Provide Direction to Staff Regarding Certain Elements of a Proposed Rent Stabilization and Tenant Protection Ordinance. (City Manager 2110)
Okay. We're going to take a short break right now. I'm going to. Over real quickly, what we're going to be doing. We're we're coming back to the rent issue. Staff has a presentation that should take about 10 to 15 minutes. I'm going to ask all council to hold their questions on that. Then we have our 2829. We have one more speaker now. 29 speakers One more. Okay, so we're at 30 and we're going to limit those to 2 minutes each. And if someone else like when you're standing up, if there are a lot of people that you think are going to agree with you, you can always say anyone that's an agree with me, please stand if you want. Do something like that to try to make it. So maybe some of you don't have to speak for the full 2 minutes. Obviously it's already 1120 and then it'll come back to council and we'll be able to ask our questions and go through that part of it. So thank you very much. Good evening. I'm Debbie Potter. I'm the city's community development director. And this presentation and this item this evening is a follow up to the January 5th meeting, city council meeting. At that meeting, the council made a lot of progress in reaching consensus on a number of key points that would be going into the proposed ordinance and was able to give staff some really good feedback and direction as we move forward in crafting that ordinance. However, there were several key items that staff either felt we didn't hear consensus at the meeting on January 5th or that we wanted to come back tonight and get specific direction from the council. And I would like to run through each of those issues and then following my presentation and the public comment, then come back to the Council and receive direction from the council on each of the issues. There was consensus on the part of the council at the January 5th meeting to require the offer of a one year lease to prospective tenants. There was not consensus about offering that one year lease to in-place tenants, and at the meeting on the fifth, staff suggested that we go back and take a look at the City of Mountain Views ordinance, which recently went into effect regarding one year leases and based on a review of that ordinance. And we did see that Mountain View was requiring the offer of one year leases for both in place and prospective tenants. So staff is recommending that that the ordinance reflect that one year leases be required for both in place tenants and prospective tenants. There were several issues, one being the program fee and the other being the capital improvement plan that were not discussed. On the fifth. At the meeting of the Fifth, the council asked that staff table the discussion about program a program fee and directed us to to do more analysis about what the cost of the program would be once we had the program more fleshed out. So we are doing that and we anticipate coming back to the Council on the 15th with with a program fee proposal and we don't have any additional updates for for this meeting. In addition, there was consensus on the part of the Council that there be a requirement for a capital improvement plan that would be approved by the city prior to terminations for substantial rehabilitation. But as staff had been saying during this process, we had not yet been able to put together the policies and guidelines for for the CIP that is actively in progress now. And we will have those policies and guidelines, a resolution for the Council to consider at its meeting on February 16th. No cause eviction protections. There was consensus on the council that no cause evictions would be permitted in the city of Alameda under any new ordinance. However, those no cause evictions would have several limitations. The first limitation being the requirement to pay relocation benefits. And then the second limitation would be capping the maximum allowable rent increase that would be permitted for for the the next tenant who would move in. And the purpose of these limitations is really to discourage evictions. That would be solely for the purpose of evicting tenants to raise rents up to to the market level. And in addition to having consensus from the Council about permitting no cause evictions with limitations, there was consensus about capping the rent increase that would be allowed for the new tenant. So only a direction that we're looking for this evening is what the amount of that cap would be. There was some discussion at the meeting on the fifth that it might be 5%. If that was going to be the threshold amount for triggering the rent review process, maybe that was an appropriate cap for the new tenant. There was some discussion that perhaps it should be zero just to reflect the disincentive that the Council wanted those provisions to be. So we're looking for feedback on what that cap should be. In addition, there was consensus that there should be a cap on the number of no cause evictions that would be permitted in any given year. And initially in the three draft ordinances that staff presented on the fifth staff was recommending a cap that would would set four buildings, for example, with 15 or more units. The cap would be set at no more than 50% of of units being it being able to serve no cause notices on up to 50% of the units in a year and no more than 25% for buildings with four or fewer units. There was discussion at the meeting on the fifth that perhaps that cap was too high, that if a if a property owner were patient in two years, they could empty out their building with a cap of 25%. And we did hear some discussion about reducing that cap down to 25 for a maximum of 25% of units receiving no cause eviction notices in a one year period. We just the minutes did not reflect that there was consensus on that issue. So we just want to confirm that the council was agreeable to capping the number of evictions, no more than 10% a month or 25% in a year for buildings of five or more, and then for buildings with four or fewer units that it would be capped at one unit a year. There was a lot of discussion, but no consensus about the issue of mom and pop property owners. And I think and whether or not they should be exempted from requirements of pain, relocation benefits, which there was consensus that relocation benefit should be required for no cause and no fault evictions. And then the discussion was whether or not mom and Pops should have some sort of an exemption. And the first two bullets on this slide are really to kind of frame the the the discussion or the the issues about this. You know, on one hand, it's the ability of a mom and pop property owner to pay the relocation benefit. Would that be a hardship? Would they, you know, maybe not have the cash on hand? And then on the other kind of on the other end of the discussion is that if you exempt mom and pops from the payment of relocation benefits, is that it does that create a disparate impact on tenants who, just by virtue of living in a smaller complex, they would not get the same rights and benefits as tenants living in a larger complex so that those kind of the first two bullets kind of frame this issue. And then there was the discussion about, well, and if we were to look at doing some sort of exemption, whoa, how would we define, you know, a mom and pop property owner? And so staff did. You know, we did take a look and see if we could find ordinances that had definitions of mom and pop property owners . We didn't find a lot of examples. Los Gatos has rent control and Los Gatos is rent control. Ordinance applies to projects that are three or more units. The city of Los Angeles has a definition. It's a very narrow definition. Their definition of mom and pop operators is narrowly in their muni code for relocation benefits that are paid for owner move ins. And their definition of a mom and pop is you can't own more than a single family home. And then for four units in the city of Los Angeles. So those were those were kind of what we could find looking at, you know, over the last month to see if we could find a definition. Because if the council is interested in and if there is any consensus on on whether or not there should be an exemption, you would need to define what a mom and pop was. And so staff would want feedback. And I do apologize for that typo up there about defined honors be defined. So I apologize for that. And and the other thing I wanted to point out, it's in the staff report that there was there's been some discussion that perhaps if there was a desire to kind of acknowledge that pain, the the cash relocation benefit could be a hardship right now. And what we had talked about was relocation benefits would either be in the form of cash or additional time, and that that would be at the choice of the tenant if the council were interested in exploring potentially an idea where mom and pops once again having to be defined and their option, they could choose the cash benefit or more time. And that might deal with the issue of whether or not they had the financial wherewithal to to pay the relocation benefit. So something to think about and that's talked about in the staff report. Another issue that there was a little bit of discussion about was was there sufficient discussion afforded to to the council and the community about whether or not a rent increase cap was that a consensus was reached regarding the issue of a rent increase cap? What staff heard and what staff believed the consensus was on the 5th of January was that there was that the council there was not consensus on setting a maximum allowable rent increase or, you know, that basically there was no consensus on having an annual cap on the amount of rent increase, which is what that's traditional rent control , is that you have a maximum allowable rent increase. And if you want to raise your rent beyond that maximum allowable annual rent increase, you go through a petition process, a hearing process in the alternative. Or alternately, what we heard is that council wanted to establish a rent increase threshold which was set on the fifth at 5% above which a property owner would be required to initiate the rec hearing process. And then. Layered on to that would be the requirement to provide what the slide here says, a binding arbitration appeal process. And I just want to talk about those two words. Binding arbitration. Binding arbitration has a legal and a technical meaning that we are not proposing under the the ordinance and the program. Typically in binding arbitration in kind of the strictest legal sense is that the two parties waive their rights to a judicial you know, they say we do binding arbitration and we agree to go with the arbitrator decision and we give up our recourse to to that to the courts. We explicitly say that if somebody doesn't like the hearing officer's decision, they could take it to the next level, to the courts. And in addition, the rules are much stricter with binding arbitration, and the rules would not be kind of technical and strict. It would be a little bit more informal than technically binding arbitration. So we're actually calling it a binding hearing process. So that was my short cut. But I just want to clarify that we're. You will not see binding arbitration going forward, appearing anywhere in any of our documents. And then I just wanted to this was the the ordinance this was the flowchart that we showed and shared with the council and the community on the fifth. The only thing that is different about this is that when we had presented this on the fifth, we were working with an 8% cap. And we we've revised this to reflect the 5% which the Council had given consensus on on the fifth. So that what it shows is that right now, under the current ordinance that went into effect October of 2015, the landlord has to notify when the landlord increases the rent. They have to notify the tenant of the hearing process the availability of that process under the proposed ordinance. Now, you would not only would you notify your tenant of the availability of the right process, but if you are proposing a rent increase in excess of 5%, you must the property owner must file that notice with the the staff and start that process. And then if the rent increase is 5%, under 5%, the tenant can request a hearing, but it's a more optional process. When the racketeering is scheduled, the landlord must attend that. That is also provided for in our current ordinance that went into effect in October. And if a landlord doesn't attend the hearing, the rent increases null and void, and the rent cannot be increased for another 12 months. That's already on our books. The one kind of nuance to this is that with the hearing process under the proposed ordinance. If you've raised your rent, if you're proposing a rent increase 5% or more or above 5%, add someone with an ownership interest must participate in the racketeering. So that's another kind of piece that just kind of taken together with all of the other requirements is really intended to incentive incentivize property owners to keep rent increases at 5% or less. You go through a non-binding process if the parties agree. Great. If the parties don't agree and you are and you are in a unit that is subject to Costa Hawkins, is subject to rent control. You can go forward with the binding hearing process and if you are in an exempt unit, a unit that's exempt from Costa Hawkins, your appeal process would be to the City Council for a non-binding. Review of the Iraq decision. And then this slide just shows in a little more, you know, kind of going the next step if you end up if one of the parties requests. The binding hearing process that which would be available for rent increases above 5% for units that are covered by Costa Hawkins. You can go through the back and go to a binding hearing. You have the hearing with the hearing officer. The hearing officer's decision is becomes the imposed rent. And you. That's your rent. Unless you. Decide to go onto judicial review. So that is just kind of a recap of the the process charts that we had presented on the fifth and that we. Believe. There was consensus on that. And so really staff is asking that that that that direction be affirmed for us. And then lastly on the data collection, the council felt very strongly about the importance of data collection. And we just wanted to clarify that because we're focusing on increases of about 5% or four tenant initiated cases, that that's where we would we would be requiring data for those increases, and we would not be requiring property owners to notify staff of increases that were less than 5%. And this is really kind of striking a balance about the amount of work and the cost versus the effectiveness of of the data collection. So with that is staff's presentation. I will sit down, take public comment and then happy to return and talk about. Thank you. I appreciate that. Okay. And I'm going to call out names and if people could line up and then you have 2 minutes and you will just keep it moving. Okay. I really appreciate that. It'll be Eric Strimling, maybe you, Kevin Yi and then Keith White, Whiteson and then Amanda. It looks like. Like. So you could line up on this side and then approach. Let's go, Eric. Thank you, sir. Good evening. Waste is not good morning this time. That's right. Let's try to get all these through the evening then quickly. So very interesting meeting. I just thought along the meeting, the people who are getting the community development block grant, how many of them are renters? How many of them will be able to afford 5% rent increases? How much of the money that we're trying to get to these people will be taken by rent increases by landlords? How many of the artists in on Alameda Point would be able to afford a 25 to 30% increase in their rent over the next five years, which is what a 5% per year increase would give them? They have a fixed rent. That's why they can afford to be there. It's why they can predict and build their business. I think tenants in Alameda should deserve the same favor. On the one year leases. The real question is at the end of that lease, is that an eviction? Standardly a lease ends and it's the end of a contract. And you just say, I'm not really doing a lease and goodbye. If that's the case, then offering a one year lease is a trap. If you don't take it, then you get all of the protections of eviction control. If you do take it, you're out after a year and you get nothing. So I'd like you to please explicitly put into your ordinance that termination of a lease is an eviction and subject to all of the controls. Whatever controls you do choose to put on to evict on to evictions. I'd like to point out that 53% of our maidens live in rental units, or 52% of housing units are rental. More than half of your constituents are who you're talking about here. Landlords constitute maybe 2%. So it's a lot of people and they're living with a 30 day. I mean, they're living with a 60 day possibility of eviction all the time. If you keep the four months, do the math, you're going to get a lot of evictions on December 31st because six months from then is the end of the school year. Parents will choose to stay in school and lose the money in order to keep their kid in the school. Thank you. Maybe you. Maybe you. All right? And I need you guys to keep going. I'm sorry. We are. You only get 2 minutes. This is quite late and I'll try and keep. Let's see. Or with 2 minutes. And there are so many things we all want to talk. So I don't envy you guys. You have to weigh the delicate balance between apparently 53% of their constituency are tenants and maybe only 47% of their landlords. So what I invite you to look at is, is a. That were mom and pop businesses. I mean, sure, there are. There are a handful. I think someone earlier said Don Smith had some security concern. Well, there are not a lot of Don Smith. Most of us are mom and pop. My wife and I have lived in Alameda for 15 years. We we saved up our life savings and bought a property. We rehabbed it, spent literally two years because we bought it in foreclosure and spent hundreds of thousand dollars, including the foundation, made it we made it habitable where it was not before. So we're increased the housing stock but for Alameda and it was a Victorian home. So so it's got a nice statue on Lincoln Avenue. And so. The concern that I have is the controls that you're putting that you're considering putting in place prohibit us from being comfortable about being able to sustain our business. You say, well, this tenant, if it's greater than 5%, will. The the normal landlord tenant relationship is to take care of the tenant