The battle over rent control at the Alimur Mobile Home Park will come to a head this week, as will a test of a new county law designed to protect affordable housing.
The owner of the Soquel Drive park is asking county supervisors to convert the park's 147 rented parcels to owner-occupied parcels. While the owner notes the benefits of resident ownership, park tenants and their supporters fear the means of achieving this would raise the park's living costs and set an ugly precedent for low-income residents across the county.
"This is what we call a sham conversion," said attorney Terry Hancock, who works for Senior Legal Services and represents a number of park residents. "The park owner stands to make a lot of money and the residents lose money. If this process is successful, other park owners will look to their parks in the same way."
At issue is how the mobile home park ownership should be organized. At Alimur, residents currently own the coach they live in and pay rent to keep their coaches in the park. The owner is proposing that the mobile home park, instead, be carved up like a subdivision and residents buy the land beneath their coaches.
While the plan would give residents a chance to own their land, critics say many tenants couldn't afford to buy it. And though residents would have the option of continuing to rent, the conversion to an owner-occupied park would exempt the park from local rent control provisions, which critics say many tenants rely on.
Foreseeing this problem, the Board of Supervisors two years ago passed an ordinance requiring half of a mobile home park's residents to agree to any such conversion.
The ordinance hasn't sat well with park owners, though. Legal representatives of Alimur's owner Paul Goldstone say limiting options is unfair as well as illegal.
Susy Forbath, with Santa Monica-based Gilchrist & Rutter, explained that the state is responsible for setting the terms for mobile home park sales. Local governments, she said, are prohibited from adding their "spin."
At Tuesday's Board of Supervisors meeting, her firm will press their case for the Alimur conversion, despite Goldstone's failure to comply with the county ordinance and win tenant approval.
According to county documents, just two of the park's 121 residents favor the conversion.
Clay Butler, who has lived at Alimur with his partner for seven years, is among the majority against the conversion. He says if it goes through, he loses much of his investment there.
The graphic designer bought his mobile home for $75,000 with the understanding that the unit would forever remain on a rent-controlled parcel. But if the park owner is permitted to begin selling the parcels and the rent controls vanish, all he'll be left with is his mobile home, worth $4,000, and a big price tag for the land it sits on, he explained.
"I'm losing my equity," Butler said. "The rent control has provided value for our homes."
County officials say such conversions, by doing away with local rent controls, would eventually eliminate the large stock of affordable housing that exists in nearly 50 mobile home parks countywide.
While state law would still limit rents for those who don't choose to buy their properties, once the property turns over the price controls vanish.
"Park owners are continuing to look for creative ways to do away with our rent control," said Supervisor John Leopold, adding that he'll do what he can to maintain the caps. "We have a responsibly to the people who live here."
In February, the county Planning Commission recommended the Board of Supervisors deny the Alimur conversion, despite additional guarantees from the park owner to keep rents below what the state requires.
Representatives for the park owner say they will go to court if the conversion is not approved.
County supervisors will hear the request at 1:30 p.m. Tuesday in the board chambers at 701 Ocean St., Santa Cruz.
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