According to village statistics, only about half of rental buildings and units in Riverside comply with the village’s building code five years after the start of its rental registration program.
At the village board’s meeting on Feb. 5, Community Development Director Anne Cyran shared stats on the program’s progress from 2025. Of the village’s 57 rental buildings, 30 are fully compliant with village code, Cyran said. In terms of discrete rental units, 224 of Riverside’s 485 apartments are compliant, about 46%.
Those figures represent a marked improvement from 2024, when just 15 buildings and 174 units were compliant, Cyran said. She said village staffers completed 411 inspections in 2024 and only 288 in 2025, but Riverside still earned more revenue from fees last year than the year before, from $14,836 in 2024 to $17,215 in 2025.
“Inspection fees increased last year due to improvements in inspection tracking and invoicing despite the reduced number of inspections,” Cyran told village trustees. “We don’t anticipate inspection fees increasing in future years. We anticipate we’ll remain consistent with the number of inspections we conduct.”
Despite the reduced number of inspections, Cyran said staff issued 15 citations in 2025, up from nine in 2024.
According to Riverside’s rental registration webpage, the program costs rental property owners $15 to register each building with three or more units every year. Self-certified inspections cost $15 while village inspections and re-inspections cost $55 for one unit or $100 for the building, which includes the exterior and common areas.
According to village documents, building inspections are required every year. Each individual unit must be inspected every three years, meaning about one-third of units are inspected each year.
Cyran said her department’s goal for 2026 and 2027 is to increase the number of compliant buildings and units each to 60%. That means four more buildings, for a total of 34, and 67 more units, for a total of 291, must comply.
Cyran said the buildings that remain non-compliant tend to need more investment from their owners to meet the village’s standards “due to deferred maintenance.”
“These are the folks who we’ve been out to the property a few times, and we’ve had the same comments. We’re getting to the point where we’re going to need to start issuing citations when we’ve reached the end of our term of voluntary compliance,” she said. “We always strive for voluntary compliance; however, if someone doesn’t comply, we do need to issue citations. That is not a hugely involved process, but it does require more staff time to go through adjudication.”
Village President Doug Pollock lauded Cyran and her staff for their work in bringing more rental buildings and units into compliance.
“This program is geared to ensure safe housing for all Riverside residents,” he said.