because you want a long term tenant, you're going to do the repairs that are necessary. And because a vacancy is is a big no in our industry. And so you're by putting that 5% threshold in there, for example, what you're doing is you're telling the landlord community to every year raise the rent by 5%. I don't want to raise it by 5%. I'd rather most times leave it at zero or 2% or something like that. But I'm going to need to keep up with the because I don't know what's coming down the road. I might have a bad tenant who destroys something. I might have a leaky roof or an earthquake that I can't fund without. Thank you. 2 minutes and that's as much. Appreciate it. Thank you very much, Phoebe. Maybe you? Yeah. My name is Phoebe. You. Good evening to Mayor, Madam Mayor and the councilman. Thank you guys for staying so late and hear us out. Well, it is there are more than 50% of all Americans are renters. That means less than a little bit less than 50% of all Americans are homeowners. I'm not sure 2% or 7% or any percentage of them are landlords. But I've heard enough of landlords telling their stories, just like the gentleman before me. So Alameda has a very tight community. Sorry to. Interrupt. I need you to lower your sign so the people behind you can see or you can go sit in the back row so you're not blocking anyone. Thank you very much. All right. You may continue. Thank you. We have a very tight community here in Alameda and it shows by one example are a measure a parcel tax was voted by 68.1% of the voters in Alameda to pass. The special assessment to only the property owners, which we all voted yes. So we will pay $0.32 per square foot by the properties that we own to support our school and our school district. And that means for a property owner who owns a 2000 square foot property, they will pay $640 more property taxes per year. And for some landlords who owns about 10,000 square foot, maybe eight units are rental property, they will pay extra 30 $200 per year. That's a little bit too short in 2 minutes, I think. Can I finish? I'm just. Sorry. We need to keep moving along. Well, you were. I were interrupted. All right. All right, go ahead. Go ahead. That's right. That's right. I appreciate that. I don't know if you gave extra time. Right. Thank you very much. Thank you. So we voted yes to way more so the majority. Another example is if you are studying the thesis that our HCC has been reviewed for unreasonably increase rent, there are only a handful of landlords does that. The majority of the landlords in Alameda are very reasonable. By strictly rental control in one format is going to penalizing mom and pop landlords like us. So another point I really, really would like to make is the reason, another very valuable reason why we love Alameda is because we have all these historic homes. You know, they are in the styles of or different. I appreciate that. We have 20 some more speakers to go. So thank you. Next speaker Kevin, you. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Kevin. And then it'll be Amanda and then William, if I can. Okay. And then Franny and Mark. Okay. Thank you, Major Spencer. Mayor Spencer, council member of staff, city. Staff for being here, just like hearing us out. My name is Kevin Yi, and I'm here on behalf of all the all the moms and pops owner in Alameda. Like many, you know. Small landlords. For years, my wife and I, we weren't able to refinance due to the market value at the time when the rental market was extremely low. And for many years, my wife and I, we were always in the red when we had to go into our own funds to pay the bills. And it wasn't until one or two years ago that we were starting to break even. I mean, one of the main reasons my wife and I decided to invest in. Alameda is because is a small towns, a close knit community. And, you know, like life was. Simpler and there was no rent control over. Here. And what I see in bigger companies, corporation or owners that were thought to have 20 to 100 units in a same building. You know. They're having to pass, raise, rent. Substantially or evict with no with no cost. I mean, everyone knows that in general, cost has been increasing and still increasing everywhere from property tax, property insurance management fee, utility repair and maintenance. I mean, the 5% increase is quite low for small owners that have less units to work with. I mean, just recently because of the storm, I put up a 20 foot fence with two gate and that cost almost $2,000. And I have several estimates I made that were from local, you know, a handyman. And I compared it with the estimates I had with the licensed contractor. And they were like 3500 to 4000 for the same fence. I mean, and to get a plumber or locksmith into your place is like $80 just for them to show up. I mean, this is just showing that costs are still increasing and repairs are expensive. I mean I mean, I'd just like to also mention to know just cause I mean, with my eight years experience that says land or I encounter like tennis that just aren't compliance with the building rules and no matter how hard I try or how do we solve this? I think all. The tenants I mean, all the landlords had experience, like with tenants that are just noncompliance with the rules that everyone's lives miserable. And because. Of this. No, just cause it helped us out tremendously. I mean, I just want to say, you know, that your meeting is on February 16th. I just hope that my next speaker. Amanda. Okay. Let's go. And then after your manabe. William and then Franny. And then Stephanie. Good evening, mayor and council members. I'm here to represent the small mom and pop landlords, and I just wanted to give you, like, my my perspective of this as a property owner from mom and pop standpoint is hard, like Kevin mentioned and the previous owner, that landlords try to do their very best to accommodate everyone. And so it's not in their intention to increase rent or anything like that. But when. You know, things that come up, for example, just the basic of mortgage payment and property tax, you know, that increases every year, plus just homeowner's insurance that left alone. But when something happens, like your roof breaks down, that's $20,000 of replacement cost right there. And then so I mean, just to bring up something like that, refrigerator cost replacement is two 500 plus stove a repair is $200. So the list goes on. And so just to bring that up, it is hard for someone like that. So that 5% is kind of difficult to work with. I just I would just wanted to bring attention like, for example, like mom and pop struggles to, for example, I recall when we had to borrow to it, I mean , financial aid for my daughter to attend college. And it wasn't an easy task, but luckily she was approved the financial aid and loan because of budget. But that's do because the rent did not cover the expenses that we had to incur. And so we didn't mind making the sacrifices. We knew what we were getting into and I and I'm happy about that also mentioned about the refinance it was it is difficult when you are going under the market, the value and your rent control. It doesn't when you're trying to refinance a loan, they're going to decline you and then that's a possibility of foreclosure. So I just want to bring that to your attention to as well in terms and then I think somebody mentioned about she put on a slide show about the 5000 dollar moving expenses. I like that option of perhaps considering relocating for 4 to 6 months instead of paying that 1500 dollars rent. If that's a consideration, the Times is up. So anyway, I guess that's about oh, like one last thing, but the mom and pop, she did statistics about it. I just want to bring like Mountain View in like Los Altos is a whole different market. I mean, the rent is outrageous. So thank you. Thank you very. William is there. William, when you went home. Okay, Frannie. We are not I'm not the time. You really are not. He get up 5:00 in the morning to go to work. All right. And you're Fannie and Freddie or thank you. And then after Frannie will be Stephanie and then Don SC later. Go. Evening, everybody. Good evening. I represent a group of small property owners in Alameda City. We are looking at a proposed rent ordinance. We did not see any exemptions, so we would like to respectfully request that if there's any proposed rent ordinance, there will be clearly defined exemptions. We have night requests. Number one, new building after 1995. Second, substantial. We have dilatation of the 1995, especially the historic building, because when we restore them, we get to keep the outside and we do that foundation after the inside is extremely costly. I have renovated two buildings like that due process. I spent $500,000 in each of the building. I'm a rent is about $3,000 a month. And historic home because we believe that under the California era Mental Control Act, historic home cannot have rent control without clear study and approval and special approval request exemption to single framing, home and due process. Because a lot of homeowners, elderly, family, they live in one in Alameda and the rent out the other. It's very common to rent a one unit of a due personnel I mean that to supplement the retirement income. House share situation. A lot of men and their relatives live the house. When a couple rooms subsidize the income, tenants own property within 100 miles of Alameda should not have a rent control apartment. I have a tenant works at Google making $103,000 a year and he rents one room from me. I can tell you that in two years we'll be buying homes in other cities in California. So rent control should be income based. And finally, if the tenant refused to cite another lease, same length as a current lease should be exempt. That's it's the same as the San Francisco rent ordinance. And then. The Labor and material concession calls in the last four years doubled. I got a call from a licensed contractor doing four steps of Stairway for $5,000. So 5% is way too low. And we do not have a lot. Of evictions in Alameda when there's no rent. Control. Q Is there, Stephanie? No. Stephanie. All right, Don Celotto. And then Katherine Pauling and then April ceded her time to Catherine and then Malcolm Leigh. Good evening. Thanks for your time and thanks for working so hard on this. Just a brief explanation of our situation. We are a mom and pop landlords. The biggest property we own has three units. Most of them are single family units. We do own several units. We've invested a lot of money because they're older homes and maintaining them with roofs and in foundations and so on over the last few years. But most of our tenants, we try not to raise the rent. We're very small and make very small rent increases. Just because they're good tenants and we'd like to keep them there. And usually if they leave, then we'll worry about market rate. They leave voluntarily. I have a couple of questions for you, though. How much is this whole rack process going to cost? And we did discuss it at one of the prior meetings. It seemed quite large. And then how are we going to pay for it? Are the landlords going to pay or the tenants are going to pay? Are we both going to pay? But I think we need some clarification there from you. And then what happens when we have to sell the home for whatever reason? We'd like to be able to get the market rate for that home, whoever is buying it, if they want to continue to rent it out. We're going to have other issues. So is there anybody thinking about what's happening there? You know, please take it into consideration. That's all I have. Thank you very much. Thank you. Katherine Pauling. And she has someone saying a time to her. So it's 4 minutes. I have two people sitting time to me at this. The other one. I have April and Malia. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. Katherine Pauline, leader of Alameda Renters Coalition. Thank you. It's not quite. Good morning. We sent a letter responding to the staff report and I understand there was difficulty opening it. So I want to use the time to actually read our position. We went over it very carefully. We have a number of questions and a number of concerns. Dear Mayor and Council Members, the Alameda Renters Coalition respectfully provides the following for your consideration regarding rent increases and evictions in Alameda. We believe there are important principles that must be emphasized and kept in mind during your deliberations. They are that the ordinance regarding rents and evictions must, in the first instance, serve the dual purpose of keeping rents stable and keeping residents in their home. Recall that it was renters. The majority of Alameda residents who brought the issues of excessive rent increases and unfair evictions to the council in 2014. Why do we say this? It's because too much discussion has focused more on landlords right to a fair return rather than on rent stabilization and tenant protections. I will have to point out that that Debbie spent quite a bit of time expressing concern about how mom and Pops could pay even the small allocation allowed, and only a passing reference on what it might be like to be a tenant with none of those resources. And that is to the core of this. This is becoming kind of a landlord protection act. 20. She she really she went on and on and on about the mom and pops and only a passing momentary reference to tenants. The rent crisis was not created by the tenants, but by excessive rent increases and unjust evictions by too many Alameda landlords. Again, we ask that you keep this in mind. Regarding the cap on maximum allowable increases. Without a cap on rent increases, rents quickly become unaffordable and rent stabilization is not achieved. We have consistently called for a rent cap of. 65% of the Bay Area CPI. In line with numerous other California cities. Despite this, staff has never provided data indicating why it is not possible for landlords to make a fair return, with rent increases capped at 65% of CPI, nor even addressed it as a reasonable option for Alameda. Neither staff nor council have provided a rationale for uncapped rent increases, nor provided data regarding the cumulative effects of uncapped rent increases. Uncapped rent increases this threshold that you mention do not stabilize rents and ultimately lead to displacement. Similarly, the proposed 5% rent increase threshold to trigger a mandatory review by the Rent Review Advisory Committee rank is not related to any economic metric. Such as the CPI. And again, no analysis of the cumulative effect of 5% rent increases is provided. Cumulative 5% rent increases show after only three increases, which can occur within 25 months, that on a $2,000 apartment will cost $2,315 within 25 months, a 315 a month rent increase with a 5% cap. And after five rent increases and when Don Lindsay did some of his stats, he showed that the average tenant stayed about five years and in an apartment. And then there was a natural move. After five rent increases, it would be a $552 a month rent increase. These are not affordable rents and increases like this do not achieve rent stabilization. The title of your proposed ordinance, on the other hand, rent increases at 65% of CPI so that a $2,000 a month rent amount increases to $2,098. It would be a $98 a month rent increase. After three increases, it would go up to 2160. Oh, excuse me. I read that amount increases after a 98 a month after three increases 165 a month after five rent increases at 65% of the CPI. Stabilize rents and protect tenants from economic displacement. Meanwhile, the average income growth has been 2% per year, meaning that Alameda families with a 5% cap would be falling behind. To truly stabilize, rent increases must be limited to 65% of the Bay Area Consumer Price Index, which currently at 2.4% would make 1.6% the allowable increase. We've been dealing with double digits now for year after year and the council chose, the landlords chose 10% and indeed that's what the RAC was imposing time after time, then arbitrarily 8% and the moratorium now arbitrarily 5%. It's still almost three times what is reasonable. Somehow this disconnect where property owners, homeowners have twice had more than twice the income of renters, there is a disconnect here. So I'm going on with my second seed capital improvement plan. It's now 6 minutes, so that it was 6 minutes. But one more person has offered this time. You have another. That was 6 minutes. I'm sorry. At that time. Because two other speakers said they wouldn't speak and let her speak. But. Okay. So then I'm going to propose. 2 minutes to kind. Of wind it up or you can come back around because I've got another 20 some speakers. I understand. Thank you. Okay. So there's also the capital improvement plan. And we do not believe landlords should have should be able to evict tenants just for substantial rehabilitation. We've talked about this before. People stay in their homes when they do it. It should be a temporary relocation. What should the expense should be covered? No cause protections. An ordinance that allows no cause evictions does not provide tenant protection. A cap on the number because we oppose all no cause evictions. We cannot of vision in circumstance of multiple evictions being acceptable relocation assistance. The current amounts mentioned are far below. It costs me 8000 to move the last time by the time you do first last deposit and the cost of moving. I'm 67 it's and my friends with their bad backs. We can't do a U-Haul and do it anymore. The amounts of money. 