Tenant advocates, racial equity groups, YIMBYs and even some of their usual opponents wanted to see the bill pass.

The cities of San Francisco and Los Angeles — which rarely see eye to eye on housing issues — as well as every Democrat on the Assembly Housing and Community Development Committee had signed on.

So why did Assembly Bill 854, which would have curbed an owner’s ability to evict their tenants using the Ellis Act in rent-controlled jurisdictions, die without even a floor vote in the Democratic-supermajority Assembly?

Proponents of the longtime progressive priority — which promised to preserve the stock of affordable apartments amid a historic shortage — point to an aggressive campaign mounted by the deep-pocketed real estate industry.

“It’s insane to see so many groups working really hard on this and then still for it to not be enough because the opposition’s influence on our legislature is so immense,” said Sarah Abdeshahian, an advocate at the Tenderloin Housing Clinic, which co-sponsored the bill.

But just as a diverse group of advocates coalesced to support the bill, thousands of property owners — even those outside unincorporated Los Angeles County and 20 rent-stabilized cities directly affected — opposed it, united by a sense that the state is chipping away at their rights, just as COVID-19 has decimated their business.

“‘It may not be in my area, but it could be, next time,’” Sanjay Wangle, senior vice president of governmental affairs at the California Association of Realtors, said his members told him. “I think there’s a growing sense of sort of commonality of interest, which may not have existed before, between the Fresno property owner and the San Francisco property owner.”

Assemblymember Alex Lee, the Democrat from San Jose who authored the bill, says the legislation would have passed out of the Assembly and over to the state Senate but for the recent departures of four Democrats: Lorena Gonzalez from San Diego, Ed Chau from Monterey Park, David Chiu from San Francisco and Jim Frazier from Fairfield.

Lee is still weighing whether to reintroduce “substantially the same bill” next year or this legislative cycle — an option left on the table by having avoided a losing floor vote. Similar bills have been introduced, unsuccessfully, at least three times before.

“All those things are on the table luckily, and that’s something we’re still working out with our coalition, given the volatility of resignations,” Lee said. “That’s always our wild card.”

“This issue has been around for years and I understand the vote got very close, with significant new support for many corners,” said Chiu, former chairperson of the Assembly Housing and Community Development Community, who co-authored the bill last year and is now San Francisco city attorney. “And so I’m hopeful that there will be a real conversation about this in the coming months.”

Protecting small landlords — or big business?

The bill took aim at the Ellis Act, a 1985 state law that allows owners of rent-controlled properties to evict their tenants if they take all the units of a building off the rental market – a path that could otherwise be blocked by local governments guarding the precious stock of affordable units. Once off the market, those apartments can be sold as condos or demolished to make way for new homes.

More than 27,000 rent-controlled units have been removed in Los Angeles since 2001 using the Ellis Act, while San Francisco has lost about 5,000 units since then. And they’re sorely needed: the California Housing Partnership estimates 1.2 million low-income renter households don’t have access to an affordable home, and building a new government-subsidized unit costs an average of $500,000.

Related:

Lee’s bill mandated a five-year holding period before evicting tenants — an attempt to allow struggling property owners to go out of business, as had been the law’s original intent, while preventing speculators from buying up cheap properties and flipping them overnight. The bill also restricted the use of such evictions to one building per owner per decade.

That would significantly curb Ellis Act evictions, as three-quarters of evictions in Los Angeles between 2016 and 2019 occurred within five years of purchase, according to a recent analysis by Alexander Ferrer, policy and research analyst at SAJE in Los Angeles. But because of a glaring lack of transparency around who owns buildings in California, the effect on mom-and-pop landlords — a group the Legislature holds dearly — is difficult to determine.

In an opposition letter to lawmakers, the California Association of Realtors asserted that the bill would devastate “Struggling Small Property Owners Who Are Seniors or Individuals of Color.”

“I think it’s concern-mongering for a problem that we don’t know exists,” Ferrer said, citing the lack of demographic data on property owners. Wangle cited anecdotal evidence from their members.

