Victory Alert: Pasadena Reconsiders Attack on ALL No-Fault Evictions
Victory Alert
Pasadena Reconsiders Attack on ALL No-Fault Evictions
By Janet M. Gagnon
Chief Corporate Affairs Officer & SVP, Government Relations
On May 8th, the Pasadena Rental Housing Board (“Board”), which is composed of 13 renters and only 2 property owners, walked back a draft ordinance that would have eviscerated ALL No-Fault evictions under state law. No-Fault evictions include substantial remodel, government order, demolition and owner move-in as well as permanent removal from the rental market under the Ellis Act. We urge all Pasadena rental housing providers to attend the May 15th meeting to voice their strong opposition and to send emails NOW to the City Council and Board!
AAGLA successfully defeated this ill-conceived, draft ordinance by clearly and zealously arguing that extreme harm would result to renters and rental housing owners alike by preventing property owners from promptly making needed major system repairs (a/k/a, substantial remodels) and complying with government orders for similar repairs and/or hazardous material removal once identified. AAGLA further advocated for multifamily owners to be able to move into a single unit during times of financial distress rather than being forced to sell the entire property (a/k/a, owner move-in).
The grossly overbroad nature of the draft ordinance shows that the Board and its supporting city staff are clearly out of hand when developing new rental housing policies. This is precisely why the City Council must step in to moderate such extremely overbroad and harmful Board actions, especially now that the Board is being funded with taxpayer money to pay full-time City employees, including senior level managers, to staff the Board. This draft ordinance should never have been written, much less discussed by the Board.
In fact, the Board had instructed staff at a prior meeting to do a thorough analysis of any other local jurisdictions with a similar ordinance that delays No-Fault evictions during the school year. However, the staff failed to bring such an analysis back and instead only brought a deeply flawed draft ordinance assuming that it would easily pass such an extremely lopsided Board. Fortunately, AAGLA reached out to the full City Council that seems to have made the Board think twice before exposing the city to litigation based on this extreme overreach.
The only other city in the Southland to have such an ordinance to further delay evictions is Santa Monica. Even their ordinance is not as extreme as Pasadena’s draft ordinance. Further, the Board is now considering making the ordinance even more egregious and beyond their scope by extending it to children attending school OUTSIDE OF PASADENA and employees and independent contractors working AT SCHOOLS OUTSIDE OF PASADENA. Clearly, the Board has no respect whatsoever for jurisdictional boundaries.
We urge our members with rental properties in Pasadena to immediately email the full City Council and the Board urging them to substantially modify the existing draft as follows:
- Limit this new eviction delay to only demolitions unrelated to health, safety and structural violations and/or removal of the property from the rental market.
- Limit this new eviction delay to only residents with minor children under the age of 18 years old that are going to school IN PASADENA.
- Limit this new eviction delay to only residents that are employees of schools IN PASADENA (not independent contractors that may only visit a school on a single occasion, such as plumbers, electricians, roofers, etc.).
- Limit this new eviction delay to “School Year” defined as Pasadena Unified School District’s school calendar.
We need your voices to achieve these revisions before the ordinance is passed. Now is the time to ACT before it is too late! Contact the City Council and Board today!
This article is for informational purposes only. If you have any questions regarding your property or specific leasing issues and the requirements of any legal changes described herein, please consult with an attorney.