ACTION: Statewide Ellis Reform
The Berkeley Rent Board agenda for Monday March 17 contains a report on landlord and tenant bills at the state legislature. BTU is asking the Board to take action to support and broaden the two bills to reform the Ellis Act, a law that allows speculators to buy an apartment building and immediately get rid of all the tenants. We hope the Board will ask Nancy Skinner and Loni Hancock to persuade San Francisco’s Tom Ammiano and Mark Leno to change their bills so they could apply in Berkeley if use of the Ellis act rises dramatically here.

Santa Monica’s Rent Board, and then Santa Monica’s City Council, have taken a similar position, stating that they are hopeful that any Ellis reform will allow all jurisdictions with rent control to be given a chance to opt in.
Santa Monica Rent Board Annual Report: “…entering 2013, there are signs that the economy may be improving—foreclosures are down in California along with unemployment—and there is a sense in the state that our economy may finally be headed in the right direction. Along with that recovery is the likelihood of increased Ellis activity, bringing with it the inevitable loss of accessible, competitive, controlled housing.”

The Berkeley Rent Stabilization Board meets Monday at 7 PM — 2134 Martin Luther King. The report on housing legislation and discussion on Ellis reform are early on their agenda.

Berkeley Rent Board Legislative Report, Item 5 http://www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/Rent_Stabilization_Board/Home/Agenda__RSB_2014_Mar_17.aspx

Also on the Agenda, Banks as Landlords, Item 7(a)8 and Wall Street Securitizing Rents 7(a)11

Ellis Reform from the San Francisco Appeal: “Speculators are buying properties and posing as new landlords, then evicting the tenants within a matter of months to “flip” the building and convert it into a high-cost home or luxury condominiums, the senator said.”
http://sfappeal.com/2014/02/local-landlords-demonstrate-against-announcement-of-legislation-to-close-ellis-act-loopholes/

Ellis Reform from 48 Hills Blog: “The presence of the mayor and the tech industry is just the latest indication of how serious the eviction crisis has become – and how much of a force the tenant movement has become in local politics. When you get a crowd like this for an anti-eviction bill, it’s clear that 2014 is, indeed, the Year of the Tenant in San Francisco.
http://48hillsonline.org/2014/02/24/everyone-in-town-except-a-few-landlords-is-supporting-lenos-ellis-act-bill/

San Francisco To Raise Ellis Relocation Benefits?
“The Campos legislation will pay tenants 2 years’ worth of the “rent differential” between their current rent and the market rent they will have to pay. For example, if a tenants being evicted is paying $1,500 a month in rent and the current market rent for a similar apartment is $3,000, they will received $72,000 in relocation benefits (the $1,500 difference their current rent and the new rent, times 48)”–  according to Eviction Free SF. Berkeley’s Ellis relocation benefits are currently between $8,700 and $16,200 per household, San Francisco has a $15,632.69 maximum, and Santa Monica and West Hollywood base their benefits on the size of the unit, with relocation payments of up to $17,000 (West Hollywood) and $19,000 (Santa Monica.)

Student Perspectives on Housing
This week was UC Berkeley’s annual Tenants Rights Week, so BTU tabled on campus alongside Renters Legal Assistance and other services. The Daily Californian has their annual housing special issue, with articles discussing gentrification, types of housing in Berkeley, vacancy decontrol and landlord profits, and the role of the Rent Board.
http://www.dailycal.org/section/special/housing-issue-2014/

Tuesday Exchange on Berkeley’s Downtown
There are 1,400 units of rental housing in development for the Downtown area, and none of it will be rent controlled. Unfortunately, this talk will happen while you are at work.
The Berkeley Historical Society asked LWVBAE to partner with them in an exploration of how development activities may potentially impact the cultural and physical characteristics of the Downtown area. Panelists, including Michael Caplan, Lisa Stephens and Jim Novosel, will open a discussion on this important topic, which will be followed by a question-and-answer period. The talk will be moderated by Steven Finacom and introduced by Sherry Smith.”
Conversation about the Downtown Development Plan
Tuesday, March 18 :: Noon to 1:30 pm
Berkeley History Center, 1931 Center Street
Admission free. Donations welcome. Wheelchair accessible.

Oakland City Council To Review Capital Improvement Rent Increases Tuesday
A staff recommendation this week calls for the number of years landlords can amortize capital improvement costs to be extended from 5 years to 20 and caps the rent increase at 10 percent. In addition, landlords would be asked to petition the city for rent increases. Currently, the only way for the city to track rent increases triggered by capital improvement projects is only when renters issue a complaint. Most tenants, however, may be unaware of their rights regarding the complaint system, says Oakland tenants’ rights advocate James Vann”.
http://oaklandlocal.com/2014/03/tenants-rights-resolution-heads-to-oakland-city-council-as-talks-continue/

Photo courtesy of Tenants Together.
Photo courtesy of Tenants Together.

