The ordinance’s similarity with a recent Los Angeles County moratorium may cause confusion with tenants and landlords
Evictions for substantial remodels will soon be more difficult and more expensive for landlords under a new ordinance moved forward by the Long Beach City Council Tuesday, Feb. 8.
If approved at next week’s council meeting, landlords who want to evict their tenants to substantially remodel their units will be required to pay relocation assistance to tenants (at least $4,500). They could also face civil fines of up to $15,000 if they illegally evict their tenants.
The ordinance also has a data-collection component, as Long Beach currently has no concrete data on such evictions in the city.
In order to receive permits (a local requirement for substantial remodel evictions), landlords will be required to provide a complete list of tenants who will be evicted in relation to the permitted work.
“What we have here today are concrete actions that will make a difference to our renters at a lower cost to both our city and landlords,” Councilmember Cindy Allen said, noting that the changes would “make a difference to renters today.”
Substantial remodel is a just cause for eviction under the Tenant Protection Act of 2019. The bill outlined limits on rent hikes and defined valid reasons for no-fault evictions.
It also allowed substantial remodels as a just-cause for eviction as a means of improving the State’s aging housing stock.
Any kind of substantial modification—structural, electrical, plumbing or mechanical that requires a permit and takes at least 30 days—can be used as a just-cause for eviction under the bill.
In Long Beach, 71% of the housing stock is over 50 years old, meaning many units are decades overdue for rehabilitation.
Substantial remodels, and the evictions that stem from them, have become a contentious issue in Long Beach.
Advocates claim that substantial remodel constitutes a “loophole” in the Tenant Protection Act—one that allows landlords to evict their tenants to hike up rents.
In Long Beach, some landlords reportedly made aesthetic changes to their units and claimed substantial rehabilitation as a means of illegally evicting the tenants, according to groups like Long Beach Residents Empowered and the Long Beach Tenants Union.
These include painting exteriors of buildings, changing cabinets, installing new tiles, removing floorboards—all illegal reasons for eviction under the TPA.
In some cases, illegal building-wide eviction notices for substantial remodel were the catalyst to tenant unions like the Daisy Resistance and the Orange Resistance.
In response to these illegal evictions, Long Beach passed a tenant harassment act, added requirements to serving illegal evictions and temporarily banned substantial remodel evictions to evaluate its policy.
But even with the newly-proposed protections, tenant advocates say they aren’t enough to protect long-standing tenants in Long Beach.
“I urge you to revisit the staff recommendation to change the construction threshold for substantial remodel from 30 to 60 days,” resident Kayte Deioma said, noting that such a change would protect the remaining 20 tenants in her apartment complex.
Melody Osuna, a lead attorney with Legal Aid Foundation of Los Angeles, said that the changes won’t prevent landlords from legally or illegally evicting their tenants.
“[This policy] just makes substantial remodel evictions slightly more expensive. It doesn’t protect the long-established tenants,” Osuna said. “Tenants will be displaced for higher-paying tenants, and the cost to substantially remodel and evict the previous tenants will be recuperated quickly for the property owner.”
Landlords will only be subject to civil fines if their illegally-evicted tenants take them to civil court, where they are not provided a lawyer.
A recent change to Los Angeles’s eviction moratorium may also confuse both landlords and tenants.
On Jan. 25, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors extended its eviction moratorium. The phased program will protect residents facing no-fault evictions (like substantial remodels) until Dec. 31, 2022.
If the council approves the ordinance next week, it will “be on the books” but will be superseded by the County moratorium, Deputy City Attorney Rich Anthony said. The council’s policy would go into effect on April 1, 2022.
The confusion was enough to impassion Elsa Tung with Long Beach Forward to urge the council not to pass the ordinance until later this year.
“Passing this ordinance tonight will lead to mass public confusion for both tenants and landlords, and unfortunately will lead to more evictions,” Tung said.
She noted that the new County policy is not an actual moratorium on filing evictions, but rather a defense against illegal evictions.
“Most tenants don’t know their rights, don’t want to go to court and are understandably terrified when they receive an eviction notice,” she said, urging the council to publicize more information about the County’s moratorium. “Most tenants simply move out without knowing they are protected.”
Councilmember Suely Saro asked whether there was anything the City could do to prevent confusion between Long Beach’s law and the County’s.
“The most effective way to combat confusion would be what several of the speakers mentioned, which would be a concerted effort on the part of staff to publicize the fact that there’s a county moratorium,” Anthony said. “And to publicize it as widely as possible.”
The council unanimously approved the motion. It will come to the council for a second and final reading next Tuesday, Feb. 15.
For more information on Los Angeles County’s recent tenant protections resolution and eviction moratoriums, visit www.dcba.lacounty.gov/noevictions/.
Correction: Feb. 10, A previous version of this story stated that County protections for substantial remodel evictions would last until May 31, 2022. They will last until Dec. 31, 2022. May 31, 2022 is the date that phase two of the eviction protections will trigger.
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