1500 for moving. Are you kidding? Relocation assistance. So the benefit, the rent increase process and the rec individual, when you have 55.3% of households in Alameda are renters and you're going to do it individually through a mediation and arbitration process. And renters have to pay. Where I resolved. And withdrawn. I freaked out contact. All right. I'm sorry. I actually don't have a gavel to gavel. I don't count it out. I'm sorry. I'm quiet. Please. Thank you. I don't. I. I'm okay. I'm sorry. We're going to take. A short recess. Thank you for taking a recess. I don't have a dog, and I. Yes, we're taking a recess. I'm sorry. I don't have a gavel. I need to calm this down before you can take. And you even hear me that I'm taking a recess. Did we take. Ah. Easy way to get the gavel. Is that. The big. I think maybe it. Not seed time, I think, you know, the the stalwarts. Well, just in case anyone was thinking of doing that. Well. Otherwise, I don't think. And I think. Okay. So he's. Going to change the rules because of intimidation. Midstream. Okay, that seems okay. Like Rule of riot. Well, actually, Ms.. Ms. Wooldridge just pointed out that we probably can't change procedures that we announced at the beginning of a meeting. Actually, something so. So we were on recess. Now we're going to resume the meeting. All right. Member Ashcroft Well, I, I would favor not seeding time, but I understand some people might feel strongly about that, just that, you know, those of you in the room are the the stalwarts who stayed. So you should be able to have your 2 minutes. And then just a tip to all of you speakers, just launch right into your remarks. You don't have to greet the mayor, the staff, everybody else, because that's eating up your 2 minutes. So just go straight to the heart of what you want to talk to us about. Okay. Any other council comments. Thank you. All right. So after Kathryn, I have Leah Vella, then Malcolm Lee. She ceded her time to Katherine to. All right. Now Malcolm Lee and then Tony charr yet it looks like. And then c h unchr. I am a yes. Let me just cut to the chase. The a lot of folks, if you are not a homeowner, you don't understand. A lot folks will not understand this. It's not to blame them. But you when I'm a homeowner, I also am also a landlord. Now, the when we collect rent, on one hand it goes out as a mortgage. Property taxes maintain the big ticket items, even maintenance. And a lot of us are all working class the homeowners. So what happened is this we go to work during the daytime and we stay working now. The so the at the end of the day, we go to the building, we went to head of maintenance crew and sometimes we get where to head off the service people to clean up the cleaning crew. So as we go along some years, we have good tenants until we don't. And someday we have a good economy, someday we don't. So let's just go back a little bit from 2006 all the way to 2010 and 11. Randall Market is very, very soft and is very hard for us to keep our buildings full due to that load at low occupancy during those years. Who is out there to help us? No one is. We have to struggle extremely hard so that we can keep afloat. Otherwise, if we can't collect rent or if we have too much vacancy, then our we won't be able to pay the mortgage. So what would happen? Foreclosure and lose. Just two years ago. We have a we have a chance to catch up and now we have this rent control imposed of us. Just like all my colleagues mentioned earlier, the the maintenance costs, everything goes up on top of that. One thing that I like to point out to the council members is this. Recently we got some letters from a garbage company. They said you have to have compost and if you don't separate them, if your tenants do not do that, you as home owner, you will get dinged for it. So we got caught in both ends. This is not right. So I'm completely against Franklin trial. Thank you, Tony. This discussion started at 8%. I was okay with that. Now we're dwindling down to 5%. Landlords have a lot of expense here. We have property tax insurance. Maintenance on the properties. And, you know, there are rumors the Federal Reserve is worried that we'll might be going into a recession. And if we do go into recession, I can tell you a lot of landlords will have a hard time when these tenants are not there and buildings are vacant and we have 20%, 30% vacancy rates. They will have a hard time. And, you know, forecast is that at the end of the year we will be in a recession and things will not be as nice as they are now. What are you going to do for the landlords? What do they do? Are we going to be supplemented in any way? Who can we take? Give us a break on our property tax? No, the answer is no. Will the banks give us a break? No. They'll foreclose our properties. So please have a little consideration. We really come out like the bad person here trying to gouge everybody. It's not the truth. And you all know that we have a big financial responsibility and we're just trying to stay afloat. Thank you. Thank you. And I want to clarify, we are not talking about a 5% cap. We are talking about a 5%, what I'm calling a trigger that if a landlord wants to do more than 5%, that they would go to rack. But we are not talking about any cap. And when you compared it to the 8% that was during the moratorium and that was a cap 8% during the year that this proposal is has no cap. However, the landlord would have to come to our rent review advisory committee if they want to do more than 5%. And then that's when the the landlord would have the opportunity to share. But you're speaking of these additional costs or whatnot. So I just want to clarify that. So you're. You're welcome, Tony. I'm sorry. That was Tony. And now it looks like Cenci. And then Greg McConnell. And then Mimi. Good morning. So I guess you heard the latest news, Yahoo! All 1500 last week. We were. And then before that, GoPro, Twitter, IBM, HP, all announced layoff. No new IPO for a while. Chatter about Apple and Google have a hiring freeze. Last quarter GDP point 7% or this number indicated basically economy inflection point is actually closer than many of us think. So actually when you made a decision, think about it. When you go through a downturn, you basically, as the Lord shared the responsibility to shoulder the responsibility that's no market economy, whatever, you know, free reign, one month's free reign for the tenant. Okay, you go ahead and do it. Nobody help us. But when the market is good, the economy's good. Then we have to go to some sort of control economy. So basically you have to have a cap. That's not fair. And then number three, I wish that the console can be a little bit more creative in terms of thinking outside the box. Like Redwood City, they actually have some sort of incentive for the landlord. If you offer volunteer rent control under certain limit, they give you some sort of incentive. I think there's something creative way you can think about it. And also single say they are considering rent control. They hired a consulting group to study it and the finding, you guys can also attend a meeting as well over there. Basically, what they found is really interesting. From 1990 to night, 2014, the 24 years, actually the rent increases for the unit that under rent control are higher than those that are not under rent control. So if you think about it, it really makes sense to to actually allow the market economy to do its work, don't mess around with it. So if you have interest in it, you can get a report from sellers they are willing to share with you. Thank you. Thank you. I just. I'm Debbie. Debbie Porter. Why don't you. Thanks. All right, Greg McConnell. Maybe. Is there a mommy war? Ah. Oh, there's like RH. Ah. Lester Cabral. Is he? Anyone else come up. Good evening. Manama City Council. Let's talk about resident of Alameda and a property owner. Been here for many years. You know, it's only been less than 30 days since we met on this issue. And all of a sudden we've got all kinds of new things here. You know, 5% was 8%, you know, and these little notations and stuff. You know, with rental business. There's a lot in into doing rent here in Alameda and anybody that's if you studied the state real estate guide you'd notice there's quite a few there's quite a bit of information in there. I think we're acting too quick on this here. We need more time to really get into defining what's going on here and the best avenue. Like I said at the last meeting was we do have a rent for review committee here. Let's utilize them. You know, you get into 5% and all these other little things, you know, they're just little tricks on there. It's really not going to work. We need to go case by case. They say there's better than 50% of the housing here in Alameda is rentals. Okay. That's a lot of people, you know, and not everybody is getting hit with hard rents. There are some out there. Sure. Those need to go before this rent review committee and get ironed out. But the majority of it out there is not, you know, I mean, that's just where it's at. I've been in the business for over 50 years, you know, and seen a lot. You know, the market is from supply and demand. And, you know, you have to really look at that emphasis. You're going to put us little guys out of business. You know, that's just what's going to happen. The mama papa clause here, nobody can define it. Come on. Anybody that owns less than five units, you know they're a mama. Papa, because they can't afford ten units. That's just way out of bounds. But anyway, we need to do a lot more work here. Thank you. Thank you, Dan Wang. And then Minha Yang in a yang. And then Tristan Schmidt. And even he won't want me there. Yeah, I just wanted to echo the comment. You know, especially concerned about a court of arbitration. Is that taxpayer or a landlord? Landlords or renters. So, you know, wish that I chatted with real estate agent and he told me is that this will rent control will have a very negative impact on society in the city and especially in terms of income. And he predicted that the investors will have much less interest in buying rental properties and that and the value will drop. And as a household now I'm concerned about that. And also to the as the number of transaction in real estate sales are drop, this would reduce the income from transfer tax and the property tax and consequently we reduce the funding for schools and the public. So is I really like Alameda as a very charming city and a school system? And, you know, I'm really concerned about that. I do want to our children, you know, they need to have early release because of lack of funding. That is really not good. And at that point, you know, I would like to echo that. You know, I have experience. I have a plumber who charges $200 for 40. 40 minutes. On clogging. And we have some guy come to change the tank or charge it, you know, $800 for the labor. And, you know, who is going to cap that. And so, you know. So in short, you know, cost is there. And, you know, once economy is not good, there's nobody protect the landlord. Thank you. Minor, Mina. I'm interested in Schmidt and then Rosalind mcCorvey. Hi. Good morning. Mina Young. Um, as a mom and pop owner, we really need things to be flexible because we all to ourselves, I mean, we take care of. The parties ourselves. And we have parents to take take care of. My dad has. Dementia and then, you know, we have to take care of him and have to take care of the properties. And so, I mean, whenever something happens, we have to take time off from work and take care of it. So either take care of the work or take care of the parents. So it's very important that we be flexible. And so by having more laws and more restrictions, it's very hard to run the business. So a lot of times we would rather not run the business, just not rent. And so you'll get less tax revenues and then we'll get less income. It's very hard to do that. And so and we are owners and and tenants and I mean, we are roommates sometimes with our tenants. So it's is very important that we be able to, uh, to work with the tenants directly, freely. So by having more restrictions, it's not going to help and you'll you're going to take more units out of the market. Thank you. Thank you. First, Linda Corby. I'm sorry. Tristan. Tristan Schmitz. Next. Sorry. You're right. My husband and I have been mom and pop tenants in Alameda for 20 years since 1996. My husband's a teacher. I'm a childcare provider. I see a lot of classism going on here, a lot of implicit class values that are discriminatory. My husband's a teacher. I provide childcare. But the gentleman back here who told me to get a job at 20 years of employment experience, have a master's degree in psychology. And I'd like to know why the police don't respond to this kind of thuggery when innocent renters stand in the hallway and get sent to Santa Rita classes . Okay. That's what I see here for the last nine years, before I got evicted by Gallagher, Lindsey, my mom and pop landlord never once came by. I had a leaking pipe for nine years. I had a crumbling wall. We had two heaters, neither of which rarely, hardly ever worked. We had gardeners come in between grass of Tony's left cigaret butts all over the place and mowed down the tulips we planted. This is not market value service. How many of these landlords who claim to be mom and pops actually live in other towns? How many actually have other jobs? Other incomes? How many have properties in other towns? One of my landlord has a very lucrative restaurant business. Another one was a car dealer. We need to take into account the fact that just because somebody already has money, had enough money to buy a property does not mean that they are guaranteed an unlimited raise every single year. The economy has tanked because we had to bail out the banks. Okay. The economy is not getting better. I am not going to get a 10% or a 5% raise every year. I provide a valuable service here. I do a lot of volunteer work. Money is not my first priority, but my next home is going to be a tent. And you know where you go from the tent? The police come and take it away. Why? Classism. First, Linda Carvey. And then Lawrence Quintero. Good evening. I'd like to see if we can get exemptions for mom and pop landlords. We are small business owners, just like you were saying about Alameda Point. Say the small business owners retain them. You have to protect us also. We. This is. This is not a hobby. This is our job. We are responsible people and we do the best we can. And as far as, uh, having rent control on the small, say, 5 to 6 unit buildings and under. I think it would be unfair. The. We don't have deep pockets like the larger investors. I personally know people that are in rent control units in San Francisco. They're laughing at the bank out there. They're planning on staying forever in these units. They they earn each $150,000. They're married. And, you know, they're going to stay forever. And it's not fair that they're able to stay. So this rent control should be tenant income based and it should not be, you know, oh, just everyone. It doesn't work that way. And also, historic properties are a lot more expensive to maintain. And just repairing anything is just a fortune. So that should be an exemption also. And, you know, one has the right to devalue my property when I go to sell this or what, you know, whatever I intend to do in the future that your 5% cap or or possibly more. It's not going to be convincing to the next buyer. So when the appraiser comes out, okay, when the appraiser comes out to do an analysis, they're going to take into all of this into account. So you're devaluing my property, which is not fair. Thank you. Thank you. Lawrence Quintero. And then Dan Zhang. I just wanted to. Give you my interpretation of what's going on here. My wife and I have had a three unit place here in Alameda for about 25 years. And in that 25 years, we've had probably two evictions. And they were because of the behavior of the tenants, not because we wanted to get the people out, because most of our tenants stay there, some, you know, seven, ten years. And we treated them right and they treated right, you know, treat us good as landlords. We were always thinking of what they could afford. We try to keep our rents down as much as we possibly could because we wanted to keep them. So as a small landlord or mom and pop, as some of them say, we've had good experiences. And our tenants have a good experience. Now, when we're talking about a place that has 50 or 100 units, that's something else. And I don't feel that. I should be put in the same bottle as somebody who has tenants and mistreats their their tenants. And I just don't think it's fair. I think the rent rent review board has worked well, and I don't understand why we have to change everything because of some people's concerns. I mean, I feel bad if somebody is having a tough time, but landlords can have have tough times also. I just had to put a new sewer ladder. 9000 bucks. You know, I'm not going to go to the tenants. Say you have to give me so much to pay for this. I had to figure out how I was going to pay it. So as I say, the rent review thing, it doesn't bother me. Because if you do right, you're going to come out okay. I just don't like the fact that they're trying to box in with all these others. Thank you. Thank you. Dan? And then Margaret Tong. And then Layla. I'm here. I just want to express my. Opinion about the No Cause. Eviction because. Alameda is different from San Francisco. Hayward, Berkeley is a way to want to be. Another San Francisco or, you know, like a San Jose. Or, you know, you know, Alameda. We have like 4000 buildings outside the historical buildings and study list. And the also we have to see, do you have a soft story list? So for the homeowner, I have to do the earthquake originally, you know, certain type. So some of the job we need to evict, empty the whole building to finish the job. So if we have the. The limitation of the eviction, no cause eviction, then how could the homeowner do the job? So why here? So if we have five or four units, that means that the first to evict the one I pay for the, you know, something like the penalty or relocation cause the and the wait empty the unit and the with another year you wait another one and then after four years empty the building. Then we I can do. The earthquake a regional fee. So that makes no sense. So that. Yeah, I just want to say. That. So everything should be. Case by case. We cannot deal with it just like it is with. Margaret. And then Leila and then Daniel Lee. Well, everyone. I am. Mom and pop small shop and I'm single. Mom. I have a big mortgage to pay. I have a historical building. Maybe I have a brick foundation that on which I don't have money to replace. I just spend $20,000 on a roof and replace a roof because of the rain. So I have not increased by tennis rent for the last three years. So I treat them very well. And I if they have a hardship, I can delay their payments. So I think this rent control is really unfair to put us in a hardship. We are responsible owner. We are. He kept everything all the way up here right away. Since the the market baby market is tied to the standard of living people, of income. So minimum wage went up 28% in Oakland in last two years. I have not. I am sub engineer. I work full time. I'm single mom. My rent, my income have not increased for the last ten years, but I still keep up my rent. I'm not. I'm raising my child by myself. So I think this is rent. Control is not fair for small mom and pop shop. Thank you. All right. Thank you. Layla. I'm sorry. What was your name? I'm sorry. Hey, come on. What was your name? I live in Alameda for 20 years already. I have a house, a very old and the old house. You know those? Of those houses really near the coast right now. This is a business. Business would be outside. Happy