HARRISBURG, Pa.—Today, the Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania ruled that the borough of Pottstown’s ordinance allowing officials to search rental homes without a warrant based on probable cause is unconstitutional. The decision comes more than eight years after Pottstown residents Dottie and Omar Rivera, and their landlord Steve Camburn, teamed up with the Institute for Justice (IJ) to file a lawsuit challenging the rental inspection ordinance.
“This is a massive victory for the privacy and property rights of renters throughout Pennsylvania,” said IJ Senior Attorney Jeffrey Redfern. “If the government wants to search your home, it needs a warrant based on probable cause. You don’t lose that protection because you rent your home.”
Pottstown’s rental inspection ordinance forced landlords and tenants to open their doors every-other-year for an inspection of the home, in search of code violations. Instead of obtaining warrants based on probable cause that a code violation had occurred, officials obtained “administrative” warrants that essentially permitted them to search any rental property wall to wall.
In today’s unanimous ruling, Judge Stacy Wallace wrote that the administrative warrants the borough previously relied on for conducting rental inspections were “at best based on general suspicions.” Because of that, the court ruled, “the Borough’s Code provisions authorizing administrative warrants for biennial rental inspections on less than individualized probable cause are facially unconstitutional under article 1, section 8 of the Pennsylvania Constitution.” Although federal courts have previously held that suspicionless searches of rental properties are permissible under the Fourth Amendment, the Commonwealth Court held that the Pennsylvania Constitution is more protective of privacy and property rights than the U.S. Constitution.
Following today’s decision, the borough must either obtain a warrant based on probable cause that a code violation or other issue has occurred, or receive landlord or tenant permission, before conducting a rental inspection.
“I’m thrilled that renters now have the same rights to be secure in their homes as homeowners in Pottstown do,” said Dottie. “If I don’t want someone searching through my home, and they have no reason to believe I’ve done something wrong, then they shouldn’t be able to come in.”
“For me, this case was always about standing up for my tenants and for other people throughout Pennsylvania,” said Steve. “Thanks to IJ’s help, I’ve been able to protect my tenants from these unconstitutional searches.”
IJ is the nation’s leading defender of property rights. In addition to the Pottstown case, IJ has challenged similar rental inspection ordinances in Orange City, Iowa; Zion, Illinois; and Seattle.