“I think there’s a growing sense of sort of commonality of interest, which may not have existed before, between the Fresno property owner and the San Francisco property owner.”
— Sanjay Wangle, senior vice president of governmental affairs, california association of realtors

Ferrer’s analysis found that owners who had a property registered under their own name evicted tenants, on average, eight years after purchase — while limited liability companies, responsible for more than half of those evictions, did so in an average of just three years. But in California, it’s not uncommon for individual property owners to put even a single rental into an LLC.

That means a bid to win more votes — an amendment that carved out an exemption for “natural persons” who own no more than four residential units — is “not logical,” according to Debra Carlton, executive vice president and chief lobbyist for the California Apartment Association.

Ferrer found 45% of Ellis Act evictions during that time period in Los Angeles were filed by owners who held five properties or less – L.A. ‘s definition of a mom and pop landlord – a percentage Wangle, from the California Association of Realtors, says is not insignificant. Besides, he argued, the impact of the pandemic on small property owners should not be understated. Some landlords, he said, have gone nearly two years without rent payments, thanks to eviction bans, while still having to upkeep their properties.

“Among small rental property owners there’s this sense of, ‘Wait a minute. We’re enduring all these problems right now and again, more burdens are being placed,’” he said.

Tenant attorney Sean Chandra, from Public Counsel in Los Angeles, said the threat of an Ellis Act eviction remains a crucial tool for landlords, even if the court process isn’t completed. Instead of going through the Ellis Act, which mandates relocation costs between $8,650 and $22,350 depending on a renter’s age, income and tenure in the building, some owners pay tenants to leave by their own choice in “cash for keys” arrangements.

Chandra’s client, who declined to be interviewed, is facing an Ellis Act eviction at 416 South Catalina Street in Koreatown. The elderly woman and her adult son are paying $975 a month for their two-bedroom in the six-unit building, where they moved in 1996. The stucco-clad, L-shaped two-story, originally commissioned by a L.A. Times advertising executive in 1940, was deemed historic by the city, which means it can’t be demolished. The owner is hoping to mount it on a truck and move it elsewhere – and renting isn’t in the picture.

The owner plans to erect a luxury tower in its place — following in the footsteps of a 61-unit tower next door, where a 576-foot studio rents for $2,654 a month and where, according to the building’s website, “living your best life has never been easier.”

“You tear down an old building, you want to build something that’s going to maximize your income,” said John Greenwood, the developer’s attorney. “So it’s hard to incentivize building low-income property. And these Ellis Act evictions do displace poorer people, that’s understood. But, you know, that’s also the definition of progress – making things better.”

According to Greenwood, the tenant will be able to rent an affordable unit in the new building, provided she qualifies. Ellis Act restrictions in L.A. stipulate that if a developer builds market-rate units, a portion of them must be affordable, or all the units must be rent-controlled after the initial rent is set. But in contrast to rent-controlled units, affordable housing usually comes with income and immigration status restrictions, and sometimes, a long waitlist.

Demolishing rent-stabilized housing to make way for exponentially more housing is taking place across Los Angeles, according to Moira O’Neill, senior research fellow at the Center for Law, Energy, and the Environment at UC Berkeley, who recently co-authored a report for the California Air Resources Board about social equity in housing development patterns.

O’Neill and her colleagues found that the demolition of at least 2,400 housing units in L.A. between 2014 and 2017 gave way to at least 12,000 new units. But the demolition of 1,600 units that were rent stabilized gave way to only about 1,300 affordable units on those same sites. Their geographic distribution was particularly troubling.

While every neighborhood type saw a loss of rent-stabilized units, most were lost in more affluent areas of L.A. like Westwood and Brentwood. Only 241 affordable units replaced the 1,092 rent-stabilized units lost in those same neighborhoods. About half of the rent-stabilized units demolished in moderate income areas, like parts of Koreatown, were replaced with affordable housing.

“It makes sense that people are trying to prevent that,” O’Neill said.

Policy and politics at the Capitol

California YIMBY, which often supports housing production efforts, backed the bill because production alone isn’t enough, said legislative director Louis Mirante.