then deal. Right. Right now I feel this is not fair because the the thing is for tenant happy you have one side happy the others are not happy. You don't have a right to stop this business. They leave. We should pay them. And moving fee. Up 5%. We have to file for a hearing under 5%. They can file for hearing. And when they move out, we have pay that we have to pay the moving cost and the month's rental cost. We we pay too much and we earn so little because the slow time, you know, when the business is not not good, the houses empty. Nobody can they can choose us. We cannot choose them because our. Life saver already in there. We cannot move the house away. We have a mortgage we have to pay every month. No matter this business, good or not. So I feel very, very sad. Okay, that's it. Thank you. Lila. Before the incident, I was seated by someone. Okay. Did they turn around? Yes, they. Did. Masha. But I did it before that, though. So I think that I should. We've all been waiting for over 5 hours. I'm sorry. I don't have a slip for that name. Say it was. I thought I did. Or did I already call it? I don't know. Ah, you try to do it in 2 minutes. I will try. I'm going to be brief anyway. Thank you all. My name is Layla and I'm a realtor and longtime resident of Alameda. I'm here on behalf of myself, as well as clients I have closely been working with this past year who are mom and pop landlords. And I'm here to oppose this ordinance. And I'd like to give you one brief example of why, supported by actual numbers and this is, by the way, obviously one of many cases. My most recent example is the sale of a multi residential property. My buyer purchased this historic property at the beginning of this year for over $1.7 million, which is on par with current comparable home values in Alameda, where we all live. He currently has a longtime tenant and some of those tenants have been there for over 20 years, and they pay right now in amount of $880 a month for an apartment that is over 1000 square feet in a very nice location just a couple of blocks away from Park Street in Alameda. While I strongly do empathize with these tenants and their situation, I empathize even more for these home owners and landlords whose source of income and only source of income for many comes from these rents which they use for their own bills and livelihood. And this economy is has been and always will be extremely volatile. And it's incredibly unrealistic to assume one's rent will remain the same from year to year, let alone for decades. The last time this particular property was sold was for $130,000 with an annual tax of $6,000. The current tax for this new homeowner is over $35,000 a year, with 5000 for insurance, 5000 for water, utilities, and a mortgage of over $100,000 a year. So his total cost to own this property amounts to over $150,000 a year. The way current rents are at that property, he's making an income of under $70,000, which he now is experiencing a loss of over $80,000. This is a strong underestimation, by the way, and I'm almost done. At this time, the Bay Area is one of the most expensive areas in the entire nation. Home values are dictated by the market, not by individuals. And these home values are what govern the rental market. And these home values are also what makes our beautiful cities so desirable by many to live in, and which is what keeps our businesses here thriving. Again, although I do empathize with the tenants, I believe that the city should look elsewhere for solutions. Please do not punish the homeowners who are bringing up property values and paying exorbitant amounts of annual property taxes. Thank you. All right. And in the future, if you want to have someone cede your time to you, I need that person here so that I know. All right. Okay. Thank you. All right. Next speaker, Daniel Lee. And then it'll be Susan G. O. And then Jeff camera. Okay. So obviously you will see you have already seen that. How much how much friction we have right now by I go ahead and bring it up this ring control stuff in. In so many cities in the Bay Area. I can see in Pacifica, San Francisco, Mountain View. And the river city in san mateo. Any city. This is a tenant, eva. Gays are fighting for their paycheck. They are not fighting for the tenants. They get funded by the city. They get funded by the state. They get funded by the federal ban. Also, probably. And they get a money from the corporation. So they are fighting for their paycheck. They are fighting for their livelihood. They are not fighting for the tenants. We have a very good relationship with our tenants. So all these rent control is coming in right now is going to create a very, very bad relationship between Lando and the tenants. I won't say tenant. I will say our tenants because they are our customer. They pay our bills. We also have to pay a mortgage as well. And just like my colleagues at one money, one side of the pocket, the money comes in and the other pocket I go still up because of the mortgage as well. No. Earlier, one of the teachers say that she'd get evicted. I think. We do not evict any any rent paying tenants. Have you fire anybody who is doing a good job as your employee in piece? Of course not. We don't. Anybody. Anybody? Any tenant? Any tenants that get evicted. It has to be none. And then rent paying tenants or they are behaving badly. Right. Oh, thank you. Thank you very much, Susan. And then Jeff. And then Karen Bay. I go to work last lastly late. Yeah. I'm a small landlord of Alameda. I'm strongly against run counter run trays made by market, not made by landlord or the government. I'm against it because it. It's not fair. They are poor people too. We'll protect small landlord. By the way, I got the last 20% of my 41k and the savings. I cannot pay my son's college fee. Can you please tell me when we will have a city council hearing to get my money back from the stock loss? I did an increase rent every year before. If there's a rent control, I must increase every year. Do you think gun control policy protect tenant? No, absolutely not. I have a full time job Monday to Friday, such like I have to get up sticks for my work. My husband and I spend much of our night time and the weekend to work as a handyman. I do a lot of work gardening, cleaning, painting, small fix, even toilet fix. I also take my 15 year old daughter to do yard work. I let her come here to do the yard work. She asked me, Mom, why you don't hire a gardener to do this work? I say, Daughter. I want to save money. I want to lower my expense to keep this rental property. Otherwise, I don't have money. I'm pro-people too. However, Pepsi's mortgage water power pigeon ye garbage insurance are all increased. Last year for the mint. For the Mint? Is it for the maintenance? I spend $20,000. I just got my water bill yesterday. This must be increased to 5.8% than last bill. I cannot see till I'm out. I don't have extra money to pay. Sorry. Thank you. Thank you. Jeff. There's a gentleman there. I did. I call your name already? Are you all right? All right. Come on up. Thank you. My point is that I think there's not a tendency, not enemy. I think we want to do each other well. And I'm very good landlord. I have to say. Then I. I rent my room. Paul, my tenant. It's only $400 right now. So if I want to improve my. I'll pay my house, then rebuild the foundation. What happened? Think about that. The first. And the second is the. You get on the house and me on the house. I'm retired already and my wife retired. We total income is that lower than $2,000. Okay. So. He would control everything we have to. Foreclosed in my house. The theory is that the only control that then you can do a Home Depot. You controlled the contractor controlled the auditorium through that lets the builder and then you charge it up. Why you don't control them. They come to us. Right. Everybody need to free and then you need to. How many? To living together. So everyday need to talk each other and don't make us strict nor a strict discipline then to who make us a hot time for when to sign and other sides happy. I have to say that my situation in finance is not written in my hand. My tenant. An $80 an hour. You know how much on the highest time. I'm on 40 in an hour and then is lucky. I'm a driving instructor. You're happier. $80 sell them. But they earn each day, each week and each week they then $2,000 each week. And day a week. What happened? So you need to. Consider all the elements together and then make everybody happy. Okay. Thank you very much. Jeff Canberra and then Karen Bay and then John Klein. Good morning, Mayor Spencer. Council and staff. My name is Jeff Canberra. I am a. Community facilitator and have privately mediated numerous tenant landlord disputes. Over the past. 18. Months. I am here. Tonight to draw your attention to a group of residents. That the provisions that. You are discussing may not adequately protect. Our city contains a number of. Groups of residents. That would not. Use the rec. They include families and especially. Elderly tenants that are. Fearful of even talking to their housing providers. And the fear rest in rent increases, even within the limits that you are setting. Service reductions and subtle forms of retaliation that would not rise. To the level of actionable conduct. This list also includes. non-English speaking and ESL residents that do not. Understand the complexities of going through or simply fear Iraq. Hearing undocumented residents, tenants living in. Illegal. Units, and tenants that believe that property management companies regularly review the list of RAK applicants and blacklist residents. The raft, by its very nature, is confrontational. A trained mediator working a semi-private. Environment can assist attended in opening the lines of communication. With the housing provider in a non-hostile, non-confrontational manner that can lead to a mutually. Agreeable resolution. This is the method I have used time and again. There are numerous cities using the semi-private mediation process. The City of Mountain View just passed such a provision. The idea. Of an optional. City sponsored semi-private. Mediation being available to this. To the disputes would serve the most vulnerable yet vulnerable members of our community. As a city sponsored program, the committee would be able to oversee the mediation to assure that the tenants participated in a process that was fair and level the playing field. A city sponsored programs could still collect the data. Thank you very much. I will give you the rest of the time. Thank you. Karen Bey and then John Klein. Good evening. I'm here this evening to represent the small mom and pop landlords. We are going to be the most impacted of all the landlords by this proposed ordinance. If you own 20 units or more, you have the opportunity to spread out the cost. But if you own 1 to 4 units, it's it's it's it's not feasible to spread out the costs without raising rents much higher than 5%. And if you own an older building 100 years or more, the cost to maintain and repair those buildings are significant. I share the same story that this woman told. I'm a single mom again. I've got a brick foundation. I finally the rents have gone up. I can apply for a loan. The loan is 65% LTV. But with your proposed rent ordinance, our property values could go down. We've been told that our property values could be lowered. So this is as if there's an earthquake. I and I need a foundation out of luck, right? To lease the Mountain View ordinance for the leases that terminate. Say that as long as both the tenant and the landlord agree. And I think that that language should be in the ordinance because most tenants are good. But there is the occasional problem a tenant that tries to gain the system relocation assistance. I think it should be means tested. The Mountain View ordinance requires you to qualify for relocation assistance. So it focuses on working families, which is what we need to focus on. That's what this is really about, is the working families. And if they qualify for relocation assistance, can they get it? Finally, I just want to say everyone should pay for the cost of this housing crisis, not just the landlords. It's unfair to make us pay for a regional housing crisis that we didn't pay that we didn't cause. So the Mountain View ordinance create the have a community rent relief fund and they use that fund to help to help tenants with housing issues. And I think if we need to find a way to tax everybody so that we all share the costs, not just the landlords. Thank you. Thank you. John Klein. And then Rita Hill. And then Maria Dominguez. My name is John Klein, and Charlie Edwards has succeeded some time to me as well. So the staff report I'm glad to see that it's proposed a and to talk to you about the mom and pop exception. I propose that that mom and pops are comprised of 2 to 4 units. You have over 4600 units. That would be mom and pops. That's 28% of the rental rental units in the city. You are concerned about the large landlords with 50 units or more. That's only 17% of your units. The mom and pops are 28% of your units. The fact that you're considering any kind of exemption for them is why we can't call what you're working on the Landlord Protection Act. It just shouldn't be happening. It just shouldn't be happening. But even so. No one's ever provided any data that substantiates the claims that they can't afford that and any benefits. As a matter of fact, that is that claim is contradicted by experts from the real estate industry. For example, just six months ago, in October 2015, as a research vice president at the National Association of Realtors said in August 2015, rent spiked 3.6% over the same time a year earlier, the fastest pace since 2008. Naturally, people collecting rent are thrilled with the gains they are seeing. Both large part investors and mom and pop landlords are enjoying the best conditions they've seen in years. Similarly, a Zillow economist in an article about the Bay Area titled Best Cities for Small Landlords, the greatest returns are actually in the markets like San Francisco and San Jose, where there are short term monthly losses. But the long term earned equity makes them the best markets to invest in. So we say that Oakland, Alameda, real estate markets are virtually indistinguishable with regard to their profitability. So so these claims that they can't afford tenant protection benefits are unsubstantiated at best and in spurious. So. Really? So that's what I have to say about the mom and pops. But so the data collection is what's important here. Right now you're talking about just collecting data on 5% rent increases. You must collect it all the the the the mom and pops who come in and say, we never raise our rent more than 5% . You don't know that. And you don't even know who the mom and pops are you. And so the data collection needs to be all units. It needs to be by size 2 to 4 units, 5 to 9, 10 to 19. And these categories are out of the bay report that I'm giving to you. So none of the claims that the mom and pops are making can be substantiated unless you do complete data collection for all types of units. Thank you. Thank you, Rita. And then Maria Dominguez. I'm talking about the displacing family and the low rent tenants with rent control. Number one, displacing family. You know, more landlords would only rent to the individuals sharing rooms instead of renting entire apartment to family. B Individuals have a much higher chance to move out due to a change of jobs and family size and etc.. Number two, with rent control and we will spend more money to rehab the property, then rent at a market rent instead. And with rent control we can. No longer help people out and we must rent property out at above market rent, otherwise won't be able to raise rent in the future. And number three, create tension between landlords and tenants. You know, we want to have a good relationship, working relationship with the tenant and also want to lay low. Landlords are human beings. We're not evil. We're not enemies. We bring the business to the city. And rental business, just like other business, is a very good business for the economy. The city too and also know no more long lease. We usually signed two years with a low increase in the second year only a few percent. But now we will only do more one year lease. And that's why rental control does not set there. The rent law is that it push the rent higher. So thank you so much. Thank you. Maria Dominguez. And then. John. John. My name is Mario Mingus. I'm an Alameda resident and a renter. I'm a very active member of my community. I'm part of the League of Women Voters, Alameda chapter and a member of Alameda Renters Coalition. I received a 60% increase in November, and I'm here tonight out of self-interest, but also and more importantly, my community's interests, including low income, working class and middle class workers. Are you willing to displace schoolchildren in the middle of the school year? Are you willing to lose schoolteachers? Just today in San Francisco? Tenant protections for San Francisco teachers are being proposed. Why isn't Alameda looking to be an innovator in the Bay Area as well? If you don't do the right thing, you will contribute to increasing homelessness in the Bay Area and creating a less racially diverse alameda. This is Black History Month. Housing is a civil rights issue. Do the right thing and be on the right side of history. Don't let Alameda history repeat itself like ten years ago when hundreds of black families were forced out from the Harbord Island Apartments, a complex that was then home to about a third of Alamitos black population. Today, black and immigrant families are especially vulnerable, including Filipinos, Vietnamese and Latinos on the island. Again, do the right thing and be on the right side of history. Put a cap on maximum allowable increases of rent at 65% of the Bay Area. CPI is reasonable and in line with numerous other California cities. Don't look at San Jose. They're going to change it as well. They're going to bring down their numbers. Pass no cause eviction protections, provide relocation assistance, amend the relocation benefit exemption for so-called mom and pop owners. Mediation and arbitration is not appropriate here. Create an elected rent board that is accountable to the community, mandate data collection for all rent increases and collect an annual program fee so you can pay the costs of the hearings, the program staff, the data collection and all the other necessary administrative and enforcement costs. Do the right thing and be on the right side of history. Thank you. Thank you. John. John J. I and G. John, are you here? Monte Hyang. And Monty