The Committee to House the Bay Area (CASA) process has come to a close. The proposal will now move forward through the Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC), the Association of Bay Area Governments (ABAG), and the state legislature. The policies that come out of this process will impact housing, development, and displacement in the whole Bay Area and perhaps even the state.
For Iván Contreras, it’s normal to hear complaints about sudden rent increases from his neighbors; usually a couple of new people each month will reach out. But so far in January, Contreras, a housing organizer in Queens with community group Woodside on the Move, said it’s closer to a couple per day, all coming to him with notices from the state that their landlords performed “Major Capital Improvements,” or MCIs, and now want to increase their rent.
Oregon appears poised to impose statewide rent controls, a national first, and place new restrictions on evictions.
It’s the second time rent control has been teed up as a major decision for the Legislature. This time, however, Democratic leaders in the Oregon House and Senate have united around a single proposal, and there’s little sign members of the majority party will defect to oppose it.
Gov. Kate Brown supports a bill that would limit how much Oregon landlords could increase rents and eliminate no-cause evictions of long-term tenants, her office said Friday.
Brown believes those ideas “are innovative and will give renters some peace of mind,” spokeswoman Kate Kondayen said.
The endorsement increases the likelihood Oregon will enact notable tenant protections amid a housing shortage after failing to pass similar laws in 2017.
After flirting with a handful of renter protection measures in November, the Half Moon Bay City Council decided to put them on the back burner because it wants to gather more data on renters and landlords in the city and it’s worried that such measures might bring unintended consequences.
Los Angeles has adopted sweeping regulations that will restrict how long people can rent out their homes using Airbnb, as well as which properties they will be allowed to list with the home-sharing service.
The defeat of a ballot measure that would have allowed for the expansion of rent control across California has buoyed landlords and left tenants pinning their hopes on the state’s new governor for relief.
Proposition 10 failed resoundingly with nearly 62% of voters rejecting the initiative as of results tallied Wednesday. The initiative would have repealed the Costa-Hawkins Rental Housing Act, which bans cities and counties from implementing more aggressive forms of rent control. The result means those prohibitions remain in place.
Only 39 out of 482 cities in California have strong tenant protections. The Tenant Protection Act, AB 1482, that passed in 2019 is an important baseline, but we need to go further to stop displacement and unfair evictions. That’s why tenants are rising up in cities and counties across the state to win rent control for all!
Proposition 10, the proposed initiative to repeal the Costa-Hawkins Rental Housing Act, was stymied at the state ballot Tuesday thanks to an unprecedented $74 million in real estate industry opposition money, but there were also victories for rent control at local ballots across California.