WOODSTOCK – Woodstock Mayor Brian Sager said he will no longer support a mandatory landlord registration program after overwhelming opposition at a meeting Tuesday night.

About 40 people spoke at a nearly four-hour-long public comment session Tuesday at a Woodstock City Council meeting, when the council was set to discuss the proposed landlord registration program, which could have led to a Crime Free Housing initiative. Landlords said the action would have been a costly governmental overreach while city officials entered into discussion on the premise that the program would help nail down landlord contact information, reduce chronic nuisance and benefit tenants and landlords alike.

Public comment went on until almost midnight Tuesday. After its conclusion, Sager said he wouldn’t support the program as proposed.

“Obviously, this is an extremely important issue to you all,” Sager said. “I understand that. … I appreciate where you are all coming from. I appreciate the issues that face the community at large. … I am not, at this stage, going to support an inspection program. I am not at this time going to support mandated crime-free housing. I am not going to bring this forward on an agenda except for a volunteer program during my tenure as mayor.”

Sager’s announcement was met with cheers from the crowd, although some council members said they would like to explore the idea of crime-free housing and landlord training on a voluntary basis.

“I am not ready to abandon crime-free housing,” council member Mike Turner said. “I would at least like to monitor it, if it is working in other communities elsewhere and whether landlords would reconsider. … Crime is No. 1 up here. I still have the desire to understand whether there is potential there.”

Part of the push for landlord registration stemmed from a 2013 discussion with Woodstock tenants who said they felt helpless in the face of an unresponsive landlord, according to city documents.

Former City Council member Joe Starzynski brought that point forward Tuesday night after the mayor’s statement.

“Why do we have police out there?” he said. “Because a small amount of people out there want to break the law. There is also a small amount of landlords that don’t want to treat their tenants well. What can the government do for them?”

Starzynski added that tenants can face financial burden while trying to get out of a bad rental situation, because of security deposits and the cost of moving.

“That is not financially possible for them to just walk away,” he said.

It was unclear whether the matter of voluntary registration, crime-free housing or landlord training will be discussed at a date anytime soon.

“It depends on – quite frankly – how much I am willing to put on an agenda,” Sager said.