on yours. It has Tristan sitting time to you, but she already spoke. So is there someone else that wants. If you need more time. I'll talk fast. All right. Okay. I'm a 15 year resident of alameda. I pulled off some comments. Brant complaints from facebook. Alameda peeps. You may be familiar with it. This is deni. In October, our day care provider got her rent increased by $750 after another increase of $200 earlier this year. She'll be paying for 4000 a month. Our little one loves her. We were extremely happy with her. It would be great if she could stay in Alameda. This is the day care provider. This is Gillian from January. In writing, I'm writing on behalf of my dear friends who are a lovely family here in Alameda. They are being evicted from their apartment of eight years because the owner is moving in the family and now we are faced with daunting rent increases we all know have caused so much duress here in the community. This is this is Maria from today. We just received a 6.3% increase increase effective March 1st. It was a $90 increase last March and a 100 and hundred dollars increase this March. My husband refuses to go to the rack for fear of retaliation. But I can report the data, so why can't I report the data somewhere and have it matter to anyone? This is Siena for January 31. Got a 8% rent increase notice yesterday. Less than six months ago, they added utilities to our lease. How long was slow response, a service request and poor upkeep of common areas. I feel like they've been holding us hostage because of threats of rent increases, because people are afraid to complain. So when a hired lobbyist comes in here quoting. From a Cheyenne telephone telephone survey. I hope you'll think about people like Danny and Gillian and Maria and Sienna. Thank you. Thank you. And our last speakers, Brian Maguire. If you haven't heard yours, it's time. Thank you. Good morning. Didn't think I'd manage to do this later than last time. I'm impressed that after ignoring the buzzer for 4 hours, you managed to you chose to unilaterally give this item in particular 2 minutes only and start cracking the whip. That's seems kind of arbitrary and capricious, if you ask me. But for the people, the landlords complain that 5% is not, uh, functional for them. This is a very different than, say, two thirds or CPI like you see in some of our neighboring cities. If the economy stalls like everyone likes to predict every six months, you still have the ability to catch up at basically double the rate of inflation over recent years. So it's it's a far cry from what, you know, the people are are trying to say what happened with, you know, comparing this to like a stricter voter driven policy. You guys should be championing you guys should be the ones endorsing this all the way. Because like some have said, this is this is going to protect you as far as some of the. Provisions as far as mom and pops, which we hear about all the time. They don't have to evict the tenants if they don't want to pay the relocation costs, if they do need to evict the tenants. They have a pretty nice piece of collateral that they can use to finance that, you know, relatively moderate or minor cost, depending how long the tenants been there. If you can't make that work, you're in the wrong business. And no business owner deserves guaranteed success. Just look at the restaurants out here on Park Street. Property owners. Do not have a moral right to extract all of the income gains in the region from a booming economy. If there are any exemptions considered from this council, I would suggest limiting it to something like owner occupied parcels with two, maybe three units capped. Anything beyond that? You're you're in the business of, you know, providing housing and you're a property manager. But if you were living on that site, maybe there's some some differences there. But thank you. Thank you. Any other speaker slips. All right. So he was our last speaker. Staff are going to come back up here now. Now, Miss Potter, do you have, like, a list? How do you propose? So my recommendation is, if we could call back up the PowerPoint presentation, I would suggest that we just scroll through and we kind of like we did on the fifth issue by issue, if that works for the council, otherwise we can answer questions. Yeah. You know, we never did have an opportunity to ask questions on the staff report, I assume, just because we wanted to get into the speakers. So can we ask the speakers as we go through I mean, ask for clarifying questions as we go through the items instead of all at once. You mind if we do it for item. On the staff. Report? Um. Um. I'll do my best. But normally we do have a chance to ask clarifying questions of the staff report. She's going to be going over the report. And it's going to be the bullets to it. But Mr. Spencer, she's this is not the standard we're looking at. See. Where do you want to start? Yeah. So I am prepared to talk on the PowerPoint slides, the staff report or the principles that were the exhibit to to the staff report. Um, but if we just wanted to start and take them in order, we would start with the one year at least and staff would request a consensus direction from the council about. Um. Mandate and a requirement to offer a one year lease to in place tenants as well as the already agreed to offering of one year leases to prospective tenants. All right, Member Ashcraft, are you in a position to discuss that or you want to go back to something else at this point? I'll go with the flow, but I expect you to let me ask my questions at some point this evening and not to get to a point and say, okay, no questions, it's too late. But, I mean, I think we need to now have more council deliberation than hearing staff speak. So. Debbie Ms.. Potter's presented this question. In the frame. So she's going to go item by item, and then we can respond and deliberate then at each item. I remember. So I like it. I prefer just to begin going item by item, asking whatever clarifying questions or any questions we have, and then and having an opportunity to the extent that council members so want to, you know, frame all the questions and comments and concerns. All at once. Everybody, whether you. Agree with or dislike, I mean, as you suggested, Madam Mayor, we go through each item, liberate, give our comments and questions, and there's something we haven't done and we want to do a wrap up statement. Then we could kind of do that up there. Didn't you want. Them okay with you? I prefer that. I think it's orderly. I think I was very successful last time doing it that way. Did you want to weigh in by square or. Yes. I like the idea of going through the points that need the staff feels it needs to get clarification on. But I do think we should be able to have questions or comments on the staff report. Or offer other thoughts at the end of this. Yeah. Yeah. And I'm I'm in agreement with the vice mayor if you know. It necessary at that time. I beg your pardon. If we still need you at that time. Yeah. Right. But bear in mind, we're doing this cleanup session now so that when we come to the 16th, we'll be ready to move on with the first reading of an ordinance. We most certainly weren't ready to do that coming out of the January meeting. Remember. And I believe that we were clear with staff when we suggested this meeting that it would be pretty much limited to these these eight items that, you know, not rehashing what we've already decided. Absolutely. I agree. Member de SAC. So if I could just begin a quick, quick question on the one year lease, if it were all right. So at this point is go ahead with your recommendation. Thank you. So there was consensus on January 5th that one year leases be required to be offered to prospective tenants. There was a question about whether or not you wanted to extend that to in place tenants. Two staff's recommendation is that the one year lease offer requirement be extended to in place tenants to. All right. Desai My quick question is, do we have, for lack of a better word, case history of how this works in other places, though? Do we know where other places have a similar feature? Yeah. So Glendale. Glendale is one of the cities that's had a longstanding ordinance regarding the requirement to offer a one year lease. The city of Palo Alto has this requirement and then Mountain View just put put an ordinance. I think it was effective last month. And do we have any can we provide a 10/2 response as to if we know how effective that's been in addressing whatever their housing issues or. Well, I would say the example of Glendale is that I'm in Glendale. If you offer a one year lease, you are exempt from all other requirements regarding relocation and all the others. So, so in Glendale, and if you go on to their website, they'll tell you that. You know, their their programing they have. There is very little activity because my guess is that they offer one year leases and they move forward. And that's what Palo Alto has had in place. But we have not researched the the the details are kind of beyond that. That's fine. That was an interesting point about Glendale. Thank you. Mm. Any other clarifying questions or comments on this issue? So notwithstanding your comment about Glendale, we're not proposing we're not even on relocation benefits yet. Right. This is, you know, the recommendation to require one year leases was part of the package of sort of additional tenant protection measures. And from staff's perspective, the idea of offering one year leases is to bring some stability and some certainty to the process that if you have a lease, you will your rent will not go up for a while, for 12 months. And it's an opportunity to to introduce stability. The council already said that they wanted to do this for prospective tenants. The only question I believe that's on the table for for for further discussion is that if you extend that requirement to in place tenants and. That that's what other jurisdictions who have this requirement they they offer it to in place as well as prospective tenants and the in-place tenants are only once because the or you know as. The ordinance is going to be effective. And then what we anticipate is that you would offer that the one year lease when either if you have a lease now 60 days before your lease expires or at that time your first rent increase. And it's a one time only. Requirement. And if you've done that, you've you've fulfilled that obligation under the ordinance. And it seems to staff that the you know, it's equitable if you required of perspective as well as for the in-place tenants. But we had a question from an audience member. If they offer a one year lease, does then become a month to month or is it one year and then done? We'll roll to it. Typical residential rental leases in the state. That it rolls. Yes, roll to month. But is that a requirement of this then? If there's a. Requirement. Is that it be if you have an existing lease and you're going to be offered, you're an in-place tenant with an existing lease and you're going to be offered one lease. It has to be materially the same. So if it rolled to month to month, it would roll to month to month in the new lease to. All right. Thank you for clarifying that. Remember, it's a quick. Question. I think we decided last time, if I'm not mistaken, that you get one rent increase per year, right? That's correct. So, I mean, if you do opt as a tenant to go month to month and don't accept that lease, you're still going to get one increase per year. You're not going to get an increase every two months or three months or six. That's correct. And then we so our is your suggestion that, you know, we do this as a one time stabilization and then everyone whose lease expires and gets an increase within the next 12 months gets an option of one year. And then we just we're one and done. Yes. Some people don't want I mean, this is what February. Right. The recommendation is one day. So anyone whose lease may have expired in January, you know, next January, they'd be subject no. But once the right for. The first time, there's a notice of a rent increase after the ordinance goes into effect. Okay. So what if they don't do it in the first year? But that only applies to rent increases in the first year after the ordinance goes into effect. The way we are and the way we've drafted is the first time there's a notice of the first rent increase, whether it's a year from now, 24 months from now, if. Or any other member. Oh, I'll go. After. Them. Just for clarification, a tenant could opt to, rather than if the tenant had some reason to not want to be held to a one year lease. Job relocation prospects are something they would don't have to accept the one year lease. They could ask for month to month and they wouldn't be penalized. That's correct. But they would still have the rent increase then. Correct? That's correct. And I remember they it I remember. Just just to be clear on the policy. So on the rent increase, with the one time a year limit, you know, we've kind of taken care of the rent increase. The stability that we were trying to get with this one year lease was on the evictions because those that were on a month to month lease would then understand that at least for the next year, unless they do something like nuisance or don't pay their rent, that they're not going to get a no no fault eviction or, you know, some Omar or something like that. Evictions. It's things like provision of a parking lot or access to laundry facilities, things that are that are provided to via a lease that that you would have that kind of certainty or stability for for an additional year. And then anyone that may, for one reason or another, you know, not have a formal lease or be on an oral agreement on a month to month, which, believe it or not, they're still out there. You know, we'd get them like with standardized terms. You know, one thing we may want to think about, you know, is some type of model lease, but that's a discussion for another day. Right. You're right about that. Yeah. Well, actually, I might have had some request about coming up with a model list once the ordinance is in place. And that's something I think that staff is interested in working on that would be available. Standard noticing, model list, those kinds of things that that. Could be helpful. Yeah. And we're not we're not it's not a gender issue. We don't want to be here till four in the morning. So thank you. Another time. Every day. So one last question for me on this topic. So with regard to going back to the Glendale model, are you saying that we anticipate implementing that feature of the model where if you implement a one year lease at the time that the lease is exhausted, if the landlord so chooses not to continue and the per the Glendale model that the landlord doesn't have to provide relocation benefits. No, we're not recommending that. All right. So then, are we ready to give direction? So this time we were just giving direction. We weren't actually taking emotion. So. Right. Right. I think if there's a sense of the council or consensus that the clerk could capture, that would be all right. So council members, you just want to go around the table. How do you want to do whatever you want? I'm okay. I'll I'll go ahead and say I'm agreeable to staff recommendation. Anyone else want to weigh in? I'd like to have it the way it was originally. Where it's just the first time. Nebraska. Did you want to weigh in? Do you want him to clarify. What's between. The four? It doesn't apply to existing tenants. You don't want it to apply to existing tenants. Oh, okay. I'm. I'm agreeable to what's on the screen before us. To offer the least to existing tenants. I had never talked to. Any questions are going away. No, I. I think. It's supply it to new tenants. But I will hold off as to whether or not existing tenants. I mean, I'll have to think about that more. Well, is that an abstention then? Because we know it just means that for sure and for. Uh. So we're going to be able to craft an ordinance to come back to us. This is this is preparing for that. All right. All right, go ahead. 