“I think California YIMBY is a great example of an organization that endeavors to find the three P solutions: The production solutions, the tenant protection solutions and the affordable housing preservation solutions,” he said. ‘We’re not eager to pit those solutions against each other.”

The California Apartment Association, however, dubbed the bill the “Stay in Business Forever Act,” arguing that it restricted landlords’ freedoms. Carlton said while a property owner could still sell their building, without the option of turning below-market apartments into more profitable condos or market-rate units, the universe of buyers shrinks considerably. The powerful California Chamber of Commerce opposed the measure for the same reason, as did the California Building Industry Association.

Carlton also argued the bill would block “tenancies in common,” in which several families buy a duplex or fourplex together — the only way for some families to enter homeownership as median home prices top $700,000 in California.

“I support homeownership, but the question is: ‘How are you getting there?’” said Joan Ling, an urban planning professor at the UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs. “Are you going to get there by dislocating renter families that most likely are going to have to move out of the area where they are living? There’s a big public policy question here.”

“It became just like an annoying screaming match where the Apartment Association will be saying one thing, we’d be saying another.”
— Sarah Abdeshahian, advocate at Tenderloin Housing Clinic in San Francisco

Abdeshahian, from the Tenderloin Housing Clinic, said that during the two weeks leading up to the vote, the legislators who had originally demonstrated their support for the bill began parroting the talking points they read in opposition letters by the Realtors and the Apartment Association, which spent $1.6 million and $1.3 million, respectively, in total lobbying efforts in 2021.

“That’s what killed this bill,” she said. “It became just like an annoying screaming match where the Apartment Association will be saying one thing, we’d be saying another, and why would they listen to us when we don’t give them any money for their re-election, but the Apartment Association is the reason that they’re in office?”

“I just don’t buy that,” Carlton responded, describing a clear division between the organization’s lobbying and campaign efforts. “This has just been a consistent policy that legislators haven’t agreed with.”

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CALmatters.org is a nonprofit, nonpartisan media venture explaining California policies and politics.

Lisa Marie DeWitt was born on June 3, 1981 and crossed over on December 28, 2021. It is with comfort we know she has rejoined her mom.

Lisa was born in Berkeley, and she moved with her family to Southern Humboldt when she was 3 years old. She attended Redway Elementary, Miranda Junior High and South Fork High School. In her Southern Humboldt years Lisa was often surrounded by her group of friends and was always the life of the party. Lisa dreamed of being a mom, and in 2005 her dreams came true as she welcomed Skyy into this world.

Lisa worked at Green’s Pharmacy and the movie theater in Garberville and after moving to Eureka held various retail jobs. Lisa was a dedicated volunteer helping start the Jefferson Community Center, organizing the park-building project, starting the youth afterschool program and teaching sign language and parenting classes. Lisa was also a member of the Neighborhood Improvement Project (organizing alley clean-ups), the annual safety fair and other activities. Lisa loved helping people. Lisa’s non-judgmental spirit was a welcoming presence and her laughter filled the room and put everyone at ease. Lisa also provided respite care for foster families, as her home was always a warm and welcome environment for those in need.

Lisa was preceded in death by her mom and best friend Ursula DeWitt, her uncle Eddie Pratt and all four grandparents. She is survived by her son, Skyy Allen Joseph Garrett, her father Joseph DeWitt, her brothers Joey and Adrian DeWitt, her half-sister Katina LaFond, her aunt Linda DeWitt and numerous aunts, uncles, friends and her West Side family from Jefferson.

A celebration of life will be held at Jefferson Community Center on February 19, at 2 p.m. on the back patio or in the auditorium with the windows open. Please expect to observe Covid protocols.

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A beached yacht, once worth hundreds of thousands of dollars, is now a costly pile of junk that the National Parks Service is still working to remove more than four months after the 41-foot Meridian named “Zoli’s Dream” ran aground on Redwood National and State Parks property.

