Tag: Berkeley

By Posted on Posted in Actions

April-28-BTU---02

Tonight the Fair Campaign Practices Commission meets (7 pm, North Berkeley Senior Center) to consider the stipulation offered by members of Tenants United for Fairness (TUFF)—a slate that ran for Berkeley’s Rent Stabilization Board in the November election—and the landlords who illegally funded their campaign.

The proposed stipulation would fine the TUFF slate members $300 each, and their backers under $3000 total.

In comparison, at the same meeting the people who raised money to defeat the street-sitting prohibiting Measure S and who failed to properly report $500 in late contributions in a timely manner are proposed to pay a penalty of that amount—$500, the amount they received. Nothing illegal about the contributions, they’re just paying the amount of the contribution for failing to report it on time.

TUFF raised and spent over $50,000 from landlords, over $30,000 from one PAC alone. Berkeley has a $250 per candidate donation limit and bars business donations, the vast bulk of those donations.

Read the entire article here:

http://berkeleydailyplanet.com/issue/2013-05-13/article/41068?headline=Berkeley-s-Fair-Campaign-Practices-Commission-Meets-Tonight-To-Consider-Light-Penalties-for-Flagrant-Election-Law-Evaders-News-Analysis—By-Dave-Blake-and-Dean-Metzger

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Justice?Berkeley’s Rent Board will discuss support for the state bill SB603 which would provide further protections for tenants and their security deposits. All-too-often, landlords don’t return security deposits or follow state laws, such as the rule that they have to let tenants know they can request a pre-move inspection, or the law that landlords must send copies of receipts. SB603 would allow a chance for tenants who have to take owners to small claims court to get damages. And if landlords risk having to pay the tenant MORE than just their deposit, maybe landlords won’t try to keep it for no good reason.

Tell the Rent Board what you think on Monday, or write them here: rent@ci.berkeley.ca.us
If you write the Rent Board, please say you support BTU and make sure you title your email “For the Commissioners re: May 13 Meeting” so it gets to them.

Tenants Together, the statewide group leading the charge on this issue, just published a report about security deposit theft.

The report contains the following findings from a survey of Tenants Together members from across the state:

  • 60% experienced unfair withholding of some or all of their deposit;
  • 53% did not receive any of their deposit funds within 21 days of vacating the last time they moved;
  • 36% reported that their entire deposit was never returned the last time they moved.

The report also analyses of the outcomes of security deposit cases filed by tenants in small claims courts to recover their deposits. The three-courthouse study, the first of its kind in California, found:

  • Tenants prevailed in over 70% of the cases that went to judgment;
  • In only 3.5% of the security deposit cases filed by tenants was a landlord assessed a penalty by the court.

read more here:
http://www.tenantstogether.org/article.php?id=2707

state bill:
http://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=201320140SB603

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1930 and 1922–24 Walnut Street (photo: Daniella Thompson, 2009)
1930 and 1922–24 Walnut Street (photo: Daniella Thompson, 2009), courtesy of BAHA

Berkeley’s Zoning Adjustments Board voted unanimously to approve Acheson Commons in December – but their vote included allowing a dangerous new interpretation of Berkeley’s Demolition Ordinance which will certainly lead to future evictions in Berkeley! Please write them NOW!

Thursday May 9 the ZAB is to reconsider allowing deep-pockets developer Sam Zell’s Equity Residential to tear down eight rent-controlled units on Walnut Street, but not replace them with affordable housing at the 205-unit development, which is one of the first under the Downtown Area Plan.

It seems the City has a new view of the Demolition Ordinance which allows destruction of empty rent controlled units without requiring replacement. They say if no one lives there, it isn’t “rent-controlled” – this will lead to evictions! This is also the view city staff were pushing for the revision of the Demo Ordinance, which should be before the City Council later in the summer, so we need to show that Berkeley won’t stand for unmitigated destruction of affordable housing while developers make billions on new bedrooms for dot-com commuters.

PLEASE WRITE TO ZAB RIGHT NOW! TBlount@CityofBerkeley.info

Read more »

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Turret

You are invited to the Berkeley Tenants Union May Potluck.

Come break bread with tenants, smart landlords, activists, and everyone who wants to keep rent control strong and working in Berkeley.

When: May 8, 6:30-8:30 pm
Where: Grassroots House, 2022 Blake, Berkeley between Milvia and Shattuck
RSVP: info (at) berkeleytenants.org (Children are welcome. Please include in RSVP. There will be childcare.)

There will be a brief presentation by the Oakland Tenants Union.

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Our awesome web guy and I went to the Berkeley Public Library and took some photos from their file on the history of the rent strike, the birth of rent control, and the struggles of the Berkeley Tenants Union in the 1970s and 1980s. We will post some of the scans and copies of full-text articles at a later date – here’s the really fun stuff!

Click on each photo for a closer view.

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Garbage & Fence

BTU is a member of Tenants Together, California’s statewide tenant organization. Our friends there have provided an easy way for you to support SB603 – the great new law about Security Deposits that we keep telling you about. If passed, this law would give California tenants some rights that Berkeley tenants already enjoy – like interest on their security deposits. In addition, Senator Leno’s bill calls for landlords to pay penalties if they improperly withhold a security deposit. SUCH PENALTIES ARE IMPORTANT because many landlords withhold security deposits as a matter of course, because they count on tenants being unwilling or unable to take them to small claims court.

Just last week at the Farmers Market, BTU met a tenant whose landlord was taking improvements like new carpet and cabinets out of a deposit – this a is a real problem in Berkeley and you can help RIGHT NOW by following the link below to send a letter to our state Senator. You can also call her at (510) 286-1333

http://org2.salsalabs.com/o/5247/p/dia/action/public/?action_KEY=13246