5 seconds. Yeah, I'm fine with the staff recommendation. So I would say that that is there's no chances. To have this work and be a majority consensus. Majority. So that's helpful. And B will be capturing the concept of the one time lease offer for a perspective as well as in place tenants in place. It's when there's a rent increase or not. If they're on a month to month and then if they're already have an existing lease, it will be 60 days before their current lease expires. Just once. Just once. For. Two years they would. That's correct. And just for technical clarification, Ms.. Former Madame. Referred to and b I don't see an. Inbuilt in the staff report under staff recommendations. Gotcha. Okay. Okay. I'm a. So this one, I don't think we're not asking for any action this evening. This was just an informational update. And so unless council had any feedback or input for staff, I'm. Member Ashcraft Okay, so the direction I would like Steph to go in, in the ordinance you're crafting is that I think. It's important to. Um. Not have the tenant bear the cost of arbitration. So I know there's been some discussion in the course of discussion of, you know, both sides maybe dividing the fee. I think I said this before in January, this playing field is not level. If someone is, you know, coming forward saying, I can't afford this rent increase, how are they going to afford the. The the arbitration clause. But I think there is a you know, it's not wanting to throw a wrench into the works. But as I listened to you, Ms.. Potter, explain that we can't say binding arbitration because there's legal implications, and you're right. And then you get into, you know, really having it be rent control. And there's other implications to that. So it's just a binding hearing process. But there's the judicial review. So just stop and think for a minute of how onerous a process that might be. So landlord comes forward wanting to have an increase of more than 5%. First you go to the rack. We all know that's not binding. Then we go to the arbitration process. But that's not binding either because it can still be appealed, so then it can be appealed to a judicial process. So we are requiring in some instances people to go through cross three hurdles. So it's my understanding that's exactly what the City of Gardena has, and that still counts as rent control. By having this arbitration, it is considered some sort of rent. Control by the and even it's clear what what Gardena does are, you know, Cucamonga or whatever. What I'm just concerned about is our renters here. And I just stopped and thought about that process, for starters. How long will that take? And and then what's the cost? That what's the cost as a judicial process is this small claims court so parties aren't represented by attorneys or what's the. Can you walk us through that? Because I think we need to consider that. If you want me to jump in on that. Sure. Can I just one thing that I want to say about what's being proposed is that for rent increases that are being proposed, that are above 5%, that the rent increases not effective until the the that all of the processes have happened. So I understand the technicalities. I've read the report, but I'm just saying, what happens if I mean that conceivably a renter and a landlord could go through these three steps? That's correct. That is that is correct. And so, Vice Mayor, you I think Mr. Bash was going to chime in. Well, I'm concerned about how much time we're going to spend on this part. Vice Mayor, did you want to comment? I just want to comment very quickly on this whole notion of binding arbitration or binding. Hearing. Hearing and thinking about and then hearing your explanation. I'm not. I'm no longer supporting that because I don't think it provides enough benefit for the cost and the problem. We've had a non-binding system when people are avail themselves of it or feel comfortable enough to go to it. It's been fairly successful at a fairly low cost, and there's still judicial review at the end of that process that's available to people. And I think this puts and maybe. A unwieldy and and maybe not beneficial step in between. A mediation. And if I was to say spend the money, I'd spend it for private semi-private mediation in front of the rack. Before it becomes public. I think that has better benefit than putting a binding arbitration at the end of it. And so with all due respect to and I'm concerned with the time to, but I would still like to have our attorney weigh in on this. Madam Chair and members of the Council, Michael Rausch from the City Attorney's Office. The. Yeah. The agenda report's going to indicate that the program fee will be such that it would cover the cost of the the hearing process. So, in other words, that we make some or certain assumptions that there'll be a certain number of matters that will go to the binding hearing process and that will have a cost. And that cost will be built into the overall fee that housing providers will pay. The the persons or the housing providers who will be subject to that process will presumably pay a slightly higher fee than those that aren't, because those folks won't have the opportunity to go to the binding hearing process. But if it does go to the binding hearing process, once that decision is done, it can be challenged judicially. But I think, as Ms.. Curran has indicated previously, it would be done by what's called a petition for writ of mandate, where basically a a trial court would review the administrative record that was had before the hearing officer would look at the transcript, would look at the evidence, and then based on that, decide whether or not that decision was upheld by by substantial evidence. I think the substantial evidence rule would apply there, not an independent judgment ruled. I don't mean to be talking legalese here, but just for the just for what actually will happen. So the answer is, as staff is going to propose it there, there would be no cost to either the tenant or the housing provider to go to the binding hearing process. But beyond that, if someone wanted to continue to challenge it, it would be on either the housing provider or the tenants costs to do the judicial process. So there would be a cost to a tenant to to to for the court filing or. Correct. I think the idea of much like, you know, to analogize it to when the council does a land use decision a person might not like, the planning commission's decision can appeal to the city council. City Council decides that if somebody is dissatisfied and wants to go to court, that person then has to pay the freight or attorney's and other court costs that would be associated with the writ of mandate process. And that would be the way it would be handled here. Just just a point of clarification, a couple of things. This process that we're talking about right now is not really on the agenda right now. You all decided that process. We're not asking for any clarification on that process. So I would really I mean it with all due respect. Program fee is not even actually on this agenda because we're suggesting that we're going to come back in February 16. Okay. And that that's fine. Fair enough. But just I was trying to give direction because then when you come back, we may be sending you back again, but. But that's actually not going to be separate and. That's correct. That's right. And my question on this subject matter of program fee is simply this. In the case. I believe there are cases that we here in Alameda are probably looking to. Of cities that have that administer this kind of stuff. Perhaps Los Gatos is an example. I'm not quite sure, but I think it would benefit the public and many people if we simply demystify this whole process and in addition to kind of, you know, discussing the mechanics of it, but kind of be able to point at, well, and this is how Los Gatos works for good or for bad, but just the facts or this is how did you say Gardena? This is how Gardena works, how much it costs and blah, blah, blah. So that we get we get the sense that, okay, this is something that, you know, that other places are doing. And so we're not doing something that's so. No mystical. Well, we were actually focusing on what or what the proposed ordinance looks like and what we think it's going to cost to administer our ordinance. But we we will have flowcharts and lots of information. Thank you. All right. Just real brief. You know. Personally, I think on a policy level, this is going to benefit tenants. And there's also going to be some some things in there that the landlords want. And I think the only fair and equitable way is to share that cost equally across all landlords and tenants. 5050. That's just my. So actually, I, I I'm going to hold off because. Thank you. Thank you. That's what I heard you wanted us to do. So honor that. So you could just go straight to the next point that you need us to respond to in order to craft the ordinance. Let's stay focused on that. Thank you. So the next item is that the council has already indicated that they want to allow no cause evictions with certain limitations. So the the only the only direction that we're really looking for this evening is what the cap what cap you would like to see for the next tenants rent increase if there is no cause eviction or an in place tenant. All right. So my position on this one is that then the the rent to the next tenant would be whatever they could have gotten if they've kept that tenant. And so if they hadn't given had a rent increase within the past year or if they wanted to do more than that, go through whatever would have been the same. So. So are you suggesting 5%? Because that's the that's the threshold. Or it. Was that. They hadn't received the rent increase. But how are we going to. Okay. So whatever is not clear, sir. Really? Yeah. I mean, I. I see that it's a split the baby. So if you've had a run increase within 12 months and the new tenant, the old tenant couldn't get a rent increase until the 12 months is up. But if you're evicting somebody at the end of their lease, then you'd be entitled to raise that rent 5%. So you'd be entitled to raise it to an unlimited amount. We're not paying a rent. But if. The thought was here that you could only charge what you would have, charge the tenant that was staying. Well, know what that cap is really. The 5% is really equivalent to the trigger that we would require initiating the process. That's what the 5% was it. And in January we had it set at 8% because that was the percentage. For rent on a new. Tenancies, rent on the new tenant. And the whole point of this policy, if I remember correctly, was to disincentivise the rent evictions. That's correct. So if you allow somebody to evict somebody and then charge a 25% increase. Exactly. A disincentive. So that's why we're asking for a direction on a cap. Right. And I think the mayor's suggestion was. If you if the if they got their rent increase in the last 12 months, then you couldn't. Increase that existing tenants rent if they were on month to month. So that should be zero. And correct me if I'm wrong, but if they were eligible for a 5% increase, you know, we would make at that flat 5%. What about instances where a tenant tenant a move is evicted for no cause and receives a relocation benefit? So are we saying that the landlord has to pay a relocation benefit and then where the new tenant is kept? Yes. Because this is connected to that code section as my recollection. Where. Yes, that's correct. Next to that code section. In which case it's. Doesn't start brand new. So it would actually be. If if the code section is correct, if that's what this is, then it's zero. However, there's the next time they could give the increase would be whenever it would have been eligible for the prior tenant. Is it coming? So I understand. I understand the point about if the rent has been increased once in the past 12 months, you can't increase it again. So that might argue for a zero, you know, allowing for no rent increase. The part that I'm not quite following is that because there is no cap on rents, I don't know if they haven't done a rent. If they're if they haven't if they're owed a rent increase. It's been 12 months. They could do 20%, 15%. I mean, you would have to set a. Cap purpose of. I know. So that's why we need a cap hearing. So. Right. So we need a percentage cap. So may I. Remember? So I'm going to suggest that we make it 5%. And it's part of the package of what you as a landlord, you have rights, but you have responsibilities. So you're going to come up with this. You want to turn it out. Don't have to give a reason. Don't have to go to court and pay attorney's fees. But you will have to I know we haven't gotten to the relocation assistance, but we've talked about this. You'll have to pay the relocation assistance. You'll have to pay the movie expenses. You can charge the next tenant, assuming they you evicted right at the end of the term or whatever the. What you were currently getting, plus up to 5% increase. And with that, I also expect to eliminate a lot of the arguments I heard tonight about how mom and pop landlords can't possibly afford all these various expenses because we are giving you a cushion is essentially what we're doing. But I don't see how we can. Well, I don't know. I mean, there may be legal ways, but I think if 5% was the trigger that we chose for taking, you know, a below 5%, 5% or below would stand unless the tenant took the the landlord to the rack. It seems like 5% is an increase that we found was reasonable. And let me ask this question. So going back to real life examples, can you give an example where where such a clause exists? No, because this is this is kind of this is a good example of the hybrid ordinance that the Alameda is looking at. If most cities with rent stabilization don't allow no cause evictions, they they only allow evictions for just cause. And then if you don't have rent stabilization, you tend not to have eviction protections. So this is something where the city is kind of proposing to do something that is accommodating the request by a lot of the property owners that they be allowed to do no cost evictions, but are willing to put limitations on that to really address the very important issue of sort of the economic evictions, evictions strictly to raise the rent. When a tenant has been paying their rent every month, they've been, you know, abiding by their lease, that kind of thing. My opinion is simply that to me, while we have. Discussions about the relocation assistance and maybe there are other benefits. To the extent that the tenant. Tenant A is moved and received whatever the relocation. The benefit is in my opinion that landlord, as so to speak, given to the church already. So now we're doing a second penalty where they can't do some kind of rent increases because it's altogether possible that they have to do a rent increase for or some capital expenses. I know. That's just my opinion. Right. So capital expenses would be a different type of eviction if you were to if you wanted to, to deal with a substantial rehabilitation. And you needed you were going to make a big investment and you needed a rent increase above the 5% that you would. That would be a different grounds for eviction. This is evictions for for no cause where you don't have to show cause. And so the council had already agreed in January to. To doing the cap and to doing the in requiring the relocation. And really what we're focused on is the very narrow question of what the percentage cap should be. It was my understanding and recollection that when we did this, went through this, we were told there's a civil code section that says that you cannot once you have a city that has rent control, that and that's what this would be then that if you evict for no cause that that next tenant, you cannot increase the rent for that civil code section. Well, you can rent. You disagree with that code section that that does not apply. Very. I, I think our opinion is that the Council has the discretion if it wants to set that 5% cap, that it does that it. I don't think it's quite as black and white as that as it may have. Self-represented. So could we set 10%? 20%? You don't think it has any bearing on this at all? I don't think it does now. So what do you think that code section speaks to? Well, I think it speaks to situations. It it's a fairly narrow exception concerning single family residences. And this is going to apply more broadly than that. So, again, I just think that. It really addresses a different issue than than you're really kind of facing right at the moment. So I think if the council if the council wants to make it zero, it certainly can. If it wants to put it at 5%, I think it can do that as well. So I'm hoping we don't have very many no cause evictions and that's what I think we're trying to contain here. So I would like us to figure out a way that it can, in fact, be that they don't get to bite that they have. I actually don't think this is about evicting someone. And then you could increase the rent all you want for a no cause eviction. And and. But. But should that number be zero 5%? So I, I feel I mean, I've heard the term split the baby. It's not my favorite term, but I guess it's biblical. But I do think we have to try to address interest on both sides. And what is that? I think there are different no cause evictions. And I'm just going from, you know, a lot of conversations I've had with housing providers. And one is that, yeah, we've seen egregious rent increases where a landlord came back with, you know, a very steep increase after they got charged twice as much or whatever. But I'm also told that there are times when you have a problem tenant that is, the other tenants don't want to testify against him in court, and that's what it would take. And yet it's causing a problem for all of the tenants. And this is a way to get that tenant out. It's also a way to look at it charitably, to not put a black market on that particular tenant's record that would make him or her have a harder time renting a subsequent unit because there's you know, there's all different ways to look at this. So I'm comfortable with having the No Cause eviction allowed. And I know the the landlord organization's really wanted that and they're not thrilled with relocation expenses, but I think that's equitable. But again, I do think that we need to take into consideration ability to maintain property, ability to put aside that reserve that you need for, you know , unanticipated expenses or, you know, expenses going up. But I think then we're being quite fair. And again, the 5% figure, it is about twice CPI, but it's used in Los Gatos, you know, successfully in that well, that's their cap. But I, I, I would argue that we allow a 5% cap. I don't think that's egregious because again, it's something we agreed was the trigger beyond, which is a trigger to to go to rack. Remember. I mean, I'm fine with the 5% also. I mean, I don't want to get into a long discussion on the rest of it. So can I spare them? Yes, Jose. I am to them. There'll be a suggested cap. 5%. Okay. Thank you. But there's a double penalty. Relocation benefit was the penalty. Okay, well, but then you could. That's all right. Next issue. Let's go. Got it for next issue, then. Sticking with that, the concept of no cause evictions is to cap the number of allowable no cause evictions in it in a 12 month period. This is one of my staff report questions. All right. Go ahead, Amber Ashcraft. So my question was how? So Mr. Potter in the staff report and this is paragraph number five right now, the cap on number of no cause evictions. And the first sentence is to prevent a property owner from undertaking a mass eviction to renovate a building in lieu of preparing a capital improvement plan. Why would we ever allow a property owner to do anything that involves involved evicting tenants without a capital improvement plan? We we don't want to do that. We want to prevent that, which is why we are recommending that there be a cap on the number of no cause evictions. So there's not a workaround. And so you're really compelled if you need to evict your tenants or relocate them for purposes of substantial rehabilitation, you will have to go through the capital improvement plan process. So do you ever envision? So. Okay, so how would I? It's maybe it's the IRA, but how would. Would this first phrase come to pass to prevent a property owner from undertaking a mass eviction, to renovate a building in lieu? You mean to go away to do a mass? No. Cause. Yeah, exactly. That's why we need to cat. That's why we're recommending that it be capped. And so I think everyone was supportive of that concept and it was really initially staff had recommended it cap at 50% and I think the discussion was 50% might be too high. Staff is prepared to go with it. We're prepared to say we agree that that probably was too high and that 25% probably makes sense for buildings with five or more units in that. For buildings with four or fewer units, it's just one one. No cause eviction here. You have to fix. You agree so I. I'm sorry the. Fix your math because if you have five or if you have five units 10% a month is. That is one and it's 20% one. So you just need to fix the math. Okay. We will. But what should it be? We have a rounding up or rounding down. Right. Okay. So because you would get zero if you were only about 10% of one. So I'm agreeable with staff recommendation with tax return. Parts of this, correct. You're asking for both parts? Yes. Okay. I'm agreeable with that. So this mainly is speaking to preventing mass evictions. Masquerading as evictions. Right. So this. Is circumvent. Kind of dealing with the harbor. This would be a tool to prevent Harbor Island happening again or for $0.70 on it. And it's also a nightmare. I would prefer I would support this for units, buildings with units of maybe ten or 20 more, because that's where the problem's been. We have not had this problem. Or for the smaller buildings. And I think the we should recognize that difference. In fact, the two marquees that drive this are 30 plus. So I would say sell it for a price. Thank you. Okay. So I want to speak to that because part of the second part of this, no more than one unit per year for buildings with four or fewer units. So if they have four or fewer units, you're okay with them doing evicting all of them at once. You don't think anything. There on the circumstance and and I think. Hold on now. Aren't we entering into kind of. Hold on members? They let him finish his comment. I think those are different circumstances than theirs. That's why I've been pushing for evictions to be within the scope of of Iraq, so that those those type of where there's untrue unfairness, people have a recourse. All right, remember, they suck it. Well. I think we run the risk of having the threshold too low if we do. Or units. But no more than one unit if you only have four units in your building. Just so basically. 