Berkeley is one of 14 cities in California that enjoys strong protections for tenants. San Francisco has decent protections, but has seen a huge wave of evictions that use a state law, the Ellis Act, to get around local rules.

Now there is a statewide effort to reform the Ellis Act. The law was intended to allow long-term owners to “go out of the rental business” but instead allows investment companies and other speculators to buy rent controlled buildings, evict all the tenants, and sell the units as condos or tenancies-in-common at huge profits.

Activists from San Diego to Redding are hoping a reformed law might require an owner to hold the building for at least five years before they could “go out of business” – this would eliminate speculators who buy rental properties only to flip them after evictions. However, in 2007 a bill in the California legislature which called for a five-year delay failed miserably. If a broad coalition from many cities – including Berkeley – doesn’t support the current reform, we could end up with a state exemption to the law that will only protect San Francisco.

And you know what they say – “When San Francisco sneezes, Berkeley get a cold!” If SF was able to curb their epidemic of evictions, speculators will quickly turn to Berkeley. This is why the Berkeley Tenants Union wants you to join with us in supporting broad statewide reform of the Ellis Act now!

Our friends at Tenants Together have put together a petition as a first step:

A state law, The Ellis Act, is responsible for the unfair eviction of thousands of seniors and families in California. In the past few years Ellis Act evictions have surged, with thousands of long-term tenants displaced from their homes.

Send the message that we will stand up for our communities against speculation.
http://org2.salsalabs.com/o/5247/p/dia/action3/common/public/?action_KEY=15820

San Francisco is taking other steps to end their eviction crisis – Berkeley should also increase Ellis relocation payments, restrict unit mergers, and give evicted residents priority for local affordable housing – join BTU to fight for this today! Right now, the revisions to the Berkeley Demolition Ordinance proposed by Mayor Bates will make it easier to eliminate rent controlled units by merging them to create big houses for the wealthy — the exact opposite of how San Francisco is changing their law!
http://sfpublicpress.org/news/2013-12/supervisors-approve-plan-to-protect-tenants-against-displacement

Hundreds of seniors, families and long-term renters evicted in San Francisco
http://www.beyondchron.org/articles/Stopping_Ellis_Act_s_Economic_Terrorism_12134.html

The Ellis reform bill would allow local governments more say in preventing evictions:
http://m.sfexaminer.com/sanfrancisco/tenant-advocates-seek-support-for-reforming-ellis-act/Content?oid=2665435

CIty Council Finally Making Seismic Retrofits the Law
http://www.dailycal.org/2013/11/20/city-property-owners-may-required-retrofit-seismically-unsafe-buildings/

Berkeley Backs Off Supporting Richmond, CA on Foreclosure Efforts
Item 32 for December 2nd was amended to remove references to joining
Richmond’s Joint Powers Authority, making the Council’s deliberations meaningless:
www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/Clerk/City_Council/2013/12Dec/Documents/2013-12-03_Item_32_Supporting_City_of_Richmond_-_Rev.aspx

LWV Directors Live in Berkeley’s Wealthiest Areas
LWV Directors Live in Berkeley’s Wealthiest Areas

Berkeley’s League of Women Voters tells Rent Board to Cut Staff, Services:
http://www.lwvbae.org/league-news/league-urges-rent-board-improvements/

San Francisco Holds Hearings on Evictions:
“Overall evictions in San Francisco rose from 1,242 to 1,716 over the past three years, he said, reflecting an increase of 38.2 percent. Ellis Act evictions rose by 169.8 percent in that same time frame.”
http://www.sfbg.com/2013/11/19/eviction-epidemic-spurs-legislative-solutions
http://www.sfbg.com/politics/2013/11/14/hundreds-attend-hearing-call-action-evictions

Even San Francisco’s Mayor Wants to Stop Ellis Act Evictions:
http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/S-F-politicians-Restrict-Ellis-Act-evictions-4981974.php

Tenants Together has a Statewide Petition to Change the Ellis Act:
“…then real estate speculators starting abusing the Ellis Act to turn a quick profit by evicting long-term tenants and selling the units. Ellis Act evictions are now surging. In San Francisco and Los Angeles in particular, thousands of rent-controlled tenants are being displaced by Ellis Act evictions.” – and Berkeley could be next!
http://org2.salsalabs.com/o/5247/p/dia/action3/common/public/?action_KEY=15820

