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# Landlords look for rent control ‘abuses’ Notices landing in tenants’ mailboxes
- URL: https://www.smdp.com/landlords-look-for-rent-control-abuses-notices-landing-in-tenants-mailboxes/
- Published: 2003-04-14T15:00:00.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-23T02:04:21.000Z
- Author: John Wood
- Tags: Real Estate & Housing, Santa Monica, #archive-import

*Local residents targeted by new rent control law*

Landlords are on the look-out for tenants who they say are misusing their rent-controlled apartments.

Renters who use their units as offices, storage or vacation homes are being served with notices indicating that their days of paying low rent could be over.

A law that went into effect last month allows property owners to raise the rent on apartments that aren’t used as primary residences.

Since March, notices have been showing up in doorways and in mailboxes across the city. So far, a dozen petitions have been filed with the Santa Monica Rent Control Board.

“We’re still pretty early in the game,” said Doris Genga, an attorney for the rent control board. “But we’ve heard that the landlords at the Shores and Pacific Plaza are going to file a whole bunch (of petitions). We do anticipate heav-ier filings.”

After landlords issue notices to tenants whose residency they wish to challenge, they must file a petition with the rent control board. Once the board reviews the petition, board members give tenants an opportunity to respond. If the renter challenges the landlord, a hearing is set.

Some residents already have been hit by the first wave of notices.

Tenants at the Shores, located on Santa Monica Beach near Hill Street, gathered earlier this month to discuss how they can protect themselves.

“They sent (a notice) to us through the mail,” said Seymour Waterman, 85, a 23-year resident of the Santa Monica Shores who pays $1,180 a month for his two-bedroom apartment. “I’m not sure what we’re going to do.”

Waterman said he and his wife, Evelyn, spend three to four days a week at the Shores. They own a home in Encino, but had planned to sell it and retire at the Shores. Now, they’re not sure if they’ll be able to afford it.

“You know, people have a right to raise rent,” Waterman said. “But if you do have rent control, I would think they’d have to stick by it.

> “You know, people have a right to raise rent. But if you do have rent control. I would think they’d have to stick by it. These guys are trying to throw me out” — - SEYMOUR WATERMAN Shores resident

“These guys are trying to throw me out,” he added. Representatives from Douglas Emmett & Co., the company that owns the Shores, couldn’t be reached for comment.

The Shores’ two 17-story apartment buildings house 532 one-and two-bedroom units. The lowest rent currently being paid for a one-bedroom is $641 and there are dozens of other one-bedroom apartments in the $600 to $900 range, according to city documents. The highest rent currently for a one-bedroom apartment at the Shores is $3,419.

Under the law, landlords are permitted to raise the rent to market value if the apartments aren’t used as the renter’s “residence of return.” The law doesn’t a require a specific amount of time a renter must spend in an apartment to deem it a primary residence.

There are about 30,000 rent-controlled units in Santa Monica. Between 10 to 15 percent of the units could be effected by the law, officials said.

Douglas Emmett & Co. may be targeting as many as 100 units at the Shores, officials estimate. Andrew Zanger, a renters’ rights attorney, said landlords are filing the petitions in phases to avoid overburdening the rent control board. Since the law passed, there have been 15 working days that landlords could have filed petitions. Twelve petitions are set to go before the board.

“There’s been a ground swell of fear over what’s going to happen,” said Zanger, adding he has been contacted by many concerned renters. “Some are scared, some are angry.”

Mary Ann Yurkonis, an administrator for the rent control board, said the new law was passed under pressure from law makers in Sacramento that a tougher law could be enacted.

Landlord groups were lobbying for a similar law but with some major differences, Zanger said. The landlord-sponsored law sponsored put the burden of proof on the tenant that they live in their apartments full time.

Zanger said the proposed law also required the unit be a “primary residence” and not the “residence of return.” It also didn’t include an appeal process, as the current law does.

Residents are concerned over what they call “big brother” aspects of the new law, saying it encourages landlords to intrude on their private lives.

They worry that landlords will watch their every move, and track their property, voting, tax and vehicle records.

Residents are concerned their landlords will conduct random apartment checks and monitor their visits through electronic key cards and gate controls.

*Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on April 14, 2003.* [Read the original PDF.](https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/smdp%5Fbackissues/041403.pdf?ref=smdp.com)