Cleveland Real Estate News

One of the reasons being argued against cities being allowed to have residency requirements for workers, seems a bit odd to me. Here is a quote from a Reginald Fields post on the PD site covering the proceedings:

“[atty for State of Ohio]….said the local rules are affecting population and property values in surrounding communities because some people are prohibited from moving where they desire.

That has to be the first time I’ve heard the theory that people not moving out of Cleveland are affecting suburban property values?

If you go to the Cleveland Law Library blog you can get good details about both cases being heard on the Supreme Court level. Akron and Lima are the two cities who brought the suit. And if you recall, Cleveland supposedly missed the deadline to sign on to either of these cases (can you see me rolling my eyes here? I still can’t believe that). But it does appear that situation got rectified because if you look here  at the list of ‘parties’ attached to the City of Akron case, Cleveland is listed.

This is a City of Lima argument against striking down residency law:

“In the event a firefighter has to be called in to respond to an emergency … if they are outside the city or a county away from the city, it is going to take longer than if they were in the city,” said Anthony Geiger, attorney for Lima.

As someone who sells houses for a living and talks to a lot of fire fighters and police officers who live in Cleveland, I still say the jury is out on just how much of a mass exodus there would be if these laws are struck down. In my experience, more people have indicated they would not move (and I realize this is not a scientific survey lol).  As an example, I had a sale of a home (my buyer) a Cleveland police officer was selling.  Yes he was moving, but not out of Cleveland, only a few streets away to a larger home.

Which of course is a separate issue from whether or not cities should be allowed to do this. What do you think? And are you a fire fighter or police officer required to reside where you work, whether it’s Cleveland or somewhere else? Would love to hear your thoughts on this.

For further background, The Ninth District Court of Appeals upheld Lima and Akron’s right to require city workers to live where they work. You can read (also from Law Library blog) about it here in their January 11th post.

Peace Out – 3C