OMHA

OCEANSIDE: With rent hike denied, mobile-home park owner looks to subdivide

Residents may lose rent-control protection

OCEANSIDE —- The owners of Cavalier Mobile Estates, a large mobile-home park near the coast, intend to subdivide the property and offer the lots for sale, a move that could wipe away Oceanside’s rent-control protections there.
 
 Residents recently received a letter about the proposed conversion to a “resident-owned” community. “No one will be forced to purchase,” the letter said, while adding that “home ownership is the ‘American dream’ for a reason.”
 
 Most mobile home residents rent the land on which their units sit. By subdividing a park in what’s known as a condo conversion, park owners can sell the individual spots.
 
 Some communities embrace, even initiate, such conversions because residents are eager to own their own property, said Tim Sheahan of San Marcos, president of the Golden State Manufactured-Home Owners League. But “the trend in recent years has been to do it against the will of the residents, especially in rent-controlled areas, as a means to evade local rent-control ordinances.”
 
 ”Once they subdivide and convert only one home site as a ‘condo,’ then everyone loses their local rent-control protections,” Sheahan said.
 
 Low-income residents would still have state rent-control protection.
 
 Cavalier is made up of 346 mobile homes near the Interstate 5 interchange at Oceanside Boulevard. Earlier this year, the owners sough a substantial rent increase. But a city panel rejected their request, and a retired judge affirmed that decision on appeal.
 
 Under Oceanside’s rent control law, parks can raise rents each year by 75 percent of the Consumer Price Index. Cavalier’s owners argued that didn’t provide a fair return. They wanted to increase the average monthly rent to $600 from $348.
 Read the rest of the story

POWAY: City wins appeal in Royal Mobile Estates suit

By GARY WARTH – gwarth@nctimes.com | Monday, July 13, 2009 7:51 PM PDT ∞

A legal battle between the Poway Royal Mobile Estates and the city may be at an end following an appellate court’s decision to allow the city to refinance the bond debt from the park’s purchase.

Poway officials and park residents have had numerous legal fights since 2004, when the city first announced its intention to sell the park. The homeowners associations at the 399-space mobile home park said they wanted to buy their park and sued when the city considered a higher offer over theirs.

The city won that lawsuit after a judge ruled it was not obligated to sell the park to the residents.

Park residents also sued the city last year about Poway’s plan to sell up to $32 million in bonds to refinance its debt from the purchase of the park. Residents argued that the sale was illegal under the state Community Redevelopment Law.

A judge ruled in the city’s favor in August, and on July 9 an appellate court upheld the earlier decision.

Poway City Attorney Lisa Foster said the ruling becomes final 30 days after it is issued, and the residents will have 10 days after that to petition the state Supreme Court if they want to continue the fight.

Read the rest of the story

12th Annual Senior Expo 2009

The 12th Annual Senior Expo to be held at the new El Corazon Senior Center.  Mark your calendar for October 3rd, 2009. 

This event is free to the public and is  great way to promote your business, group or organization.  Do not miss this opportunity to provide your service and information to Oceanside Seniors as well as the greater North County Seniors population on the day of this event.  The Senior Expo is a unique event that mixes social interaction and entertainment with useful independent living information for seniors.

Seniors, there is health screening and free flu shots.  This is the place to get yours.  I get mine every year here.  There will be great music and other entertainment and food.

 If you have not seen this new center yet this is your opportunity.  It is awesome.  There is a large area outback for outdoor entertaining with a barbecue and fireplace.  You can call the Oceanside Senior Center  at 435-5250 for more information.

To download the application click on Senior Expo Vendor Application

AB 761 – The Fight Continues

June 27, 2009

AB 761 – The Fight Continues
 
Despite the hard fought efforts of hundreds of homeowners throughout the state and a broad coalition of homeowner groups, seniors, local governments and legal services advocates, AB 761 passed the Assembly floor today.  Passage of the bill was aided by the votes of several Democratic members who had initially stayed off of the vote, including Assemblymember Portantino and Speaker Karen Bass.  In the end, 42 members voted in favor, with 37 voting no or abstaining.  An official tally of the vote will be posted on the Assembly’s website by Friday morning. It was very, very close and the disappointment is felt by everyone who has worked so hard to stop this dangerous measure. 

