|
CES IN THE NEWS
Battle to Save
Rent Control
Heats Up!
| Los Angeles Business Journal Article
|
Monday, October 11, 2010
Floor at Center of Rent Dispute
Landlords, Tenants Feud Over Rate Hikes
By Natalie Jarvey
Now that the 31-year-old ordinance on rent-controlled apartments is being updated, a battle has broken out between landlords and tenant groups over how the city of Los Angeles should legislate rent increases.
 At the forefront of the debate are changes to the Rent Stabilization Ordinance's annual rent adjustment. Tenant groups say a proposal that could lower the amount of rent increases doesn't go far enough to help rent-burdened tenants. But landlords say that lowering rent increases will only make it harder for them to get enough money to cover the cost of maintaining apartments.
"It would make it difficult for owners," said Ryan Minniear, executive director of the California Apartment Association of Los Angeles.
Rent control is an important issue because so many apartments - 630,000, which were built before 1978 - are covered by the ordinance. Currently, landlords at rent-controlled apartments can raise the rent each year between 3 percent and 8 percent, tied to the Consumer Price Index.
That means landlords are still allowed a 3 percent hike even if the CPI falls below 3 percent, and that's become a point of contention. When the ordinance was passed in 1979, inflation as measured by the CPI was high; but the CPI has been below 3 percent for six of the last nine years.
The proposed changes would lower the floor of rent increases to 2 percent and increase the ceiling to 9 percent if the CPI rises to that level or above.
Anna Ortega, director of rent stabilization for L.A.'s Housing Department, said widening the range of the annual rent adjustment is meant to benefit both landlords and tenants.
But landlords aren't happy with it. Because landlords lease most rent-controlled apartments at below market rates, they argue that they already have trouble keeping up with maintenance needs.
But tenant groups are dissatisfied with the notion of a lower floor as well. They want it eliminated.
"When the CPI is below the floor, tenants are still being hit with rent increases." said Larry Gross, executive director of the Coalition for Economic Survival, a non-profit that advocates for low-income tenants. "We're looking at a situation where tenants  who are severely rent burdened would be hit with another rent increase."
The notion of eliminating the floor upsets apartment owners. They say that would leave them struggling to make basic repairs to residences.
"There's a cost to maintain a building," said David Eitches, a broker with Charles Dunn who also owns buildings in the Koreatown and Mid-Wilshire areas. "Those costs are increasing. Rents shouldn't be going down when landlords' costs are going up."
Another hot-button change to the ordinance would allow landlords to pass on to tenants any increases in rates for electricity, gas, water, sewer and trash, instead of charging the current flat rate.
Other proposed changes are designed to restructure the programs that give some financial payback to landlords who make capital improvements and structural renovations.
Minniear said it's not enough.
"Owners have felt that for the last 30 years, this program has been tough on them," he said. "The proposal is heading in the right direction, but we didn't see any benchmarks or time lines about how they're going to go about it."
He added that changes to the rent-control ordinance affect not only apartment owners, but jobs for 15,000 people such as maintenance workers, plumbers and electricians who work on apartment buildings. If landlords can't make enough money, they can't plan improvements on their buildings and those contractors won't get as much work.
Moving forward
The proposed changes to the ordinance come as the result of a study released last year by the non-profit Economic Roundtable. The study reported that 58 percent of L.A. renters are "rent burdened," or pay more than 30 percent of their income on rent; the number of renters in that category has increased this year to 59 percent.
As a result, Councilman Richard Alarcon in April proposed a one-year freeze on rent increases to give tenants a respite while the Housing Department prepared options for changes based on the study's findings. But the freeze was shot down by the City Council. Despite that, the department proceeded to prepare proposals for changing the ordinance.
The Housing Department released its proposed changes Sept. 17, and the Housing, Community and Economic Development Committee heard more than two hours of public comment on the proposal two weeks ago. At a committee meeting Oct. 6, the panel took no action and announced it would take up the matter again in November.
