitled to all court costs and reasonable attorney's fees. What is "reasonable" was decided by an Illinois appellate court decision a copy of which can be found at the following URL.

http://www.state.il.us/court/Opinions/AppellateCourt/1999/1stDistrict/March/HTML/1974336.htm

(Due to the length of the URL you will probably have to swipe, copy and paste the URL into your browser to access this opinion from the web-site of the Illinois Courts.)

Historically, landlords have more assets to litigate with then residential tenants. This very important decision allows tenants to find lawyers ready, willing and able to represent them in Chicago-based landlord-tenant litigation in matters covered by the Chicago Ordinance.