Evening star., 1922-05-05
RENT BOARD NEED
PAST, SAYS PEYSER
Thinks Rent Cases Could Be
!, Expedited by Municipal
I Court.

The emergency which called for the
creation of the District rent commission
has passed and ,the Rent Commission
will be of little value to renters after
May % and should he abolished. This
statement was made by Capt. Julius I.
Peyser of the Commissioners housing
committee, and who helped to frame
the Ball rent act, to the House District
committee yesterday
Capt. Peyser said he had tried more
than 5000 rent cases before the board.
He believes that the rent board was
needed due to an emergency, but that
the emergency has passed. Owing to-
the great amount of building opera
tlons, he believes that by October /
there will be plenty of houses for every
one. and the condition will be cured.
Capt. Peyser advocated that the trial
of rent cases might far better be trans
ferred to the Municipal Court. He ar
gued that 1t takes seven or eight months
TO get case tried before the commits
sion, and that a decision can be OBJ
tanned in seven or eight days in the
Municipal Court, which would be able
to handle all the rent cases with one
more judge. He declared that three
quarters Of the rent troubles are due to
the subletting evil.
Ads Called Propaganda.
The question of whether many of
the for rent advertisements in the
washington newspapers are part of
propaganda was discussed at length.
While she was a witness on Tuesday
Mrs. Clara Sears Taylor was shown a
strip of about three yards in length
containing clippings from The Sunday
Star. and she then declared her belief
that the advertisements were part of
propaganda, and that those apart
ments were not really for rent Rep
resentative Millspaugh asked a real
estate man about this yesterday and
then Representative Sproul of ILL.,
nois suggested that Mrs. Taylor might
be again questioned.
Mrs. Taylor said she wished to Of
FER an explanation. She said it sound
ed to her like propaganda. but wished
1t distinctly understood that she was
not accusing any Washington news
paper of cooperating with propa-
gandists or having any knowledge
that any Of the advertisements were
not bona fide. She said that every
time the rent bill has come up before
Congress long, columns of advertise
ments have appeared in the Washing
ton newspapers.
MY opinion Is that these adver-
tlsements are largely for apartments
to be rented for summer months and
not for permanent residence" she
said, and appealed for confirmation to
Jack Bowie, a real estate man, who
was present. ... -
Mrs. Taylor explained that seven
months ago she called up about twenty
five apartments advertised for rent and
received the answer that each had Just
been rented. She looked upon this. she
SAID. as part of campaign without
the knowledge of the newspapers, and
thought the propaganda. in part at
least. was directed from Boston.
Renltor Denies Charge. g..
George r. Linkins. real estate man.
denied emphatically that there is any
esfate eTgaaized msn propaganda BY the real
Il am frank to admit that I at
tempted to organize propaganda against
the bill when Senator Ball broke faith
and reintroduced the measure" he said.
but the real estate ment just wouldn't
propagand." He said that two meet
ings of the real estate board were held
but failed to take any such action.
Mr. Linkins told the committee that the
Ball rent act does not work to the
those few engaged in renting property.
John F. NJ Bowie, connected with
the real estate firm of H. L. Rust,
when called to the stand by Represen-
the fight against the proposed legis-
Ation to continue the life of the
Rent Commission for two years, testi-
fed that there is no emergency at
tinuance of the act. He said he had
! heard of a red list" of tenants, who
had appealed to the Rent Commission,
but that in his opinion no such list
exists.
Personal testimony from some ten
ants and letters from others were
read.
The committee is not meeting today,
but the hearings will be concluded to-
morrow. The committee has agreed
TO go intof executive session on Mon
day to redraft the bill, with a repre-
sentative of the legislative drafting
service present and also those who
have amendments to offer.
Petty Issues Statement.
After the hearing yesterday John