Springfield, IL (CAPITOL CITY NOW) – Springfield does not have a landlord registration ordinance, but that did not stop people from talking about it Tuesday.

“How do you oppose something that you haven’t even read about other than in ideas?” asked public commenter Ken Pacha. “That’s a really strange way to approach the possibility of change that’s been initiated by a signature-gathering campaign from our own very citizens?” Pacha touched on the topic during an address which included complaints about the city’s infrastructure and what he said was an uncaring attitude city leaders have toward the disadvantaged.

Tony Nudo (pictured, back to camera), president of the Springfield Area Landlord Association, spoke up against the idea. “It amuses me that some of the people pushing for it will not have to pay the special tax to rent a home,” he said. “They won’t have to have inspections on their home. They won’t have to take off work and have strangers come into their home just because they rent.” Nudo accused backers of the proposed registry of simply discriminating against landlords and renters because they don’t want rental housing in their neighborhoods.

“The only thing I want to ask you to do is be careful of what you are putting out as facts when nothing exists yet,” Ald. Roy Williams told Nudo. “The sessions haven’t started; the landlords-and-tenant sessions where they are going to develop the language that comes to this council.”

The council has not only resisted enacting a registry, it refused last year to place the question on the ballot as a referendum.