http://www.tenantstogether.org/article.php?id=1436
By Jessica Bernstein-Wax, Mercury News
June 2nd, 2010
At 22 years old, East Palo Alto’s rent control law is no spring chicken — and city leaders, community groups and others are hoping voters will opt to strengthen and modernize it at the ballot box Tuesday.
Many blame the existing rent stabilization ordinance’s vagueness and inconsistency with state law for a string of legal disputes over the past couple of years between the city and Page Mill Properties, which was the city’s largest landlord until it defaulted on a loan to Wells Fargo Bank and lost its 101 East Palo Alto buildings to foreclosure earlier this year.
East Palo Alto and Wells Fargo are on the verge of signing a settlement agreement that would put to rest nine existing lawsuits over rent hikes and other issues, City Attorney Vince Ewing said Wednesday.
“The point of drafting (the ordinance) again was based in large part on the challenges we had encountered to the ordinance by Page Mill,” Ewing said. “Prior to them, it had been around for years and nobody had really challenged it.”
Ewing described the new ordinance, Measure H, as “less vulnerable to attack.”
“Although an aggressive litigant can always challenge an ordinance at any time,” Ewing noted. Page Mill blocked the city’s previous attempt to put a new rent control law before voters last year by arguing in court that East Palo Alto failed to look into potential environmental impacts.
The company declined to comment through a spokesman Wednesday.
If approved by a majority of voters Tuesday, the new ordinance would limit annual rent increases to 80 percent of the Consumer Price Index, exempt only owner-occupied duplexes and triplexes from rent control rather than all buildings with four or fewer units, and strengthen a just cause for eviction section. It would also incorporate state law allowing landlords to set rent for protected units at market rates when an existing tenant moves out. However, rent control would kick in again for new tenants once a base rent was established.
East Palo Alto Vice Mayor Carlos Romero has been volunteering with the People for Fair Rent and Affordable Homes Steering Committee to campaign for the ordinance and said a group of 40 to 50 volunteers went door to door, sent out a mailer to absentee voters and distributed 8,000 fliers.
“This campaign is ours to lose just based on the publicity that Page Mill has brought to the whole issue of rent control, based on one year of outreach and intervention and the whole process,” Romero said. “It’s a question of just making sure people get to the polls.”
Romero said Measure H would make it easier for the city council to select quality candidates for the rent board by eliminating the landlord, tenant and other categories, and simplify the process by which landlords can petition for individual rent adjustments, among other advances.
“Bringing the law into sync with the state law was paramount, and we’ve done that,” he added.
Should voters approve the ordinance Tuesday, it will take about a month for the new law to go into effect, Romero said. The rent board, city staff and a consultant will then need to spend a couple of months developing regulations for its implementation, he said.
The ordinance has no organized opposition, and Romero said city officials haven’t seen any informal protests either.
“The opposition that we had last time was from Page Mill Properties,” Romero said. “They’re pretty much out of the picture.”
FAIR USE NOTICE. This document may contain copyrighted material the use of which may not have been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. Tenants Together is making this article available on our website in an effort to advance the understanding of tenant rights issues in California. We believe that this constitutes a ‘fair use’ of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the U.S. Copyright Law. If you wish to use this copyrighted material for purposes of your own that go beyond ‘fair use,’ you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.
AROUND CALIFORNIA - NEWS FOR OWNERS OF MOBILE/MANUFACTURED HOMES 