City Fights Mobile Home Rent Measure

Saying that a statewide measure submitted by California’s mobile home park owners would threaten too many Ventura residents, the City Council late Monday adopted a resolution urging voters to reject the initiative.

Although the resolution opposing the statewide measure has no impact on the initiative, council members said it is important to take a stand because there are nearly 1,900 mobile homes within the city.

“There are some measures that specifically affect our constituents,” Councilman Gregory L. Carson said before Monday’s meeting. “So we’ve gone on record supporting or rejecting a [state] ballot measure before.”

Carson said the rent-control measure on the March, 1996, ballot “favors the park owners too much.”

The measure would limit rent increases on mobile home residents as long as they live in the coaches. But once the mobile home owners die or move away, the park owners would be allowed to raise rents for spaces to a “fair market” value.

Many mobile home residents say they are living on fixed incomes and cannot afford significant rent increases.

Earlier this month, the City Council rejected a proposal submitted by mobile home park owners that would have allowed them to raise rents by a percentage equal to the annual consumer price index, a national inflation measure.

Instead, the council, considering changes to its rent-control law that expires in September, opted to enact most of the provisions of a proposal submitted by mobile home residents.

That draft ordinance, which will come before the council next month, limits increases to 50% of the consumer price index.