Letter to the Editor: Interpreting Inglewood home registration “fees”

My Fellow Inglewood Citizens,

I would beg that all please take careful note that for almost a year now, “mayor” James Butts and Inglewood’s “Housing Protection Department” has been repeatedly publicizing that in 2022 Inglewood would be requiring that all residential property owners, not just all property owners who have rental property, and not just all landlords, but, to quote a City mailer (1), “ALL RESIDENTIAL PROPERTIES,” had to be officially registered with the city by the owners.  Again, according to published city documents, and even a legal public notice in a newspaper (2), owners of “ALL RESIDENTIAL PROPERTIES,” including single family homes, would be legally required to register their properties with the city, even if (3) “…IT IS NOT BEING USED AS A RENTAL.” Those are direct quotes.

Also, here was a city webpage (see link above) that said that “ALL RESIDENTIAL PROPERTY OWNERS” must register their properties and still another city document (4) said, in bolded and underlined letters, that a resident’s home must be registered even if, “…IT IS NOT BEING USED AS A RENTAL.”  And let’s just stop here and agree that everyone knows what the word “ALL” means…right?  “ALL” doesn’t mean “some” residential properties or “most” residential properties or “certain” residential properties; “All” means “ALL” residential properties.   This message was not just in websites and city documents, James Butts even did a radio ad reinforcing it and he was quoted, apparently in a city council meeting, as giving just the blanket category of “property owners” as those who must register their properties (5).  

And what “registration” information did James Butts want?  City documents say that Butts wanted not only things like the square footage of the property and when the property was bought, but also the names of all who live on the property and even the emergency contacts of residents of that property.  Residents must have been shocked by this blatant attempt to coerce them out of their and their family”s personal and private information.  But in addition, that official Legal Notice published by the city (3) indicated that all Inglewood’s homeowners, even if they are not renting anything, not only have to provide the city with very personal information, having nothing to do with a rental, but also may be subject to a home “inspection.”  And when you throw in the fact that the city was threatening to financially penalize homeowners living in their homes, who don’t register, who don’t give up their and their family’s private information (3), it is clear that this was just one more example of a crooked James Butts blatantly abusing his power with the very definition of governmental overreach.

Clearly, James Butts demanding that Inglewood’s residential property owners, owners that had no rental property whatsoever, provide information that clearly appears to be an invasion of a resident and their family’s privacy, is not only unnecessary, but was very inappropriate and likely very illegal.  So was Butts actually trying to do this, trying to do data-mining on his constituents?  Over the past month, I heard that City officials were reportedly trying to revise history regarding that residential property registration.  Reportedly, many homeowners, like myself and my neighbors, were not ready to bow down so easily, and complained.  And because Butts’ data-mining appeared very illegal, complaining residents would have led to possible legal entanglements for this Mayor, the most scandal-ridden Mayor in the history of this city.  So the Butts administration started BLAMING RESIDENTS, pushing the story that residents “misunderstood” the program requirements, that ALL residential property owners with no rental units were really never expected to register their property.  

They said that residents just “misunderstood.”  But as with most of James Butts’ lies, and he tells an awful lot of them, this one was well-documented to be a lie.  There was no misunderstanding.  And in fact, the letter that I received on 12-18-21, from the City of Inglewood PROVES that James Butts and his administration was, indeed, trying to illegally coerce personal information from Inglewood’s residents, for reasons that had NOTHING to do with anybody renting anything!.

The letter from the city, dated 12-13-21 states, quote, “As of December 9. 2021, the mandatory registration requirement for Single Family Homes and Condominiums (not owned by a company, Corporation, or Real Estate Investment Trust) has been CANCELLED.”  Yes, the letter misspelled “canceled,” but even worse is this.  As is typical with James Butts and his administration, the city admitted that there was a requirement in the first place, and that the requirement was now canceled, but the letter still tried to hide the crime they were trying to commit, saying that “There has been a misunderstanding by some Single Family property owners.”  But what was the misunderstanding?  Residents were absolutely right; they shouldn’t have to register their properties, so they complained. 

So the requirement that all residential property owners needed to register their properties was well documented, for months and months, and now it is being reportedly canceled.  But the question is, what was James Butts trying to pull?  Why did James Butts want all this personal and real estate information from Inglewood’s residents?  Did he want to sell this information to his developer friends, give it to some new developers?  Did he want to use this information as leverage against residents?  Or is it just another manifestation of James Butts’ fasciest nature that he just wanted to know everything about everybody?  If it wasn’t necessary to run the Inglewood Housing Protection program, why, why, was James Butts so desperate to get “ALL” that personal information from Inglewood’s residents?

Joseph Teixeira