Banks “Securitize” Rents, Cause Concern:

http://www.sacbee.com/2013/11/21/5932043/wall-street-firm-sells-bonds-backed.html

http://www.salon.com/2013/11/06/wall_street_slumlords_outrageous_new_scheme_how_they_could_wreck_economy_again/

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/11/08/wall-street-figured-out-how-to-securitize-your-rent-should-you-worry/

city-to-suburb_stamenreprisedforwired-660x5891Oakland fights to close rent control loophole:
Berkeley tenants enjoy protections against bad business decisions by owners. Here, landlords can only passthrough “capital” costs if they were not foreseeable when they set the initial rent or they can’t make a fair return on their investment. In Oakland, their weaker rent control law is further undermined by broad rules which allow landlords who paid too much for a building to then raise the rents to pay their mortgage. Oakland is fighting to close this loophole even as Berkeley tenants could see passthrough rules relaxed so that landlords can charge for seismic retrofits:

“Of the ten major jurisdictions in California that have rent control laws, only four allow landlords to pass on the costs of debt service. Of those four, Oakland is the only municipality that allows landlords to force tenants to pay up to 95 percent of their debt.”

http://www.eastbayexpress.com/oakland/oakland-rent-laws-to-be-debated/Content?oid=3719780#fromMobile

In San Francisco, the rents are too damn high:
The SF Department of Public Health made an interactive map which shows how many full-time minimum wage jobs it takes to pay rent on the average market rate apartment in each SF neighborhood. For example, in the Mission District, it would take 5.5 minimum wage jobs to pay rent on a new 2-bedroom apartment, because market rent is $2,920. The actual median income of the neighborhood is about half of what it takes to pay that rent.
http://www.sfphes.org/news/211-rent-affordability-in-san-francisco

Thoughtful tech industry comments on gentrification, development, and the “Google Bus” phenomena:
Whichever side of this issue you’re on, it’s clear that we’re looking at a reversal of the historical norm: The workers that used to live in residential suburbs while commuting to work in the city are now living in the city, while the largest technology companies are based in the suburbs and increasingly draw their labor supply from dense urban neighborhoods…That they’re young and educated and lots of them are millionaires is kind of beside the point. It’s about more than gentrification as we’ve experienced it thus far: It’s about an entirely reconfigured relationship between density and sprawl…

This article contains a really cool map but it doesn’t show that these tech industry shuttles now pick up at MacArthur, Ashby and North Berkeley BART stations as well.
http://www.wired.com/opinion/2013/09/mapping-silicon-valleys-corporate-shuttle-problem/

Nob Hill building with 33 units would be largest Tenancy in Common:
Over in San Francisco, investors would like to use the state Ellis Act to evict rent controlled tenants and turn buildings in condominiums. Only they can’t, because like Berkeley, San Francisco has tight restrictions on how many precious affordable rent controlled units can be turned into condos each year. So speculators turn them into Tenancies-in-Common, which are like condos, only not. Pretty soon investors in Berkeley will be exploiting similar loopholes, so let’s get ready!
http://www.sfgate.com/realestate/article/Park-Lane-tenants-protest-conversion-plans-4853226.php

Meanwhile back in Berkeley, BNC issues strong statement on Demolition Ordinance:
The Berkeley Neighborhoods Council newsletter discusses how revisions to the Demo Ordinance are not only bad for tenants, but also for neighborhood stability:

“This provision puts multiple unit buildings that are well-integrated parts of neighborhoods throughout the city at risk of being demolished for no other reason than a developer sees an opportunity to replace it with a new and bigger building.”

In their September newsletter, BNC reminds everyone that the Ordinance will be discussed November 6 at the Planning Commission.
http://www.berkeleyneighborhoodscouncil.com/Newsletters/2013/Issue2/BNC_eNEWS_2_NNRaA2.htm

Speculators Driving Up Rents in East and West Oakland:
Big national companies are outbidding regular folk and buying up foreclosures all over Oakland’s flatlands, breaking up long-standing African American communities. Some firms just slap a new coat of paint on the “distressed property” and resell them right away, at prices working people can’t afford. Others are offering these homes at San Francisco-type rents, but plan to sell them in five to seven years. Several nonprofits – including Oakland Community Land Trust and Restoring Ownership Opportunities Together –are working to keep owners in their homes, or buy foreclosures and keep them affordable to working people. If you think this is going on in Berkeley, let us know!
http://www.eastbayexpress.com/oakland/whos-jacking-up-housing-prices-in-west-oakland/Content?oid=3726518