20%, 20% conceivable that what you're saying is anyone who who owns a. Building the four. Plex. Anyone who owns a four plex at any point in time. Even if it's. They run the risk of doing a mass eviction by definition. So these are for no cause eviction. This or even for. Nothing. Well, this is. I mean. They would think this would cap this would cap the number of no cause evictions that you could do annually. Two one if you're doing four or fewer if you were had it for plex or smaller. And it would cap it to 25% of the units annually in buildings with five or more units. The idea. Right. Once again, the idea is that you wouldn't do a bunch of no cause evictions as a way to get get. Get rid of folks and then and not sort of be required to do a capital improvement plan or something else in support of why you're evicting out all your tenants. But it's completely possible that in a four plex or even a six plex, that you could remove a person following the rules, like moving in a family member. Correct. And and then it's also possible that. Some other thing happens such that you do another no cause evictions that that is conceivably have reasonable grounds that. The family member be. Allowed and you'd be permitted to do that because family move in is a different it's a no fault eviction. It's not a no cause eviction. So you could do if you had a four plex, you could do three owner move ins theoretically and one no cause eviction. You could do that. This is this is a cap on the no cause, not the no fault. That. There are differences. Do you want her to go over that? One last question. It's a do it again. Do we have examples of cities having this kind of language? No, because once again, this is tied to the fact that we're going to be permitting no cause evictions. But we want to protect. And cities either have. Only just cause eviction or they allow evictions without regulating them. So we're really this is this is kind of new, new territory. I wrote it. And I think that was the policy. You know, the choice was doing just cause which. It's a controversial issue, but we made a policy decision not to do just cause. And landlords have told us, you know, we do these no cause evictions very rarely. And they still wanted to have the ability to do with them. So this this gives them you know, this is kind of the tradeoff. This gives them the ability to do that. And, you know, we heard landlords here today say, oh, I never evict people. I'm not going to evict people. I want to keep my tenants. But that's true. You know, that's not going to really be a big deal. Right. And, you know, this is kind of the. You get one mulligan, you know, one bad decision. You know, we can't protect landlords from making, you know, multiple bad business decisions. And like one of the tenant people said, you know, if you do that, maybe you're in the wrong business. So you get your one shot. Use it if you need a second one. You go to court. You know, if if you need four or five, then, you know, maybe you're in the wrong business. So I'm fine with the staff recommendation. Thank you. Member Ashcroft And. I just want to chime in and say that I object to having any exceptions to this. I think that this needs to apply regardless of what the the size of the unit is. I really don't want to see us start carving out exceptions because we we came to this project to begin with because of the stories we had heard. We're trying to to correct that. And so I just don't want to create different classes of of tenants. And some are protected and some aren't. And again, we're going to do this. We're going to put something together. We're going to have an annual review. We will have a chance to look back over a year's worth of work and see what works better than others. And and, you know, tweak as we need. But I don't want to start. So this has to pass. And you're okay to march then. So this is the yeah, I am. I want. That to be the same. Because part of what we want to do is also encourage people to take care of their buildings, to maintain them. So if you really have a substantial renovation you need to do, then you come forward with your capital improvement plan, but not just move people out so you can add in, not raise your rent a little bit more. But we're going to do that still. The cap is in place on this. Tent, right? Yeah. I think we have. To be aware. You're aware? I support staff's recommendation. Remember? Did clearly remember Ashcroft. You just did. Vice mayor does not remember days ago. Well, my concern, you know, part of my concern is. You just don't know what we don't know. And. All due respect to. You know our experts here. I don't think anyone is really. I don't know. Has anyone really incorporated such things and understand all the questions and the nuances? And that's. Okay. So the birds are speaking about no cause evictions, about three of us that are comfortable with it. Let's move on. And I would just say that in cities with rent stabilization there, not a lot. There are no no cause evictions allowed. So you have jurisdictions where you only can evict for cause. And those requirements have been in place in many jurisdictions for many years. So you do have the track record of not permitting no cause evictions. So because we are agreeing to permit no cause evictions, we're going to have rules that are a little different than than communities that only. Yeah. So it's a built in protection is the way. I see it. Mm hmm. Okay. So actually on this one, we are looking for direction from the council about whether or not there should be any kind of exemption for mom and pop property owners on the relocation benefit requirement. And if there is if there is a recommendation to do that, and there's the secondary exercise of defining a mom and pop property . So I'd like to speak to this. When we looked at this before. It was offering additional time because the concern has been that people are being forced out. And then we came up with this thing that they would buy certain months and then it was going to be the tenant's choice. However, my preference is to come up with something that is the same, whether it's a small, whatever you call because mom and pop or a larger one. But I'm wondering what if it's always going to be if you want to do and it could could we do it legally if they want to do any? Any of the situations where this would apply. There's no cause, no fault that it would always be the additional time unless the tenant and the landlord agree that then it's money and or formula or something like that. But it's always the time. The primary default would be the time unless there's an agreement between the tenant and the landlord that it would be, you know, the dollars for each month that they would all down and then have that apply to all situations. Because what I've been hearing is that mom and pop smaller landlords may not be able to afford given it to be the tenant choice, but if we made them all, the default is the additional time based upon how many years they've been there and then they agree to lesser. But so then it would always be the same, whether it's a mom and pop or a larger landlord. So may. I. Yes. Speak to. That. Actually, is would that be legal for us to have something like that for these conditions? No fault. No cause if we could we do that. Additional time for the buyout based upon how long they've been there. But then if the landlord and the tenant agree that they if for whatever reason, the landlord wants them out sooner than the landlord has to pay the tenant the money based upon the rent that we had that same formula. That we had discussed before. The the way that the ordinance is currently drafted it, it basically provides that there that at the choice of the tenant, the tenant can extend the time to remain in the unit and give up. Well, let me back up for a second. The way it's currently drafted is that the tenant has the choice of remaining one month for every year that the tenant has been in the unit up to basically four years, four months. But it goes on to provide that the tenant at the tenant's choice, the tenant can remain in the unit beyond the otherwise vacation date in exchange. They basically exchange the month rent for an additional month to stay in the in the unit. So, for example, if the tenant had been there for three years and they wanted to remain an extra month, then they would only get two months worth of additional. Relocation benefits. That's the way it's currently drafted at the council. But you can give direction in terms of how it wants to do that. But that's currently what would be before you if you leaving aside sort of the exemption issue. And that was and I would just add to that and the reason the ordinance is being drafted that way is because that's the direction staff received on the 5th of January. So. Yeah. And really the only there was there wasn't consensus about doing anything differently from mom and pops, but I think there was a. There was a desire to see if the council did because there wasn't consensus on the Fifth. Was there a desire to kind of revisit that idea of an exemption that. I think it was very narrowly focused on the relocation benefits and it was really around, as you were saying, Madam Mayor, that you have the cash in hand to do it and would time be preferable to cash. And the suggestion potentially is that in the instance of a mom and pop, you, instead of allowing the choice to be solely rests solely with the tenant but the mom and pop, they could make the decision about the cash or the time. All right, Mr. Ashcroft. Thank you. So one of my overarching principles for what we will achieve is that we keep this simple and streamlined. And I think the fewer. Permutations the better. But also again, we need to remember why we began this discussion in the first place. Of course, we want to be fair to both landlords and tenants, but bear in mind we are allowing a rent increase that is twice the CPI. The the concept of mom and pop landlords in even defining what that is and then also doing a means test because some mom and pop landlords have on their properties long enough to own it free and clear without a mortgage. We and any business owner has to keep in mind that there are always unforeseen circumstances and operate with some sort of a reserve. I think we're giving the ability to raise rents in such a way that you should be able to create a reserve for yourself. But what we also want to do with this is to make sure that this isn't being used arbitrarily against tenants. And so I think that what we had for what is in the ordinance currently in the draft with the number of. Payments of a month's rent based on the years of tenancy. I think it's perfectly reasonable. I worry that and I wouldn't support leaving it to the landlord and the tenant to work out between themselves because that playing field is not is not level. And if we only give tenants time and not money, how does that help them go to their next? They're paying rent and they're looking around trying to find another place in a tight rental market. But they still have to come up with the first and last month's rent and security deposit. So there's no assistance for them. And the the landlord is not having to take responsibility for their actions. So I would strongly objected to any carve outs of any particular categories of tenants, because that's essentially what we're doing. Yes. So then leave it at the tenants choice. Leave it just. Because that's what we. Have for. The tenants choice. Just leave it for everybody. All right. Member Odie. I'll try to be brief and I kind of agree almost 100% with everything Councilmember Ashcroft said it kind of look at this house. How's it going to play out? I think, one, you leave yourself a huge loophole. So if the landlord knows I can trade for months instead of paying four month's rent, then if you're astute, you're going to say, okay, I want that person out in June. You know, I'm just going to start the process early. And then knowing that I want them out in June and I'll get them out in June, because in these type of cases, possession is king. So you want possession. So the sooner you get possession, you know, the better it is. So you're going to want to. I think there's a lot of room for manipulation. You know, I understand the concept. I understand why idea is being brought. But I think there's way too much room for manipulation. I think it's going to be difficult to define mom and pop because I think we said this earlier, not every 2 to 4 unit is owned by, you know, individuals like we've seen here today. Some are owned by corporations and not every big building is owned by corporations. Some are built are owned by locally owned folks that, you know, have the same challenges that the 2 to 4 units have. You know, they're on premises. They manage their own property. You know, they have a handy person, you know. So I don't know how you can you can draw a distinction. And, you know, I think, Brian, Mr. Maguire said it best. I mean, if you know, if you don't want to do this, don't evict people. And the folks that came here tonight said, I don't evict people. So if you don't evict people, you're probably not going to have to worry about this. And just this is important. So I just wanna spend a few more minutes on it, you know, think about if I do an am I. So you say I'm going to move away? Yes. Move on and remove it. I'm sorry, owner. Move in. So I can't afford. You're saying on one hand I can't afford to have a relocation, but on the other hand, you're saying I'm moving in or my son's moving in or my parent's moving in, you know, and. But by just definition, you're taking that unit off the market so you can afford to take the unit off the market and change your cash flow. But you can't afford to give somebody, you know, four months. And the same thing with, you know, this this other type of fiction, this end, there's no cause thing that we're allowing this loophole on where we're giving the landlords. We're saying we're not going to do know cause or just cause because you want a cheaper way than paying an attorney $25,000. So, you know, there's a tradeoff there, too. And then the other one is, if you're taking it off the market, if you're acting it now, you're already making a conscious business decision. I can do without or for some reason I'm not going to be I'm giving up that income stream. So you're making a decision that I can afford to give up that income stream. So in my mind, if you can afford to give up that income stream, you can afford to pay more months relocation . And you know, I understand everything everyone said, but, you know, there was a tenant. And his argument to me is why we shouldn't do it. And he exceptions. There was a tenant, 70 year old man, 70 or 73 year old man. Seven year old wife. Small unit. Four Unit. One of these people that are mom and pop on Clinton Avenue and he got evicted because the owner wanted to move the son into the property. There's one vacancy and another vacancy on February 1st. So two vacancies plus his. And it's like. Mom and pops violate these rules. You know, mom and Pops, despite every good intention that we heard today, there's going to be bad actors, and we have to protect our tenants from these bad actors. Every day. A Thank you. I feel strongly about small mom and pop landlords because for the most part they've played fair by the sentiments by Alameda. And we should recognize that. You know, you take a look at, for example, the rent review advisory committee agendas for the past two years, and I've done that. You take a look at the agendas and there's been 40 cases that I bet that have come forward. And of the 40 cases. Clearly the vast majority are apartments. So what that means is that we're not talking about mom and pop landlords. You know, I've heard from them. And, you know, I think the arguments raised about the difficulty of spreading the cost, I mean, they're they are reasonable. Cases, there are reasonable arguments. And I think in Alameda, there's a special place that many of the mom and pops play, particularly in terms of the many of the historical buildings that they maintain. So we're not here tonight or for the past several months because of the small mom and pop landlords. And yet we're dropping the hammer on them, most especially. And they can't deal with the cost in the same way that a ten unit, 15 unit or 20 unit apartment can. So, you know, I think people really should take a look at the rent review advisory committees agenda, take a look at each of the addresses that are there and just Google Earth them. And you'll see that they are by and large. More larger apartments. Now, I think there's a case to be made for for making sure that the small mom and pop projects in Alameda are not are exempted from from things like the relocation benefit. And if they're not exempted from the relocation benefit, that they be given consideration as contemplated here where I'm given. Right. Vice Mayor, did you want. To weigh in? I agree with Councilmember De