A sort of miniature rainbow coalition of about 35 Moorhead residents lined up Tuesday to take a crack at reforming the city’s crime-free multihousing program, a successful and controversial program that gives landlords a copy of prospective renters’ criminal history.

Playing host to the get-together was the Moorhead Human Rights Commission, and the guest of honor was Moorhead Police Chief Grant Weyland. By Weyland’s side was the program administrator, Nancy Taralson, community planning coordinator for the Moorhead Police Department.

The program came under fire last year from the People Escaping Poverty Project, a nonprofit group dedicated to helping low-income and minority groups. It said the background reports give landlords a distorted view of a potential renter’s suitability.

Landlords in the Moorhead program get a report detailing virtually all police contact with the potential renter. That includes not just arrests and convictions, but incidents in which the person called to report a crime, witnessed a crime or was a victim.

By providing information on things like disorderly conduct calls and loud party complaints, the report helps landlords choose reliable tenants, Weyland said.

It’s far more useful than criminal background reports that only include convictions, like those used by similar programs in Fargo and West Fargo, he added.

But critics say the reports – which stretch back for 10 years – can unfairly dog residents who have a troubled past.

A woman who was the victim of domestic violence was recently turned down for an apartment because the background report showed numerous police calls to her home, said Lacey Robb, an attorney with Legal Services of Northwest Minnesota. Even though the woman had since left the abusive relationship, the landlord said “where there’s smoke, there’s fire,” and refused to rent to her, Robb said.

Joe Bennett, a landlord at Morningside Apartments, said the first thing he does with the reports is go through them and “cross out the chaff,” meaning incidents in which the person was a witness or victim or was tagged for an unrelated violation like driving without insurance.

He weeds out applicants with long histories of abuse or assault. “The stuff that goes on for year after year after year. Those people are never going to change and I don’t want them around,” he said.

“I use (the background report) as a guide. That’s how I use it and it’s worked very well for me.”

Moorhead suffers from the perception that it’s a difficult place to find housing, said Diane Wray Williams of Moorhead.

“The perception is out there,” she said. “We are an All-American City, but the perception is that we are not an All-American City for everybody. It’s incumbent on us to make this more fair.”

Part of the problem is that Minnesota has a broader open-records law than North Dakota, and police are required to release more information, Weyland said.

But the consent form signed by prospective tenants could easily be worded to release less information, said Melinda Hanson, a Moorhead attorney who formerly worked for Legal Services of Northwest Minnesota.

And it would not be that much more work for the Police Department, Taralson said in an interview.

But the system has worked well for more than five years, Weyland said. “We’re not willing to throw out a program that has helped thousands of people to live peacefully in multihousing.”

Nobody wants to throw out the entire program, but the criminal background checks need reform, Hanson said.

“There’s more to this than just an arrest and a conviction,” Weyland added. “I say it’s important (for landlords) to have the information, then see that it’s interpreted properly.”

Landlords who participate go through an eight-hour training course, covering everything from legal issues to identifying the smell of marijuana, Bennett said.

But Moorhead landlords have no common criteria for accepting tenants, and the city should think about establishing such standards, said Robert Diaz of Moorhead.

After more than two hours of discussion, the commission appointed many of those present to a new committee that will recommend ways to improve the crime-free multihousing program.