The bill moves now to the Senate, where it will likely be heard in Senate Judiciary and possibly Senate Transporation and Housing.  A hearing date is not yet known, though it faces significant time constraints: it must pass all policy committee(s) no later than July 10.

Now is the time to redouble our efforts to fight this attack on homeowners. We need to enlist more of our neighbors and friends from through out the state, and focus calls and letters on our Senate representatives.  If you don’t know who your Senator is you can use this form.

AB 566 Update
 
AB 566 will likely be reheard in the Senate Transporation and Housing Committee on July 7 at the regularly scheduled 1:30 hearing.  Meanwhile, please keep up your efforts to contact Senators Wolk and Simitian to urge their support for the bill.
ASSEMBLY BILLS
 
AB 481 (Ma) – OPPOSE – Not Heard in Assembly Housing, Two-year bill that may be heard in January.
Description: Would provide that a mobilehome that is not owner-occupied would not be subject to local rent controls.
 
AB 566 (Nava) – SUPPORT – Failed passage in Senate Housing.  Will be reheard June 30.  Description: Would require that the currently-mandated survey of residents of a park for slated for conversion to condominiums demonstrate that a majority of the residents support the conversion. The bill also would state that localities may enact reasonable measures to prevent sham conversions or to preserve affordable housing.
 
AB 761 (Calderon) – OPPOSE – Failed passed on the Assembly Floor (38-27). Could still be heard again on the Assembly Floor. Urge your Assemblymember to vote no. Description: Would impose “Costa-Hawkins”-style vacancy de-control restrictions on local mobilehome rent control ordinances. Upon a sale or vacancy of a mobilehome, the space rent would be set by the park, at market rate (i.e., “vacancy decontrol”). The bill would destroy billions of dollars of homeowner equity.
 
AB 869 (Mendoza) – SPONSOR – Bill will be taken up in January.  Description: Would create a program of certification for, and continuing education of, mobilehome park managers.
 
AB 1108 (Fuentes) -SUPPORT – Passed the Assembly Floor (45 to 30) and now pending in the Senate Utilities committee.  Urge your member to support.  Description: Would make various changes to requirements when electric or gas utilities are provided to mobilehome park residents and residential tenants through a master meter, including the following: (1) would allow the Public Utilities Commission to order repairs and maintenance of system; (2) Directs that the rate differential received by park owners be directed toward maintenance and repair; and (3) Would limit late fees on utility bills.

SENATE BILLS 
 
SB 23 (Padilla) – SUPPORT – Passed the Senate (36-0). Pending in the Assembly Housing Committee. Urge your Assemblymember to Support.
Description: Would require mobilehome parks to develop, implement, and post an emergency and fire safety plan; would allow cities and counties to adopt more stringent regulations.
 
SB 804 (Leno) SUPPORT – Passed the Senate (28-6). Pending in Assembly Housing. Description: Would prohibit a park from requiring a homeowner, who is replacing a mobilehome or manufactured home on a space in the park, to use a specific broker, dealer, or other person as an agent in the purchase or installation of the replacement home.
 
SB 111 (Correa) SUPPORT – Bill passed Assembly Housing (4-2) and is now pending on Assembly Floor. Urge your Assemblymember to Support.Description:  Would reorganize the MRL to clean it up and make it more user-friendly by combining certain related sections and cleaning up other portions of the code.

OCEANSIDE: Mobile home park owner appeals city’s denial of rent hike

OCEANSIDE —- The owner of Cavalier Mobiles Estates, a large, coastal mobile home park, has asked a retired judge to reverse a city panel’s decision to deny a steep rent increase.

