With apologies to the great English author Charles Dickens, Monday was a day with a tale of two cities – one city with a single-family hone rental cap and one without it.

The day started with a  noon Webinar hosted by Chief of Staff for Fishers Mayor Scott Fadness, Jordin Alexander.  Mayor Fadness provided introductory remarks and turned the event over to his Chief of Staff.  She ran down the points that had been covered in previous presentations before the City Council and on one of my podcasts.

Basically, the city has concerns that some neighborhoods have 30% to 40% of the single-family residences rentals, some as high as 50%.  The proposed ordinance would cap rentals at 10% in each neighborhood, with certain exceptions, including what the measure describes as “legacy’ rentals, in place as of December 31, 2025.  There are other exceptions listed in the ordinance.

You can view the entire city Webinar presentation at this link.

At 6pm Monday, former Fishers City Councilor Jocelyn Vare hosted what she described as a Town Hall discussion at the Hamilton East Library in downtown Fishers.  She quickly reviewed the provisions in the proposed ordinance, then turned it over to a panel discussion.  The panel consisted of 3 people with experience in private sector real estate and one tied to a nonprofit.  Meigan Wise, Janet Pritchett and Steve Ladig all have connections with the private sector…Andrea Davis is Executive Director of the housing nonprofit HAND.

The panel took questions as the event moved along, and a very different set of messages began to emerge.  Reducing the stock of single-family rental would likely raise the monthly costs for renters and reduce the opportunities for renters to live in Fishers.  Data was presented that indicates there has been little interest in institutional owners, such as Wall Street investors and hedge funds, to buy and rent property in Fishers in recent years.

Numbers were also shown that home property values in neighborhoods without rental caps has risen higher, compared to subdivisions with rental caps.  The assertion is that owners have less control over their property in a capped area, leading to values rising at a reduced rate.

Davis pointed out that people need different housing at different stages of life.  Fishers doesn’t just need more housing, Davis argues, but needs a variety of housing types.

Questions were raised about how the caps would impact the availability of senior citizen housing and diversity in Fishers.

The City of Fishers has established a Web page devoted to the rental cap proposed ordinance at this link.

Jocelyn Vare has created a Web site with links to the many resources available online about the proposed rental caps at this link.

The City Council is scheduled to conduct a public hearing and have a second reading vote on this ordinance April 21st.  Assuming the ordinance passes second reading, the final third reading vote would be held in May.

So, Fishers is faced with the tale of two cities.  One city enacts a 10% rental cap per subdivision. with a number of exceptions.  The other city would stay out of the rental cap situation, leaving it to individual Homeowners Associations (HOAs) to sort it out.

It will be up to Mayor Scott Fadness and the 9 members of the Fishers City Council to decide what ordinance, if any, to enact for Fishers.  If you have any thoughts on which of the 2 cities you would like to see, contact the mayor and members of the City Council