The Suffolk County Legislature passed a bill Tuesday night aimed at cracking down on the growing problem of landlords cheating the system.

Suffolk Legislator Kate Browning (WF-Shirley), who introduced the legislation, says slumlords are converting single-family homes into large dormitories for public assistance recipients. She says some houses have as many as 30 people living in them.

For example, officials say a home on Lee Place in Mastic is rented out as a ?sober house,? but doesn?t offer any program to help recovering alcoholics and addicts. The renters get checks from Suffolk's Department of Social Services, which ends up in the landlord?s pocket.

?The unlicensed, non-certified group/sober homes with no oversight to help those individuals are detrimental to those individuals,? Browning says.

Brookhaven officials say about 12 unrelated individuals are living in the Lee Place home, and eight or nine of them are DSS clients. According to Brookhaven town code, only eight unrelated people are allowed to live in a single-family home.

DSS says it will do the best it can to enforce the bill if it's signed into law