CITIES: Prepare for baseless suits

After conning the Coeur d’Alene City Council into denying protection to their city’s business owners and landlords, Tony Stewart is targeting surrounding communities with his campaign to take civil rights from some in order to accommodate the abhorrent behavior of others.

Unfortunately, Coeur d’Alene’s council members approached this issue with a narrow minded and shortsighted stance. I hope the cities Mr. Stewart plans to target next will take into consideration the door that the Coeur d’Alene City Council opened for erroneous lawsuits. I will clarify.

When one of my tenants in another state filed a meritless lawsuit against me, I was burdened with the cost and inconvenience of defending myself unnecessarily. Although I rightly won the case, I will not completely recover my losses.

I can see the lawsuits filing into the court clerk’s office now from the gay community. Whenever a landlord denies occupancy to one of them for a valid credit reason for example, they will be screaming discrimination. They will claim the denial was based on their sexual orientation. Even though the gay individual does not prove their charge against the landlord. The property owner will have been put through much undo distress and expense to establish their innocence. The more protected class statuses that are established, the greater chances of fraudulent lawsuits.

I am in the market to purchase more rental property, but I will not consider the city of Coeur d’Alene. With this decision I hope to eliminate the chance of being the target of a baseless lawsuit by a gay individual.

D.R. ROSE

Athol