• Home
  • About Off The Grid
  • Advertise
  • Contact Us
Monday, May 12, 2025
  • How-To
  • Grid Threats
  • Survival
  • Gardening
  • Food
  • Worldview
  • Health
  • Privacy
  • Hunting
  • Defense
  • Financial
  • News
  • Misc
No Result
View All Result
  • How-To
  • Grid Threats
  • Survival
  • Gardening
  • Food
  • Worldview
  • Health
  • Privacy
  • Hunting
  • Defense
  • Financial
  • News
  • Misc
No Result
View All Result
Off The Grid News
Home Current Events

Town Bans Homeowners From Renting Their Property

by John Evans
in Current Events
Print Print
minnesota restriction on houses for rent
Share on FacebookShare on XShare on TruthEmail Article

minnesota restriction on houses for rentProperty owners in Minnesota are challenging a first-of-its-kind ordinance restricting rental properties in the city of Winona.

The city, which is home to Winona State University, passed the ordinance in 2006 capping the number of rental properties on any block at 30 percent of the block’s total homes, according to Watchdog Minnesota. The law was meant to curb “excessive on-street parking, anti-social behavior and deteriorating housing conditions.”

But some believe it’s going too far.

“To me it’s getting beyond what elected officials are supposed to do — starting to dictate who can rent, who can’t rent, who can do this, who can do that,” Ted Dzierzbicki, one of the three plaintiffs in a legal challenge against the law, told Watchdog. ”They’re not the kind of laws that benefit and protect people. It’s more to do with somebody having a bug about something and trying to get a law towards it.”

Property owners with rental units were grandfathered in under the ordinance, which means the number of houses that can be rented varies per block. The Institute for Justice says it’s the first ordinance of its kind in the nation.

“Our argument is you cannot be denied your right to rent out your perfectly safe house to perfectly safe tenants just because a neighbor of yours has decided to do the same thing,” said Anthony Sanders, an attorney with the Institute for Justice who represented the homeowners.  “Otherwise the government is just picking and choosing who gets to exercise their property rights.”

They pledged their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor so that we could be free!

The city argues the case is about whether it can lay down licensing standards to better the community, and in April, a Winona district court upheld the ordinance.

“There is no indication that the 30% Rule was enacted or conceived as an insidious means of keeping certain constitutionally protected classes of people out of certain neighborhoods or any other improper purpose,” Winona County District Court Judge Jeffrey Thompson wrote in the ruling. “It is a good faith attempt to address real problems.”

The property owners have appealed, but it doesn’t help people like Ted and Lauren Dzierzbicki, who pay an $800 monthly mortgage on an empty house they can no longer legally rent.

“Everybody has to look at these types of laws and realize at some point in time it’s going to affect them,” Ted Dzierzbicki told Watchdog. “Some of these people that live close to the university that were behind this concept of trying to protect their neighborhood, when they pass on, what are their kids going to do with their house?  How are they going to get rid of their house?”

Ethan Dean, a former U.S. adviser in Iraq, had bought a house in Winona in 2007 to start a non-profit recovery home for returning soldiers, according to Watchdog. During his deployments, he would rent out the house to help his mortgage payments. That was until the city sent him a letter informing him he was running afoul of the ordinance.

“I am currently on my fourth mission in Iraq,” Dean wrote from his post in an email to a reporter, according to Watchdog. “It kills me to defend our freedoms, when my own home is subject to some 1944 Berlin Nazi BS…I don’t care what the city says, THEY do NOT own MY house…why the he** do I need THEIR permission?????”

According to Watchdog, the League of Minnesota Cities filed a brief supporting Winona, saying in its filing that the court’s decision will have a “significant” impact on cities that already have similar ordinances or are considering them. The filing also states that cities in Minnesota “have a public interest in ensuring the city councils’ legislative decisions receive the constitutionally required deference on appeal.”

Sanders said that hundreds of homeowners across the state are being faced with situations like the Dzierzbickis in cities with similar laws.

“They are unconstitutionally being denied the right to exercise their property rights,” he told Watchdog.

Sign up for Off The Grid News’ weekly email and stay informed about the issues important to you

ShareTweetShareSend

Related Posts

Doomsday Dominoes: What Happens When Nukes Are Launched In India Or Pakistan

Doomsday Dominoes: What Happens When Nukes Are Launched In India Or Pakistan

by Bill Heid

Health, Environmental, and Economic Impacts of a Nuclear War Between India and Pakistan The specter of nuclear conflict remains one...

The Long…  Bloody History of India and Pakistan’s Endless Conflict

The Long… Bloody History of India and Pakistan’s Endless Conflict

by Bill Heid

A Nation Born in Bloodshed The roots of the ongoing hostility between India and Pakistan officially stretch back to 1947,...

Urgent: The Top 25 Drugs and Made-In-China Medicines Set To Explode In Price Or Disappear Completely

Urgent: The Top 25 Drugs and Made-In-China Medicines Set To Explode In Price Or Disappear Completely

by Bill Heid

How Tariffs on China-Made Drugs Could Hit Your Medicine Cabinet and Wallet Most Americans are unaware that a staggering percentage...

Next Post
ground your own flour

The Best Mills For Grinding Flour In Your Own Kitchen

Please login to join discussion

YOU MAY ALSO LIKE

The Simple, Traditional, Off-Grid Way To Ferment Vegetables

The Simple, Traditional, Off-Grid Way To Ferment Vegetables

Dairy Cows Winter

4 Tips To Remember When Feeding Dairy Cows This Winter

Record Number Of Robots Replaced Humans In 2018

Record Number Of Robots Replaced Humans In 2018

TRENDING STORIES

  • bubonic plague

    Is Another Bubonic Plague Pandemic On The Horizon?

    0 shares
    Share 0 Tweet 0
  • Waco Fertilizer Plant Explosion & A Look Back On The “Waco Massacre”

    0 shares
    Share 0 Tweet 0
  • Make Yourself 3 Times More Likely To Survive A Heart Attack

    0 shares
    Share 0 Tweet 0
  • AI Surveillance Of Shoppers: Walmart’s Newest Tool To Grab Your Data

    0 shares
    Share 0 Tweet 0
  • ‘Apocalyptic’ Microchip Implants Are Here – And Being Inserted Into People’s Hands

    0 shares
    Share 0 Tweet 0

Subscribe to our Insider Newsletter

Huge discounts on off-the-grid gear and life saving supplements.






‘Off The Grid News’ is an independent, weekly email newsletter and website that is crammed full of practical information on living and surviving off the grid. Advice you’ll never hear from the mainstream media.

  • How-To
  • Grid Threats
  • Extreme Survival
  • Survival Gardening
  • Off-Grid Foods
  • Worldview
  • Natural Health
  • Survival Hunting
  • Privacy
  • Financial
  • Current Events
  • Self Defense
  • Home Defense
  • Pain-Free Living
  • Miscellaneous
  • Off Grid Videos

© Copyright 2025 Off The Grid News.  All Rights Reserved.

No Result
View All Result
  • How-To
  • Grid Threats
  • Survival
  • Gardening
  • Food
  • Worldview
  • Health
  • Privacy
  • Hunting
  • Defense
  • Financial
  • News
  • Misc
  • Videos

© Copyright 2025 Off The Grid News.  All Rights Reserved.