Rents at Cavalier run about $350 per space per month. The owner wants to raise rates to $600 —- an increase of more than 70 percent.

Mark Alpert, the owner’s attorney, argues in a legal brief that smaller increases allowed under Oceanside’s rent control law have “made it impossible for the park owner to adequately maintain the infrastructure of the park and substantially reduced the return of dozens of small investors who own the park.”

Residents have said the rent hike would be tough to manage.

In April, Oceanside’s Manufactured Home Fair Practices Commission, a volunteer panel that sets mobile-home park rents, rejected Cavalier’s request. It said the owner was already earning a reasonable return.

Read More

Legislative Update

AB 761 – The Fight Continues

Despite the hard fought efforts of hundreds of homeowners throughout the state and a broad coalition of homeowner groups, seniors, local governments and legal services advocates, AB 761 passed the Assembly floor today. Passage of the bill was aided by the votes of several Democratic members who had initially stayed off of the vote, including Assemblymember Portantino and Speaker Karen Bass. In the end, 42 members voted in favor, with 37 voting no or abstaining. An official tally of the vote will be posted on the Assembly’s website by Friday morning. It was very, very close and the disappointment is felt by everyone who has worked so hard to stop this dangerous measure.

The bill moves now to the Senate, where it will likely be heard in Senate Judiciary and possibly Senate Transporation and Housing. A hearing date is not yet known, though it faces significant time constraints: it must pass all policy committee(s) no later than July 10.

Now is the time to redouble our efforts to fight this attack on homeowners. We need to enlist more of our neighbors and friends from through out the state, and focus calls and letters on our Senate representatives. If you don’t know who your Senator is you can use this form.

AB 566 Update

AB 566 will likely be reheard in the Senate Transporation and Housing Committee on July 7 at the regularly scheduled 1:30 hearing. Meanwhile, please keep up your efforts to contact Senators Wolk and Simitian to urge their support for the bill.

Legislative Update
June 24, 2009

1102 Magnolia Avenue | Garden Grove, CA 92841

AB 761 – The Fight Continues

Despite the hard fought efforts of hundreds of homeowners throughout the state and a broad coalition of homeowner groups, seniors, local governments and legal services advocates, AB 761 passed the Assembly floor today. Passage of the bill was aided by the votes of several Democratic members who had initially stayed off of the vote, including Assemblymember Portantino and Speaker Karen Bass. In the end, 42 members voted in favor, with 37 voting no or abstaining. An official tally of the vote will be posted on the Assembly’s website by Friday morning. It was very, very close and the disappointment is felt by everyone who has worked so hard to stop this dangerous measure.

The bill moves now to the Senate, where it will likely be heard in Senate Judiciary and possibly Senate Transporation and Housing. A hearing date is not yet known, though it faces significant time constraints: it must pass all policy committee(s) no later than July 10.

Now is the time to redouble our efforts to fight this attack on homeowners. We need to enlist more of our neighbors and friends from through out the state, and focus calls and letters on our Senate representatives. If you don’t know who your Senator is you can use this form.

AB 566 Update

AB 566 will likely be reheard in the Senate Transporation and Housing Committee on July 7 at the regularly scheduled 1:30 hearing. Meanwhile, please keep up your efforts to contact Senators Wolk and Simitian to urge their support for the bill.

ASSEMBLY BILLS

AB 481 (Ma) – OPPOSE – Not Heard in Assembly Housing, Two-year bill that may be heard in January.
Description: Would provide that a mobilehome that is not owner-occupied would not be subject to local rent controls.

AB 566 (Nava) – SUPPORT – Failed passage in Senate Housing. Will be reheard June 30. Description: Would require that the currently-mandated survey of residents of a park for slated for conversion to condominiums demonstrate that a majority of the residents support the conversion. The bill also would state that localities may enact reasonable measures to prevent sham conversions or to preserve affordable housing.