Redwood National and State Parks Chief Ranger Stephen Troy told the Outpost that mechanical issues and heavy fog caused the boat’s owner to wreck near Enderts Beach on Oct. 2, four miles south of Crescent City. The unnamed man was reportedly able to escape the wreck without serious injury. However, he is now facing federal criminal charges and hefty fines as the battle over the yacht’s cleanup continues.

“Without a doubt, it’s a headache for us,” Troy said.

While Troy confirmed that DUI is not believed to be a factor in this case, the NPS remains tight-lipped about the exact details of the crash and ensuing criminal investigation.

“It is an open criminal case on the federal side and an open civil case,” he said. “The incident itself is possibly criminal — and what transpired afterward. He’s been cited to appear in federal court on a handful of charges.” 

The NPS is anticipating at least a few more months of wading through red tape before it can gain ownership of the yacht and scrap it.

“The big problem is that it still belongs to someone,” Troy said. “There are policies and laws we have to go by before we dispose of it. We’re going through that process now and getting close to a resolution. Hopefully, it will be gone in a couple of months.”

While the exact details of how the yacht will be removed are unclear, Troy said that the NPS is actively discussing the possibility of an in-house cleanup versus the cost of contracting a private company to do the job.

“Logistically it’s tough,” he said. “This is not like moving a car in a ditch. The boat is not seaworthy. It can’t float, so it has to be removed by land. It’ll cost a pretty penny for sure to remove it one way or another.”

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With the omicron surge on the decline, Governor Gavin Newsom last night announced that the state will be lifting its universal mask mandate for indoor public places, and at today’s Humboldt County Board of Supervisors meeting, Health Officer Dr. Ian Hoffman said the county will be following suit. 

Starting next Tuesday, the county’s indoor mask mandate will be lifted, but not for everyone, and not everywhere. People who have yet to be fully vaccinated — still more than a third of the county’s population — must still wear masks in indoor public spaces. And the mandate will remain in place in schools, hospitals, the county jail, skilled nursing facilities and other congregate settings.

Hoffman said the county is “moving away from policies that are requirements” toward recommendations — and both the California Department of Public Health and the CDC still recommend indoor masking. Also, businesses remain free to set their own mask policies.

ELSEWHERE: LoCO POLLZ: What Do You Think About Humboldt Dropping Its Mask Mandate?

First District Supervisor Rex Bohn expressed gratitude to the county’s public health staff, saying they’ve “caught a lot of crap” over the course of the pandemic. 

“I can’t say enough about how you’ve saved lives,” Bohn said, adding that he believes in the vaccine and is tired of masks like everyone else.

Roberta Luskin-Hawk, chief executive of Providence St.-Joseph, appeared via Zoom and said local hospitalizations peaked this past August and September and have dropped down to the current level of 16 COVID patients at either St. Joseph Hospital or Mad River Hospital.

The public comment period, predictably, was dominated by pandemic downplayers, including a man who said he’ll “preach noncompliance” on the continuing mandate for unvaccinated folks. A woman named Laura, from Arcata, claimed no one should be wearing masks because they’re detrimental to your health. (They’re not, when worn correctly.)

Just one caller questioned why the mandate is being lifted when there are still so many cases in the community.

Luskin-Hawk said that as an infectious disease specialist, she has followed the science closely during the pandemic and is convinced that vaccines have dramatically reduced hospitalizations and deaths.

Bohn shot back at a commenter who claimed the science presented by Hoffman has been debunked, saying, “You can debunk anything. You can debunk my existence if you look at the internet enough.”

The county’s public health staff have scheduled a press conference for Wednesday afternoon to provide more information.

Although the famous groundhog Punxsutawney Phil predicted that the country would see six more weeks of winter when he scurried out of his burrow on Feb. 2 and supposedly saw his shadow, we in Humboldt County are expecting the signs of an early spring, with sunshine predicted for the rest of the week and record-breaking temperatures expected over the next couple of days. Suck it, groundhog.

“Expect warmer temperatures and mostly sunny skies over the next few days,” the National Weather Service Eureka posted on its Facebook page this morning. “Near record high temperatures are possible, particularly on Wednesday. That means highs near 80 across portions of the interior and potentially over 70 along the coast.”

