Non-Smoking Enforcement

I recently took over a portfolio of properties at a new company as manager. All of the buildings are non smoking but one of them has complaints every week that seem to indicate multiple apartments are violating this at the same time. We send out emails and post signs. Most recently, we even said during the next round of filter changes if we found evidence of smoking, their lease would not be renewed and they would be fined $500. One particularly vocal resident told me that the previous manager searched all the apartments on the floor any time there was a complaint to find out who it was. That seems like a privacy violation to me for the people who aren't actually smoking and I'm not comfortable with that. But I still struggle with how to prove who's to blame.

What have you done to prove someone is smoking when you can't narrow down the source(s) of the complaints?

This is an issue we struggle with as well. We use regular maintenance visits and inspection times to really take a look in the units to see if there are indications of smoking violations. If we find signs of smoking in the unit the resident will get a lease violation. These are reviewed and considered at lease renewal time.

We also have the same policy, and also struggle to catch the offenders. Its written in our lease that we fine $500 as well. Our residents are advised to call either our office during the day, or our after hours team during nights/weekends. The team members in the office or on call are to respond to the site within 10 minutes to sniff/scout for our violator. As far as after hours, we can only do it when one particular team member is on call. The other guy lives off sites and would never get here before the majority of the smell dissipates. When we get to the door where we think it is coming from, we knock but the problem is that we don't enter unless they answer the door. I would be excited to hear any other processes that work!

Isn't it amazing that, in addition to our other roles, we end up being the pet police, the pot patrol and the cigarette detectives!

That said, I understand people don't want second hand cigarette smoke (or other smells) in their homes.

One suggestion we are trying is to have several "pleasant" designated smoking areas in the community so people will be slightly less likely to smoke where they aren't supposed to. This includes some covered areas for inclement weather days. It's not a total fix, but at least people who want to obey the rules have somewhere to go!