Alarcon, one of three council members on the housing panel, said he wants to amend the proposed changes to eliminate the rent adjustment floor to further reduce tenants' rent burden. He also wants to find more ways to help landlords finance renovation projects.
"I really believe the best answer is to provide additional resources to the industry to  reduce the stress on both parties," he said.
Despite Alarcon's efforts to satisfy both apartment owners and tenants, changes to the ordinance are expect to spur further debate between the two sides. A number of apartment owners and related employee groups have protested the proposed changes, forming the Los Angeles Housing Council. After the Housing Department released its proposal, the Housing Council ran a series of advertisements publicizing the proposals and its opposition to them.
Minniear said the ads, which read "Stop radical tenant groups," refer to those groups that want to eliminate the floor completely.
"We feel these groups are going to the extreme and harming small business owners," he said. "Eliminating the floor prevents them from increasing rents and making investments on their properties."
Not all apartment owners are concerned with the changes. Eitches said the 1 percent decrease in the floor won't hurt his business.
"These are little micro things that don't really matter in the big picture," he said. "People just like to complain."
But the Coalition for Economic Survival's Gross said the ordinance, even if modified, will split tenants and landlords.
"It's one of those issues where there's no middle ground," he said. |
CES & Other Tenants Groups Turn-Out
to City Council Rent Control Hearing  | Council Puts Off Action
on Rent Control Proposal
The City Council Housing, Community &
Economic Development (HCED) Committee, on October 6, decided more work was needed on proposal to amend the city's rent control law and voted to delay any further action for 45 days to enable time to come up with new ideas. This came after 3 1/2 hours of public testimony from tenant and landlord groups the week before on September 29.
The HCED Committee hearing on the new rent control proposals could result in major rent hikes to tenants. Please attend this hearing to help SAVE RENT CONTROL!
LA Tenants Are Paying Too Much for Rent
A $1 million City-sponsored "Economic Study of the Rent Stabilization
Ordinance and the Los Angeles Housing Market" (RSO Study) was released in June 2009. The study's findings showed tenants are paying too much for rent in LA even with rent control:
� 58% of LA tenants are rent burdened,
which means they pay more than 30% of their income to rent, with 31%
being severely rent burdened, paying more than 50% of their income to
rent.
� 56% of those with annual incomes of $35,000 or less are
severely rent burdened,  paying 50% of their income to rent.
� 27% of RSO tenants received illegal rent increases.
A Key recommendation of the study was the elimination of the 3% "floor" on rental increases allowed by the RSO based on the Consumer Price.
Last May, the City Council shockingly voted down a proposal by Council Member Richard Alacon to freeze rents until the study recommendations are discussed and adopted. As a result of the rent freeze rejection, even though the current CPI rate for
2010 was -.62 %, renters were unjustly hit with another 3% annual rent increase (with an additonal 1-2% increase for master metered builidngs, effective July 1, 2010.
New Proposals Will Result in Higher Rents for Tenants
The new proposals before the LA City Council ignores the study findings and are heavily weighed towards providing concessions to landlords at tenants' expense. If these proposals pass it will increase the rent burden to tenants, force tenants from their homes, increase homelessness and result in the loss of affordable housing.
The City Council has a clear choice of protecting the lives of LA tenants or siding with increasing landlords' excessive profits and greed.
The proposals does the following:
- Fails to Eliminates the Rent Increase Floors (It only lowers it from 3% to 2%)
- Increases the Rent Increase Cap to 9%
- Adds an Additional Rent Utility Surcharge Increase for tenants
- Does Eliminate the 1-2% Utility Rent Increase for Master Metered Units & Replaces it With the lower utility surcharge
- Increases rent increase cap amounts for renovations and capital improvement pass thoughs and extends the time tenants will have to pay these increases.
- Removes the limits on the allowed number of applications for Primary Renovation applications a landlord can file.
- Increases the yearly rent registration fees for tenants
- Allows for new luxury unit exemptions removing rent control protections for tenants living in these units. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