Seven day forecast from the US National Weather Service

Josh Wood of the NWS Eureka office confirmed with the Outpost this morning that a high of 73 degrees Fahrenheit is predicted for Eureka on Wednesday Feb.9, which would break the record temperature for that date of 70 degrees, recorded in 1928. The record temperature for Feb. 10 — also expected to reach 73 this week — is 68 degrees, recorded in 1987.

To provide some perspective on how cold it can get in early February, the Outpost will remind you that this record-breaking warmth arrives on the three year anniversary of Humboldt’s last real coastal snow! Remember that? That was fun. Super sunny 70-degree weather is February is also pretty fun, so get out there and enjoy it while you can!

A bill on its way to Gov. Gavin Newsom would require large employers in California to offer workers up to 80 hours of COVID-related paid sick leave

But there’s a catch: The bill, which the Legislature passed Monday, doesn’t apply to small employers with 25 or fewer workers. That exemption — which California’s 2021 COVID sick leave law also included — applies to more than 90% of companies in California and leaves at least 1 in 4 workers without access to the new paid leave.

Without additional leave, most workers in California are legally entitled to just three paid sick days. Early in the pandemic, the federal government was reimbursing employers for COVID sick leave, including small employers. But in September 2021, both the state law and the federal reimbursements for additional paid COVID leave lapsed.

“Both state and federal leaders are to blame here for being short-sighted and not anticipating the need for additional paid leave,” said Kristin Schumacher, senior policy analyst for California Budget and Policy Center.

California Department of Public Health guidelines say that workers who are exposed to COVID or test positive should quarantine or isolate for at least five days.

“When people don’t have paid sick days, they will work sick — and that’s a real danger,” said Jenya Cassidy, director of California Work and Family Coalition, which advocates for paid leave policies. This new bill is the product of compromise, she said, and it will wind up helping a lot of workers if it gets signed into law.

But, she said, “obviously if we’re trying to do this for public health and for the health and well-being of workers and their families, then why would anybody be exempted? Nobody should be exempted.”

“This employee threshold was part of finding compromise with employer organizations and legislators concerned about the economic impact of the pandemic on small businesses,” said Senate President Toni Atkins, a San Diego Democrat, in a statement.

Bad for small business workers

The vast majority of businesses in California have four or fewer employees according to data from California’s Employment Development Department. Workers at smaller companies earn lower wages, on average, than employees at larger firms, according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

That’s concerning because nationally, workers with household incomes under $25,000 were 3.5 times as likely to miss a week of work due to COVID-19 compared to workers with household incomes of $100,000 or more, according to analysis from the Economic Policy Institute.

Good for small business owners

Small businesses have been buffeted around by closures, staffing issues, and supply chain snafus. Business plans have been upended with each new wave of the virus, and while companies like Amazon, Apple, Tesla and UPS have seen their stock soar during the pandemic, profit margins for many small businesses have worn thin.

Larger employers generally have more cash on hand and easier access to credit, so they might have an easier time adapting to new costs, said David Nelson, director of public policy for California Asian Pacific Chamber of Commerce.

“If the exemption was not put in place for small businesses, a mandate like that likely could have been the death knell for many small businesses, especially minority small businesses,” said Nelson. He estimates that the average Asian American and Pacific Islander-owned business in California has between four and 12 employees.

But leaving small businesses out entirely wasn’t the only option lawmakers had to soften the impact.

California will have a $21 billion surplus for the coming budget year, based on the Newsom administration’s projections. Seemingly everyone involved in California state politics has their own idea for how to spend it. That includes small business advocates, who say the state could have reimbursed small business owners for providing additional paid sick leave to workers.

“We recognize, especially with another historic surplus in the budget, that there are ways that the administration could make this place that small business owners are in much easier,” said Bianca Blomquist, California policy director for the advocacy group Small Business Majority.

“It really seems like being able to support workers should be a very basic cost of doing business.”
— Jenya Cassidy, director of California Work and Family Coalition

Other small business groups opposed the bill, despite the exemption for small employers.