AB 761 (Calderon) – OPPOSE – Failed passed on the Assembly Floor (38-27). Could still be heard again on the Assembly Floor. Urge your Assemblymember to vote no. Description: Would impose “Costa-Hawkins”-style vacancy de-control restrictions on local mobilehome rent control ordinances. Upon a sale or vacancy of a mobilehome, the space rent would be set by the park, at market rate (i.e., “vacancy decontrol”). The bill would destroy billions of dollars of homeowner equity.

AB 869 (Mendoza) – SPONSOR – Bill will be taken up in January. Description: Would create a program of certification for, and continuing education of, mobilehome park managers.

AB 1108 (Fuentes) -SUPPORT – Passed the Assembly Floor (45 to 30) and now pending in the Senate Utilities committee. Urge your member to support. Description: Would make various changes to requirements when electric or gas utilities are provided to mobilehome park residents and residential tenants through a master meter, including the following: (1) would allow the Public Utilities Commission to order repairs and maintenance of system; (2) Directs that the rate differential received by park owners be directed toward maintenance and repair; and (3) Would limit late fees on utility bills.

SENATE BILLS

SB 23 (Padilla) – SUPPORT – Passed the Senate (36-0). Pending in the Assembly Housing Committee. Urge your Assemblymember to Support.
Description: Would require mobilehome parks to develop, implement, and post an emergency and fire safety plan; would allow cities and counties to adopt more stringent regulations.

SB 804 (Leno) SUPPORT – Passed the Senate (28-6). Pending in Assembly Housing. Description: Would prohibit a park from requiring a homeowner, who is replacing a mobilehome or manufactured home on a space in the park, to use a specific broker, dealer, or other person as an agent in the purchase or installation of the replacement home.

SB 111 (Correa) SUPPORT – Bill passed Assembly Housing (4-2) and is now pending on Assembly Floor. Urge your Assemblymember to Support.Description: Would reorganize the MRL to clean it up and make it more user-friendly by combining certain related sections and cleaning up other portions of the code.

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AB 761 FAILS ON ASSEMBLY FLOOR!

For your Information
At 2:20 this afternoon, Assembly Member Charles Calderon presented AB 761 on the Assembly Floor, followed by a strenuous debate with a number of our good friends speaking against the bill, and as many of our opponents speaking in favor of the bill. But in the end, all that mattered was that Calderon could not gather sufficient votes, 41, to pass the bill. Calderon persuaded 38 Assembly Members to vote for the bill, but could not round up 3 more, even though he worked on several members at length to persuade them to vote “Aye”.

When the Speaker Pro Tem announced the vote, and said that AB 761 “failed passage”, Calderon requested “reconsideration” which is fairly standard when a very controversial bill fails. Although Calderon could conceivably ask the Assembly floor to hear the bill again, it is highly unlikely.

Today was a resounding victory for manufactured home owners. This was a major floor fight, and even with their small army of lobbyists, they could not beat our committed troops and the lobbying team.

Assembly Members who spoke against the bill on the Assembly floor and should be thanked are: Assembly Members Ammiano, Brownley and Feuer. Members who spoke in favor of AB 761 were Harkey, Logue, and Salas.

Here is the complete list of members who voted against AB 761; all should be thanked for hanging tough with us against the considerable lobbying pressure from parkowner lobbyists and Calderon. Send a note or call their office and thank them:

Adams
Ammiano
Arambula
Beall
Blumenfield
Brownley
Caballero
Chesbro
Cook
Coto
Evans
Feuer
Furutani
Humber
Huffman
Jones
Lowenthal
Monning
Vava
Ruskin
Saldana
Skinner
Swanson
Torres
Torrico
Yamada

Here is a complete list of everyone who voted in favor of the bill; if you live in their district, call or send a note, expressing your disappointment: (yes, let them know that we are watching)