Saag, and it's not the size of the building. It's the number of units owned by the individual. So that's another complication. That goes into the definition. But I think someone who owns. Five four unit buildings is not a mom and pop, but someone who owns an eight unit building could be. So I think we have to peg it and we kind of did in the previous discussion where there's a cutoff of five units. So I think the number is there and I think there are also financing. You know, how you get your your loans at one point, it becomes a commercial loan. So that might be another way to identify. I'm sure there's a definition there. I do think that there needs to be a distinction because the larger the land owner, the more financial capacity they have to weather ups and downs and to have capacity to wreak havoc as well. So this is for no cause and no fault evictions. So if you have a mom and pop land, whatever that is, a property owner who wants to do a no fault eviction. So then they go ahead and they evict the tenant. And that tenant doesn't get any benefit because it's a mom and pop. But if you have a land property owner that owns five units and they want to do a no fault eviction, that tenant then does get relocation and everything. And but nothing goes to the tenant that is the mom and pop. Well. My what is my stance if you can remember last time was that I think these. The evictions should be subject to mediation and required mediation so that there's accommodation either by finance or time or a combination of both. That's worked out on a case by case basis. Mayor. Amber Ashcroft, thank you. So the problem I have with citing the RAC statistics is that we've all sat here and listened to people tell us that people were too afraid to go before the market because again and even if it were to be used for evictions, it's non-binding. All you can do is, you know, everybody has to show up and then the landlord has the option to say, yep, nope, I'm I'm doing what I want to do. But to member disagree because I know you've asked several times for precedent of what other cities have done in this regard. In this particular instance, if you'll note on the in the staff report on page four, they're at the top of page four, the last sentence of the first paragraph. Staff has not found a rent review slash rent stabilization ordinance that exempts mom and pop properties from the requirements of the ordinance. And I think that's telling. And it's what the mayor just said, that you would give some tenants the opportunity to have relocation benefits and others not. And I, I know that there's you know, we want to believe that the mom and pops, who are the good guys and the large landowners are the property owners are the bad guys. The first case I saw when I first came on the council involved the four plex and involved four sets of tenants who'd been there from 7 to 17 years, and they got rent increases of 20, 30, 40, 50% and. They really scrambled. So I, I think I think what we put together in the draft ordinance on this is a good one. And again, a year, let's give it a year's chance to prove itself. And at the end of the year, if we found some horrendous, unintended consequences, there's things that can be done. So you're agreeable? I'm agreeable. You're agreeable. So three of us are agreeable to going forward with staff recommendations and not excluding them. Mom and pop. It's going to be fine. Thank you for moving us. Let's keep moving. Okay. The second to the last issue, is it the issue of the rent increase cap and affirming that there is no cap on an annual maximum allowable rent increase, but there is a threshold amount above which a property owner must initiate the process and that that threshold amount was set at 5% on January 5th. Okay. Remember. This is one that I did correspond with staff about because I went back and listen to oh my gosh, the whole meeting that we had in that frigid auditorium. But I was particularly interested in this because we really didn't ever have the discussion about rent caps. So it wouldn't really be fair to say there was consensus about this. However, I am the chair. As I said, I put in my notes. The tape of the meeting reflects that there was no consensus on this issue because there was no discussion. But I'm willing to accept the 5% trigger and require that landlords initiate the process, followed by, I said, binding arbitration. But that's not quite the right phrase. And then review the statistics again in one year to gauge its effectiveness. It worries me somewhat because we are kind of saying there's no limits on what you can charge. However, I've also said in correspondence to staff that we want to make sure that both our RAC members and the arbitration arbitrators that we use have training and understand what the guidelines and criteria are that we expect them to apply . But again, we are charting some new territory, so we're not going to be able to see every outcome. I think there's light at the end of the tunnel, but some of this you have to take that leap of faith or keep doing what we were doing, which is to say nothing, which was having its own negative consequences . So I feel that this 5% trigger is very reasonable. It addresses the need for owners of older buildings to maintain them and mom and pops, whatever they are, to have reserves for relocation benefits and moving assistance. So in other words, I would agree with what's on the slide before us. Anyone else wanna speak to this? What about provisions for when landlords had not increased rents in previous years? Are there. What consideration do we have for that? I mean, is it as a straight five, is the threshold a straight 5% every year or in the case of Los Gatos? I think what I read was that if they had not raised the rent for two straight years, then in that third year when they're raising the rent, that the threshold is actually higher. Right. So that's when you have rent control. But all all that this is is a trigger threshold to get you to the rack. So if you haven't raised the rent in three years and you you notify your tenant that you're going to be increasing their rent 10%, you will then go to the rack. And part of what you'll say to the rack is I haven't raised the rent for 3% for three years. I'm sorry, for three years. And the rack then will take that into account when they make a recommended rent increase. Well, in the case of those guys, I think what it is. Don't don't raise the rent here. And in the third year, when you propose to raise the rent and it happens 5%. This isn't a trigger. There's a. Rent control. Those Congress has rent control. It's it's the it's the greater of 5% or 70% of the CPI. So they have they have rent control, which is 5%. And so you can't raise your rent. So and it's kind of like San Jose with their 8% rent control. If you haven't raised the rent for two years, you get 20 something first, you know. So the same living plan if you don't. Let me explain. If you don't raise the rent for several years, somehow have to take into account the cumulative effect of that. That's correct. That's why, for example, previously what I've always been arguing is that at in any one year. Threshold by which. The rent review advisory process ought to be 8%, with the caveat that over two years it is no more than 12%, so that on an annual basis really 6%. So that's what I'm getting, that there might be some times when. And it is having this hard, fast 5%. With a hard, fast 5% is a requirement to go to go to Iraq to have your rent increase that over 5% be mediated. Right. So I think the rack would take into account you haven't raised the rent in three years. You haven't raised it in two years. You haven't raised it in five, therefore. We are a reasonable rent increase would be 8%. And if all the parties agreed you would be on your way with with an increase of 8%. But what I am saying is that if in one year in year one, someone raises the rent by 3%, that means in a year or two they can't raise the rent. More than 7% is three plus seven equals ten. And over two years that averages out to five on average. Member. You want us on this. But that's not part of what what's currently being considered. I know. Right? So what I'm saying is, ah, is it a hard and fast 5% or do we take into account these kind of. But the average there. Is no our number here. Is 5%. This is a trigger. I know 5% is the trigger. So I know I want. To move on to another council member. Member. I mean, I guess not just because but if if we do a 5% cap and you also want to have some type of of consideration of banking. But if we don't do a cap, then maybe we don't need. I'm not talking about automatic trigger. I'm already about to express your. Let's move on. Thanks. I guess. Quickly. Based on the process that we designed at the last meeting, you know, good or bad, like it or not, it's kind of not a cap driven process. So, you know, I'll keep my opinion to whether I wanted to or not, but I don't know if it fits into the process that we. So are you agreeable to this? Are you able to use the trigger? Not a cap. Correct. Because I'm agreeable. I agree with member Ashcroft in regards to this. I'm sorry. Are you still speaking? Mr.. I mean. You know, the. There was a trigger on when the landlord had to initiate it and then they could prove that they were entitled to something higher. Then that's what this says. Cap. Right. But that's what it says. And so are you agreeable to this then? I suppose pretty much the summary was the fact that we all spent all that time on last time. It's these points. I don't know, based on the process. So that's what this is saying. There's no cap we have. So you are agreeable. Yeah, I agree. There's not. Yeah. Okay. That's what we need to know so we can move on. So. And I just want to say that I, I, I understand you Christian Council member deserves concerns, and that's certainly something that a landlord could bring to the. I do hope, though, that in the criteria for the rec members making decisions, it's more than just, oh, I haven't raised the rent for two years, so now I want to raise it 15%. I hope there's more. There's a there's we've identified in the draft ordinance a number of factors that the. We don't want. To wreck. I'll trust you on that but I just. And the. Housing. Okay. Perfect. Okay. All right. All right. All right. The vice mayor said he's fine with us. All right, so we're get on this real. Real consensus on this. Yes. Those to a majority. Okay. So now we're. Okay. Yes. So, um, and the last issue is the one of data collection. And I think, as we all acknowledge, everyone is keenly interested in the data collection, the annual review, the check in. And really what we're looking for is confirmation that what we would be proposing is to collect the data for rent increases above 5% because those are the ones that have to mandatorily you know, they have to mandatorily initiate the process. And then because tenants have an opportunity to initiate a process for increases less than 5%, we could also track those, but we're not recommending requiring landlords who are giving increases of less than 5% to report to the housing authority. And in some ways, you could argue that's potentially an incentive to another incentive to keep your rents below 5%. Where your rent increases. I'm okay with the rent increases above 5% because they'll all be triggered. It will have will have the information. I would say just to simplify this is anything that goes to rack we track. And that's what this means, actually. Yeah, you're right. You're right. That language is clear. I appreciate that clarification. That's real clean that anything that goes direct retract. In any way. But all right. And I agree on that, too. Member Ashcroft And I think it also goes to hopefully keeping the cost of the program fees down because if we get to to complex was it Byzantine I think was the term is it too late now? So but anyway, we wanted the. Yeah, the. I think that we definitely need the data collection and I think that a lot of this can even be done online when I think there's a process whereby the, the landlord can make this request and do some of this online and maybe even with the license payment, there's ways that you can probably collect a lot of information. And that part of that I haven't. But yes, I'm in agreement with this. And the other council member, they saw. Questions, do we know how many rack cases to how many cases come to the rack for 5% rent increases right now? You have? I don't believe that there have been a lot. I do think there's one case that's coming up, though, that's less than 5%, but there aren't a lot. But that's going to change if the ordinance is adopted, the way the direction was given, that's going to change because it's going to be a mandatory reporting for any rent increase, mandatory reporting and initiation of the process for any rent increase of over 5%. It will on its face. There's going to be more cases. Not necessarily because we might have fewer rent increases above 5%. If we have zero rent increases above 5%. Which would be great. I mean, just to weigh in real briefly. You know, I think we should, at least in the first year, collect everything. You know, as the tenant suggested. So we have data and that's what we've been asking for. And after one year, we'll have data to evaluate. You mean everything that goes through Rack. But we should track everything for the first year. I mean, I don't think there's there's agreement with me on that one, but that's just my thought. So I think I think the four of us were. Did you say you're agreeable to the tracking number? Just like I'm not sure where you landed on. Okay. Okay. So there's four of us that are limiting data collection to what goes through rec mean. Can we voluntarily have people report if they want to just so it can be tracked? Absolutely. I repeat that separate, though, because the credibility I don't know how you would confirm that. That's actual. Who's submitting. That? Yeah. Yeah. All right. I mean. Versus right now. All right. What else do you need? That's it. Somebody. And we need. More. So I'm. That's what staff was seeking this evening. The feedback and direction is extremely helpful to us and I think that keeps us on track for being back before the Council on the 16th. I want to clarify this then we'll be coming back on the 16th based on the direction that we've now been given as a first reading on the ordinance. And at that time, members of the public will again have the opportunity to weigh in. Correct? That's correct. In the staff report and the proposed ordinance will be published. It's Thursday. All right. Member Ashcroft So I did have a couple of comments on this. Exhibit one, the principles of agreement in this party. So the on. Okay. So I do want to see a clear written standards and guidelines for Iraq and the arbitrator regarding what documentation a landlord is required to provide when making a request for increased rent, and probably conversely, when a tenant is making a request for a lowered rent. This will help assure that parties using this process are dealt with in a consistent manner. I think that's important. Um. And then. Um. So then down under the rack process and this was something that one of the landlord associations raised, it's the first bullet. Under paragraph five, it's on page two. A person with an ownership interest in the property must attend the hearing. Tenant or landlord initiated. If not the rent increases void and no rent increase for 12 months. I thought that when we amended the rack ordinance we actually said the owner is somebody with the authority to make a binding decision because. The. It could be that. An owner isn't able to come, but shouldn't a property manager, as long as they had decision making authority. At that point, that. That's the way the ordinance currently reads now for for under the current process. I had understood from the Council that there was a strong desire that for the rent increases above 5%, that there would have to be the actual person with the ownership interest. So we are looking at that. And although we you do have to legally you have to be able to make an accommodation if somebody can't do it so. That a stay they have. Right. So because we. Because there will be a mechanism for somebody to who represents though who's legally, you know, who's who has a legally binding authority to make decisions if if they can't make it because we have to be able to legally we have to make that accommodation. But other than that, we would see someone with ownership interest. For the increases above 5%. If they're under five. We're keeping it as the current status quo where you can send somebody who is authorized to negotiate and come to a mediated settlement. And then on the did you remember Ashcroft? You want to go through all of your points? I think I got them. Okay. I had a question. So at this point, we're reviewing these principles to. The fourth bullet here under the rack process on page to. Drain from our men. Ah, I think this was actually the topic. Our agreed upon was to resolve the issues of staff's lack of clarity, not to. Um. So it says in the first paragraph set forth below is staff understanding of the City Council's principles of agreement concerning a proposed Rent Stabilization Tenant Protection Ordinance that staff will use as a roadmap for the ordinance will be presented. I think it behooves us to get out there exactly. Because I think this is going to be part of the ordinance. So we need to get feedback. The I want to clarify. So on the fourth bullet here, it says if the housing provider does not file such a petition. Under RAC. Okay. If the housing provider does not agree with the committee's decision unless the rental unit is exempt. The housing provider must file a petition to have a neutral hearing officer consider the rent increase if they are here. If the housing provider does not file a petition, the rent increases void and no rent increases permitted for 12 months. And I think that that should actually be the amount of the RACK'S recommendations. Right. That is. I think this is. Okay. So that's that's like a typo or something. Well, it's turned it around in one day and try to notice. I appreciate I just want to make sure the agreement. You are on, whatever. Your recommendation is, it's not nothing that the landlord gets. They get what the rack had. That's correct. Okay. And then. Then. Go ahead. I think that was. The only thing that I found on that. Did anyone else find any things that they want to clarify on these principles? All right. So then any other comments on this before we move on to the next agenda item? We're good. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Everyone on this. Staff.