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Councilmember Robert C. White, Jr. 2
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A PROPOSED RESOLUTION 6
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IN THE COUNCIL OF THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA 9
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To declare the existence of an emergency with respect to the need to amend the Rental Housing 12
Act of 1985 to limit the adjustment of general applicability of the rent charged in rent 13
stabilized units. 14
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RESOLVED, BY THE COUNCIL DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA, That this resolution 16
may be cited as the “Rent Stabilized Housing Inflation Protection Continuation Emergency 17
Declaration Resolution of 2025”. 18
Sec. 2. (a) Under the Rental Housing Act of 1985, annual rent increases for units in certain 19
older buildings are limited to inflation as measured by the Consumer Price Index for Urban Wage 20
Earners and Clerical Workers (CPI-W) plus an additional 2% and as approved by the Rental 21
Housing Commission in the District. 22
(b) In January 2020, the Rental Housing Commission approved an increase of 3.0% 23
for May 1, 2020, through April 30, 2021, for rent stabilized units. 24
(c) In March 2020, the Council of the District of Columbia voted to suspend rent 25
increases of any amount in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, including rent increases 26
in rent stabilized units. 27
(d) In January 2021, the Rental Housing Commission approved a 3.0% increase for 28 2
rent stabilized units, though Council’s prohibition on rent increases remained in effect. 29
(e) On December 31, 2021, Council lifted the prohibition on rent increases, 30
allowing landlords to give 30 days’ notice to tenants of proposed rent increases that could 31
begin no sooner than February 1, 2022, and that, in rent stabilized units, could result in a 32
maximum increase of 3.0%, per the Rental Housing Commission’s approved rate. 33
(f) In January 2022, the Rental Housing Commission approved a 6.2% overall 34
increase to rents, which was in effect from May 1, 2022, through April 30, 2023. 35
(g) In January 2023, the Rental Housing Commission approved an 8.9% overall 36
increase to rents in rent stabilized units, which took effect on May 1, 2023, resulting in a 37
total increase to rents of 15.1% over two years and 18.1% over three years. 38
(h) Under DC law, landlords must provide at least 60 days’ notice of a rent increase 39
to tenants in rent stabilized units and may only issue a notice of an increase once during a 40
12-month period at any time throughout the year . 41
(i) Except for tenants who qualify, apply for , and received a maximum 5% increase 42
in rent because they are elderly or a person with a disability, tenants subject to the 43
maximum 8.9% increase from 2023 faced the highest rental increase in the history of the 44
District’s rent stabilization program by more than 1.0% ; the next highest increase was 45
7.6% and occurred over 30 years ago in 1990. 46
(j) While landlords expressed concerns about the impact of rising maintenance and business 47
expenses on their ability to serve their tenants and maintain their businesses, tenant s and tenant 48
advocates also raised serious concerns that an 8.9% increase would have contributed to significant 49 3
hardship for many of the households living in the over 70,000 rent stabilized units in the District 50
and may have led to the displacement of residents with lower incomes. 51
(k) In response, in June 2023, the Council unanimously passed the “Rent Stabilized 52
Housing Inflation Protection Amendment Act of 2023” and the “Rent Stabilized Housing Inflation 53
Protection Temporary Amendment Act of 2023,” to mitigate this displacement risk and preserve 54
the District’s affordable housing stock. 55
(l) In March 2024, the Council passed the “Rent Stabilized Housing Inflation Protection 56
Continuation Emergency Amendment Act of 2024” and the
“Rent Stabilized Housing Inflation 57
Protection Continuation Temporary Amendment Act of 2024” to continue the protections. 58
(m) The Council’s legislation set a 4% annual cap in rent between July 1, 2023, and April 59
30, 2025, for units occupied by residents who are elderly or who have a disability, or for units that 60
are co-leased by a home and community- based services waiver, and the legislation set a 6% cap for 61
all other rent stabilized units. 62
(n) The Council’s legislation also set 8% and 12% cumulative caps, respectively, between 63
May 1, 2023, and April 30, 2025, to support tenants who already faced the 5% or 8.9% increase 64
between May 1, 2023, and June 30, 2023. 65
(o) The existing temporary legislation will expire on January 12, 2025. This 66
emergency and temporary legislation is therefore necessary to ensure tenants and the 67
District’s affordable housing stock are still protected by the annual cap and the 2-year 68
cumulative cap. 69
Sec. 3. The Council of the District of Columbia determines that the circumstances 70
enumerated in section 2 constitute emergency circumstances making it necessary that the Rent 71 4
Stabilized Housing Inflation Protection Continuation Emergency Amendment Act of 2025 be 72
adopted after a single reading. 73
Sec. 4. This resolution shall take effect immediately. 74