July 23, 2010 at 10 am the new Veterans Out Patient will be having a Grand Opening.  It is a beautiful facility close to home, just a short distance up the hill from the El Corazon Senior Center.  Please join me and our fellow veterans for this event.  Hope to see you there.

Chris Gow

Our organization, OMHA, which was reestablished in 2003, continues to keep you informed on issues that are continually facing our Manufactured Mobile Home Communities.  Many issues have come up since the rent control ordinance was adopted in 1984.  The park owners, since that time, have been trying in one way or another to raise our rents for additional revenue.  With each attempt, OMHA has gathered information that is pertinent for the residents of the different parks in the city that we represent and will continually make available to you.

A proposal by the owners of Cavalier Mobile Estates to convert their property from a rental park to a resident-owned community was rejected by the Oceanside Planning Commission Monday in a unanimous vote.

Commissioners Bob Neal and Jay Scrivener said more needed to be done to protect park residents.

"This to me needs to have a better proposal for what's going to happen down the road," Neal said. "There's too many things not done to take care of the people who are living there."

A lawyer for Cavalier Mobile Estates LLC, Mark Alpert of Santa Ana, said he would appeal the commission ruling to the City Council and if the council upholds it, he expects Cavalier to sue in San Diego Superior Court.

Alpert said the commission vote was "purely a political decision that will end up, in my view, being overturned and costing the taxpayers."

The owner of a small mobile-home park in Quail Valley has appealed a Menifee Planning Commission decision that ordered him to close the park because of environmental health hazards.

Escondido police detectives told two dozen or so homeless people Wednesday morning that they were investigating a possible identity theft scam targeting some of the city's poorest residents with promises of federal money.

Victims who fear they were tricked into providing personal information ---- Social Security numbers and the like ---- said they were frustrated, a bit angry, very worried and, now that police were involved, hopeful.

"I'm very encouraged," Yvonne Humphries said. "Hopefully, they will put a stop to this."

Humphries, 48, is ailing and homeless, and had hoped to buy much-needed shoes with the promised money.

Humphries sat in on a meeting set up by Interfaith Community Services, a nonprofit that contacted Escondido police after some of its homeless clients reported they feared they had been taken.

Sometime in early March, a number of homeless people were told they might qualify for about $850 in federal stimulus money. All they had to do was fill out a short Internal Revenue Service form requiring personal information, including their Social Security numbers.

Complaints from residents in Escondido's 23 mobile-home parks have prompted city officials to consider backing away from a plan to save nearly $200,000 per year by turning over safety inspections of the parks to the state.

A group representing the roughly 7,000 residents living in the parks contends that state inspections would be less frequent and less thorough than city inspections, which could lead to fires and plumbing problems that might spill into Escondido neighborhoods that surround the parks.

In addition, they argue that less-aggressive inspections could allow some parks to deteriorate, which might damage property values throughout the city.

Most of our competitors are simply Manufactured Home Loan “brokers” in California, which means they are just the loan middleman. They do not directly finance the loans, and have no capital to do so. This means you’re going to pay more for your loan, and receive a higher interest rate. California Manufactured Home Finance (CAMHF) is a mortgage banker which means we have our own money to lend, so we can fund our own loans for your mobile home purchase. This cuts out the middleman and brings the savings home to you. We simply offer the lowest mortgage rates and fees around for a mobile home loan.

When you need to Finance your Manufactured Home, it is very important to work with a loan expert with experience in mobile home finance. Many banks will tell you that they can finance a mobile home loan, and they mean well. But, often times they let a purchaser down in the eleventh hour. With over 28 years of experience with financing mobile home loans, refinance and escrow services, there are not many loan scenarios that we have not faced and conquered. Our knowledge of the manufactured home finance is vast and our dedication to our customers is unparalleled.

In a lawsuit filed Friday, the owners are asking a Superior Court judge to grant the increase and find that the city's rent-control law violates the state constitution. The suit also seeks unspecified damages.

"Why would City Council members ignore property rights, which are part of our core values and have been central to our success as a nation?" Mark Alpert, the owners' attorney, said in an e-mail. "Could it be they see a block of votes?"

Cavalier's current rents, he said, are "insanely low."