DeKALB – Landlords came out in force Wednesday to urge the DeKalb City Council to not license them in an attempt to clean up the city’s rental housing stock.

They were the majority of the participants who spoke at the council’s public hearing on a number of housing ordinances. They criticized the aldermen for, in the words of one landlord, trying to place the “steel hammer” of licensing over their collective heads as a means of enforcement.

At times, the rhetoric got heated. Jim Morel, a landlord and president of the DeKalb Area Rental Association, called licensing a “false prophet,” while landlord Brian Morsch accused Mayor Kris Povlsen of trying to take advantage of the city’s crime problem.