Bloomington, IL Rental Inspections: Tenant Complaint Process (2026)

The City of Bloomington's rental inspection program, added to the Property Maintenance Code at Bloomington City Code § 45-201 (Section 900), does not wait for a building's turn in the rotation if tenants are complaining. Section 900.2(f) defines the Rental Inspection Pool, the group of buildings subject to periodic, systematic inspection, and one category that lands a building in that pool is being the subject of substantiated complaints involving a life, health, or safety code violation that threatens tenants or the public, or numerous less serious property maintenance complaints. A single unsubstantiated gripe does not do it; the complaint has to be substantiated, meaning the City investigated and found the condition real.

Section 900.4 backs this up procedurally: buildings in the pool are inspected on a rotating basis, oldest-uninspected-first, but the Director of Economic & Community Development can certify a building for an earlier inspection than its place in line, based on the number or seriousness of code complaints the City has received about it, when that is necessary to protect life, health, or safety. Section 900.4(c) also makes clear the rental inspection program does not replace ordinary complaint response: the Department of Economic & Community Development can still respond to a property maintenance complaint about a specific unit or building at any time, independent of where that building sits in the rental inspection rotation. A tenant does not have to wait for an annual inspection cycle to get a hazardous condition looked at.