Anderson
Berryhill, B.
Berryhill, T.
Blakeslee
Calderon
Conway
Davis
De Leon
De Vore
Duvall
Emmerson
Eng
Fletcher
Fuller
Gaines
Galgiani
Garrick
Gilmore
Hagman
Hall
Harkey
Hernandez
Hill
Knight
Logue
Ma
Mendoza
Miller
Nestande
Niello
Nielsen
Perez, J.
Salas
Silva
Solorio
Strickland
Tran
Villines

14 members did not vote, and one Assembly seat is vacant

Block
Buchanan
Carter
De La Torre
Fong
Fuentes
Hayashi
Jeffries
Krekorian
Lieu
Perez, V.M.
Portantino
Smyth
Torlakson
Speaker Bass

OCEANSIDE: City celebrates opening of El Corazon Senior Center

OCEANSIDE —- Hundreds of people packed Oceanside’s new El Corazon Senior Center on Saturday evening to celebrate the 15,000-square-foot, $10 million facility’s opening.

“The turn-out is awesome,” said deputy city manager Michelle Lawrence. “This is the culmination of years of planning.”

“I’ve lived here 57 years, and I just told the mayor that if this what our taxes are going for it’s a wonderful thing,” said Esther Newman of Oceanside. “It’s so beautiful, and we’re close to it.’

The center is the first project completed in the master plan for the 450-acre El Corazon property, a former sand mine given to the city in 1994.

City officials have said they are happy to report the building came in on time and on budget. It is expected to draw more seniors than the city’s downtown center because of its more central location.

“I’ve only been to the older one maybe once or twice,” said 79-year-old Rose Wehling of the original center on Country Club Lane near Interstate 5. “It’s too far away, and I don’t like the neighborhood.”

“It’s the darndest place to get to, so I hardly ever go,” said Ann Halbrook, 80, of Oceanside.

Oceanside recreation supervisor Maureen Fleming said that when the downtown senior center was built in 1980 most of the seniors lived near it, but now many of them have moved to the eastern side of town. She said she was excited to see a lot of new faces at the grand opening.

“The plan was approved four years ago, and here we are,” Fleming said. “It’s a dream come true.”

“Because of the economy, it’s taking an awful long time to get this whole El Corazon plan going,” said Mayor Jim Wood. “It’s great to be able to move ahead with at least this first cornerstone —- a little way to give back to what we call the greatest generation.”

The new facility has classrooms, a dining room, kitchen space, administrative offices, a fitness room, a lobby and reception area, and restrooms.

“Whatever you view as your lifestyle —- health and wellness, cultural arts, human development —- we have something for you,” said city senior management analyst Shannon Sellinger, who will be managing the center.

The center officially opens at 8 a.m. Monday. For now, it will only operate at about 20 percent of its capacity, according to Sellinger. Services and activities will be added bimonthly.

“We’re starting out with the programs that are the most popular at the other center and adding new ones as we receive input,” Sellinger said.

“We have a very active senior community in Oceanside,” said Lawrence, the deputy city manager. “We’ll be getting a lot of feedback and input, so seniors will have a great role in the direction the center takes.”

The U-shaped building was designed by San Diego architects Roesling Nakamura Terrada, Inc. in the renowned style of Irving Gill.

Officials plan to rent the center for weddings, anniversaries and other non-senior events.

Red Alert

Projections are for AB761 to be voted on by the Assembly on Wednesday, June 10. This bill, if passed, would institute “vacancy decontrol” statewide. This means that, even in parks having rent control, rent control would be suspended whenever a home changes hands, allowing the rent to be increased substantially for the new owner. Once the new owner starts paying rent, rent control would be applied again, but starting from the highter rent. This would make it very difficult, if not impossible, for the current owner to sell the home at a reasonable price.

Oceanside has many seniors living on a very limited income and getting more so every day. Seniors are living to a ripe old age, like in their 90’s and income has deminished. Most of the time they have to sell their home and go into assisted living. The money from this home is what helps pay the cost which is very high.

AnnC