The "Proactive Rental Inspection Program" would give city authorities the power to check on houses and apartments without waiting for someone to complain, and to keep closer tabs on problem managers and landlords.

According to Housing Code Administrator Rick Hester, the program provides the city "something we can use to motivate."

The council gets a presentation on the program at its Thursday work session and, if it gives the go-ahead, inspectors will put the program into effect in March. Among the program's features:

The city may institute periodic inspections if an owner or manager has two or more code violations within 12 months, the city gets a complaint about substandard conditions, the Neighborhood Improvement department knows of unsafe conditions in a rental residence, or code violations are visible from outside;

Inspectors may institute periodic inspections in target areas, as identified by high levels of housing-code violations and crime;

The city may require property owners found to have more than two violations in a year to pay for listing on a city registry for a year;

The city establishes a training regimen for low-income property owners to bring their housing up to code and keep it there.

Property owners without histories of code violations may get a certificate of registration and compliance, which exempts their properties in target areas from periodic inspections as long as there are no "reasonable causes" for a checkup.

Crackdown urged

Durham has about 45,000 residential rentals, and Hester has said that more than 75 percent of the complaints his office receives are about rental property. For years, Durham residents - particularly advocates for low-income housing - have urged officials to crack down on those responsible for ramshackle rental properties.

Wade Penny, who owns numerous rental houses in Durham, said he was not familiar with the program. But he cautioned that some tenants are finding it difficult to pay low rents, and could find it more difficult if owners' costs lead to rent increases.

The program allows owners until Jan. 1, before registration goes into effect, and owners with two more violations in the 12 months leading up to the new year may avoid having to register if they correct the violations and attend a landlord-training class.

In the target areas, though, inspectors would start the checkups right away. A circular area with a half-mile radius may be targeted if it has had more than 300 complaint-driven code inspections and 400 reported crime incidents within the year prior to designation.

Neighborhood Improvement had identified six targets:

Wabash and Ridgeway, near the McDougald Terrace apartments;

Scout and Enterprise, in the Southside area;

Morehead and Kent, in West End/Lyon Park;

Glendale and West Trinity, in Old North Durham;

Canal and Queen, in East Durham;

Alston and Liberty, in East Durham.

The new program, said Hester, is a change in the approach.

"It has given us what we need to go after the bad landlords in the city of Durham, " he said.