“There’s this assumption by the progressives in the Capitol that employers are not doing their part,” and making leave available, said John Kabateck, California state director for the National Federation of Independent Businesses.

“California is rich with employee leave programs,” he said, pointing to a list of leave programs, many of which do not apply to workers exposed to COVID-19, such as time to serve on a jury, or for victims of domestic violence to file restraining orders.

Jim Relles, a florist in Sacramento, is glad the new leave requirement won’t affect his business if it’s signed into law. He’s got 19 employees and said it’s been hard to keep up with shifting requirements during the pandemic. A new paid leave policy would mean more bookkeeping and another rule to stay on top of.

What other COVID protections do small business workers have?

Small business employees who are exposed to COVID at work have significantly more protections than workers who get exposed or sick outside of work.

Under California’s COVID-19 workplace rules, workers who get sick due to a workplace exposure are supposed to be sent home with full pay until they’re able to return to work. If an employer offers more sick days than the minimum of three that workers are granted by state law, then they can ask workers to use those additional sick days to quarantine or recover.

Workers who are sure they were exposed to COVID outside of work don’t have the same pay protection, but they might be eligible for other programs, such as disability insurance. The state has a website to help workers figure out what sort of leave they’re eligible for based on their situation.

Cassidy, from the Work and Family Coalition, said she hopes small business owners are working paid sick leave for COVID into their budgets: “It really seems like being able to support workers should be a very basic cost of doing business.”

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CALmatters.org is a nonprofit, nonpartisan media venture explaining California policies and politics.

Raymond Anthony Ross was born in Marysville on August 10, 1977, and moved to McKinleyville with his family when he was five years old. Ray spent many summers of his childhood with his grandparents in Marysville where he loved swimming and hanging out with cousins.

Ray attended McKinleyville schools where he met his best friend, Larry Roth, before working at local mills. At 21, Ray had an opportunity to start an apprenticeship as an electrician in the Santa Rosa area. Ray moved in with Larry and Larry Sr., and within a few years, Ray became a certified journeyman electrician. Ray had a real knack for electrical — he had an ability to map out jobs in his head and was known for his supreme pipe bending skills. In Santa Rosa, he worked for Knights Electric for eight years helping bring power to wineries and commercial buildings.

While living in Santa Rosa, Ray met the love of his life — fellow Humboldt native Kelly Houston. They married a year and a half later and enjoyed living in Sonoma County. When their son Jakob Anthony was born in 2007, the desire to return home to Humboldt to be closer to family and cooler weather was too strong to resist. In Humboldt, Ray worked for Colburn Electric, supervising many commercial jobs. He was with Colburn Electric for twelve years, where many knew him simply as ‘Big Ray,’ and he thoroughly loved the opportunities he had with the company.

Addyson Ann was born in 2009, making the Ross family complete. Ray took great pride in his family and loved spending time with them and watching his kids play sports, especially Jakob playing football and jujitsu and Addy playing softball, volleyball and basketball. Twice a year, Ray and Kelly would pack the family up and head back over to the Sacramento area to spend time with his Papa Jim, Uncle Mitch, Aunt Joann and other family members. Ray’s kids especially loved these trips with their dad and being able to spend countless hours in the hotel pool swimming with him.

Anyone who knew Ray knew how much he loved hanging out with friends and family, drinking beer, telling stories and grilling an amazing steak or two. Ray was a connoisseur and master cooker of meat and took immense pleasure in knowing his tri-tip was always in high demand at any family function. Ray enjoyed listening to music LOUD, offensively loud to many, but he maintained the mantra that ‘if it’s too loud, you’re too old!’

Ray was ornery, silly and loved to have a good time. He is deeply missed already.

Ray left this earth to be with the Lord on January 30. He is survived by his wife, Kelly, son, Jakob and daughter, Addy, as well as many other family members.

A celebration memorial for Ray will be held February 12 at noon at Azalea Hall in Mckinleyville.

Anyone who wishes to honor Ray Ross is requested to make a contribution to Jakob and Addy’s college fund via Kelly Ross at any Coast Central Credit Union location.