New Jersey bed bug legislation was released by the Assembly Housing and Local Government Committee. The legislation is designed to provide additional tools for tenants and landlords to deal with bed bug infestations. The State Senate has not dealt with the bill.

A major aspect of the bill places responsibility on building owners to maintain dwellings that are free of bed bugs and they have to pay for bed bug pest control treatments. Hmmm! not an easy task. If a bed bug infestation occurs treatments can be expensive. Landlords will be fined if they don’t pay for treatments.

If this bed bug legislation becomes law it could be very costly for landlords. Typically, bed bugs don’t arrive at apartment buildings because they were invited by landlords. They arrive accidentally and in some cases because tenants were not responsible and brought in used mattresses or furniture infested with bed bugs. However, you also have tenets that have bed bugs because they crawled in from a neighbor’s apartment unit. Morally, who should pay for all these bed bug infestations? Not an easy question to answer.