Council to Consider Changes to Rent Control Rules

By Jonathan Friedman

Lookout Staff

June 8, 2010 — Santa Monica residents could have an opportunity to vote on enhanced tenant protection laws in the November election. The City Council on Tuesday will consider placing modifications to the City’s rent control law on the ballot.

The modifications were endorsed by a majority of the Rent Control Board and are opposed by Santa Monica’s longtime opponent on rent control issues as well as the Rent Control Board’s lone landlord.

The proposed changes include a warning period for tenants to correct violations before being evicted, protection for seniors and terminally ill tenants from being evicted for owner occupancy, extension of what is known as just cause protection (which prevents tenants from being thrown out for certain violations without a warning) to tenants without rent control and for increased relocation benefits for tenants who are forced to move due to owner occupancy as well as extending the right to these benefits to tenants from apartments with three units or fewer.

This proposal was initially introduced by Rent Control Board Commissioner Jennifer Kennedy at a meeting last month as a method “to improve community stability and add an additional layer of protections for rent-controlled tenants and all tenants, which would incrementally, but significantly enhance the already excellent existing fabric of tenant protections.”

At the time, she said she did not know what it would take to put the items into effect, but asked that the recommendations be presented to the City Council. She received the support of three of her colleagues.

Commissioner Robert Kronovet, a landlord who has been a thorn in the side of many rent control advocates since 2008 when he became the first person to win a seat on the board without the endorsement of Santa Monicans for Renters’ Rights, opposed the modifications.

“Strengthening private property rights will also lead to community stability,” he said. “So I’m not sure that this social agenda of weakening private property rights creates stronger community stability as Commissioner Kennedy believes.”

The modifications are also opposed by the Action Apartment Association, a landlord group that has had several battles with the City over rent control laws. Rosario Perry, the group’s attorney, said the they are flawed from the start because the process to put them before the council was flawed.

The Rent Control Roard’s proposal has been presented as a staff report and not a formal measure. He said this is not legal, because the City Charter specifically makes the Rent Control Board a separate entity outside the City Council’s authority. Therefore, Rent Control Board com

via Council to Consider Changes to Rent Control Rules.