Brewed Fresh Daily

"What's the first sign of trouble in older suburban cities? Often it's when aging neighborhoods sprout 'for rent' signs. It's not hard to picture what could go wrong: As houses go from homeowners to renters, they fall into disrepair, tenants come and go (often with dire consequences for the school system), crime escalates, and neighborhoods deteriorate. This can happen almost overnight as elderly homeowners die and their children sell mom and dad's unfashionable duplex or aging bungalow at estate-sale prices. Absentee landlords sometimes buy up a number of these places and rent them to successively poorer families until the houses are uninhabitable and the landlord walks away. Is there anything a city can do about this? Some older suburbs near Cleveland are trying a number of strategies. The most common: aggressive inspections (Garfield Heights plans to inspect every rental house every three years, looking for unsafe and unsightly conditions), programs to encourage renters to give homeownership a try and efforts to educate the landlords themselves. For instance, South Euclid requires that landlords take a one-day training course on maintenance and crime prevention when their rental permits are renewed. 'We have a standard here in our community,' said South Euclid's mayor, 'and you have to reach that standard.' Shaker Heights is trying a little more carrot and a little less stick. It's looking for a company to run background checks on prospective renters at discount rates. Its hope: By making the background checks cheap, small-time landlords will use them to weed out troublemaker tenants. 'Anything we can do to help them be a better landlord helps us as a city,' said one city official. Another carrot: Shaker Heights wants to give the city's seal of approval to landlords who meet high maintenance standards and help promote these places to prospective renters. The name of this program: 'Certified Shaker.'"