Connecticut senators approved the Golden Girls bill on Wednesday in a bipartisan vote, sending to the state House a measure that would let homeowners rent up to three bedrooms in their single-family homes without asking local government for permission.
The bill would make bedroom rentals legal statewide, even though some towns already allow them, while still requiring homes to meet local fire and safety codes. The homeowner would have to be a permanent resident of the house, a condition backers say is meant to keep the arrangement tied to empty nesters or older residents looking for a way to use space they already have.
State Sen. Rob Sampson voted for the measure and framed it as a version of the 1980s sitcom that gave the bill its name. He said the idea was to recreate, in state law, the sort of setup seen in the 40-year-old show, where unrelated women lived together without running afoul of local rules. Sampson also said the bill would shift control away from planning and zoning departments and toward the property owner.
State Sen. Ceci Maher also backed the bill, drawing on her own experience after both of her husbands died. Maher said she lived with a friend in her home for several months and described the arrangement as a gift in daily life, giving her someone to have coffee with in the morning and to discuss television programs with. She said that social value, along with the housing benefit, made the proposal worthwhile.
The friction in the debate is simple: Connecticut is trying to ease a housing shortage with a rule that would open more rooms in existing homes, but it is doing so only under a statewide framework that still leaves safety codes in place and requires the homeowner to stay on site. The bill now moves to the state House of Representatives, where lawmakers will decide whether the Golden Girls name becomes a housing rule as well as a nod to an old sitcom.
