New Hotel Regulations Threaten Tacoma's Small Boarding Houses
A proposed legislative act would force small rooming houses to meet strict hotel standards, placing a financial burden on widows and small-scale landlords.
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If acting Governor Hay signs the Potts hotel bill, every boarding house keeper in Tacoma will be put to a considerable expense, to say nothing of conforming to the rules and regulations laid down by the bill. The bill is commonly known as a hotel keeper's bill, but it specifies that any person who rents ten or more rooms shall be considered a hotel keeper. This will include many small boarding and rooming houses which make no pretense of being hotels and do not cater to transient guests. These small operations would be required to pay a $5 fee for a hotel inspector, install fire escapes, and provide ropes in every room for emergency escape. This bill passed both the house and the senate on the recommendation of the Hotelkeepers' association, ignoring the large number of widows who rely on renting out rooms in their homes for their livelihood. Critics argue the bill is primarily a mechanism to create government jobs for inspectors rather than a genuine safety measure.
“This association does not take into consideration the far greater number of women, widows generally, who are forced to gain their livelihood by conducting a boarding or rooming house.”
This 1909 legislative fight highlights the ongoing tension in Tacoma between professionalizing the housing market and protecting small-scale, affordable rental options. The fear of 'red tape' destroying the livelihood of resident landlords remains a central theme in debates over modern zoning and rental registration ordinances.
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