After spending nearly a year in city committees and recently gaining a strong student following, a proposal to limit city landlords from showing apartments will spend another month on the docket now that Madison’s City Council has voted sit on the ordinance until October.

The proposal, which Ald. Bridget Maniaci, District 2, proposed and vouched for during almost development and deliberation, would have limited all city property owners from showing apartment units for 45 percent of the year, or some time in late January for a typical lease that a University of Wisconsin student would sign.

Associated Students of Madison Vice Chair Adam Johnson referred to emails he had received in his WiscMail inbox as early as September 29 his freshman year encouraging him to rent from major landlords including Madison Property Management.

Johnson said the emails and other advertising tactics landlords used have affected his decision to move quickly into a lease his sophomore year, a decision he said he regrets.

Johnson also proposed a sunset clause for the legislation to come up for renewal in three years if campus culture changes in the future.

“It’s a blunt instrument for something that needs a finer answer, but it’s better than what we have,” Johnson said. “You [can] get a message into a freshman’s head that kind of sticks with them, and the campus is refreshed every four years.”

ASM Legislative Affairs Chairman Sam Polstein told The Badger Herald he understood objections to the current draft of the ordinance and said he plans to work with Maniaci and other campus-area alders such as Ald. Shiva Bidar-Sielaff, District 5, to enhance the proposal for the October meeting.

Area developer and housing committee member Curt Brink told the council the proposal would give University Housing an unfair advantage in its competition with campus-area property owners.

“This is unfair competition to every apartment owner in town that is paying the tax dollars,” Brink said. “[Students] can’t even look at an apartment before they make a contract decision with the university.”

Maniaci said students have shaped downtown Madison and added she felt frustrated with the prominence of large firms throughout the process. She also said the problems with lease signing were a result of council policy which has encouraged large student-related development in the downtown and campus area.

“I want people to have a positive experience living in Madison,” Maniaci said. “It frequently is a very frustrating experience.”

The city’s housing committee defeated the ordinance earlier this month, prompting a reaction among UW students and Associated Students of Madison representatives who previously did not attend committee meetings.

This May, ASM organized a group of students and members to testify in favor of the ordinance at a housing committee meeting which failed to meet quorum. When the proposal came to the committee earlier this month, the committee made quorum, but no students testified in favor of the ordinance.

Even if the proposal passes the October meeting, legal conflicts with state statute could prevent the ordinance from moving forward. Nancy Jensen from the Apartment Association of South Central Wisconsin said landlords may pursue legal action if the current ordinance passes.

“We’re putting you on notice in terms of where this will go legally,” Jensen said.