Local political group seeks more teeth in landlord-tenant laws
A Santa Monica group is joining a statewide coalition to push through renters’ rights legislation in an effort to help tenants fight their landlords.
Mayor Mike Feinstein and Mayor Pro Tem Kevin McKeown, leaders in Santa Monicans for Renters Rights, announced this week in front of City Hall that the local political organization will join tenant organizations throughout the state to form “Renters Together.”
“We are re-engaging in the battle to protect Santa Monica’s middle class, the working folks who aren’t income-eligible for subsidized housing but can’t afford condos either,” McKeown said. “This is a cause SMRR has championed for over 20 years, but now we’re joining with allies from across California.”
Besides SMRR, the new renters group will consist of the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, the Green Party of California, labor unions and a handful of community-based tenant and legal aid agencies.
A statewide shortage of rental housing units has allowed landlords to raise rents dramatically, forcing tenants and working families to make difficult choices, SMRR officials say.
“To pay high rents, working families have been forced to make choices no one should have to make,” McKeown said. “They have had to take second and third jobs, take in extended family, friends and even strangers. Many have had to move far from work, and spend more time on the road and less time with each other.”
Rent Control Board member Betty Mueller, SMRR organizers Michael Tarbet and Pam Vavra, and local renter attorney Andrew Zanger, say Santa Monica renters who live in apartments that are rent controlled are harassed by their landlords and are prone to being evicted.
One bill, sponsored by state senator Sheila Kuehl (D-Santa Monica), will expand the 60-day notice for a no-fault eviction and require written notice for a landlord or agent to enter a unit except in emergencies.
Another bill would strengthen the law against evicting tenants for retaliation, allow tenants more time to pay high security deposits, allow some tenants who lose their jobs to use the security deposit for one month’s emergency rent payment, require landlords to pay tenants annually the interest on security deposits, and help tenants get their security deposit returned by requiring a walk-through inspection with a written estimate of deductions before a tenant moves out.
The bill also would shorten the amount of time a landlord has to return a security deposit from three weeks to two weeks, and increase the penalty if a landlord illegally withholds the security deposit.
Another pro-renter bill would place a $2.1 billion bond on the November 2002 ballot, which will go to rental housing, home ownership, shelter, farm worker housing, jobs and housing incentive grants, and code enforcement.
The group is planning a larger rally in downtown Los Angeles this afternoon to announce their effort.
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on April 4, 2002. Read the original PDF.