California Governor Backs Rent Control Bill

California Gov. Gavin Newsom says he supports efforts to cap annual rent increases in the state. He ventured even further to indicate he’d be ok with even more restrictions than are currently proposed.

Speaking this week in Los Angeles at an event where new funding was unveiled to protect renters from evictions, Newsom was quoted in the Los Angeles Times, “I’m hopeful … that I will get on my desk in the very near term a rent cap bill because it is long overdue in the state of California.”

Assemblyman David Chiu’s (D-San Francisco) Assembly Bill 1482, currently working its way through the state Legislature, seeks to limit annual rent increases across the state to 7% plus inflation for three years. Landlords would also be restricted from evicting tenants without first saying why. The bill exempts apartments built within the last decade, as well as single-family home rentals in most cases.

Newsome, who wants even stricter controls, said “I think we can take it another notch up.”

The California Apartment Association this week urged Assemblyman Chiu to amend his bill in several key ways. Among them: delaying the “just cause” eviction element of AB 1482 if a tenant has been in place for 24 months, and exempting units from the rent cap until they reach 20 years of age.

“We realize that Gov. Newsom is eager to sign a tenant-protection bill this year,” said Debra Carlton, senior vice president of public affairs for CAA. “We’re equally eager to make sure that any bill that lands on his desk doesn’t make California’s housing crisis worse.”

A study by UC Berkeley showed California’s 9.5 million renters are considered “burdened” spending at least 30% of their income on housing costs. The state is seeking ways to make housing more affordable, though efforts to do so through rent control legislation have not succeeded. Last year, voters defeated Prop 10 by 20 percentage points, in a ballot measure that would have repealed the Costa-Hawkins Rental Housing Act and expanded rent control.

On the horizon is another ballot initiative for 2020 that seeks stricter rent control. Backing is coming from L.A.-based AIDS Healthcare Foundation for a proposal that includes limits to how much rents could increase when a new tenant moves in, which state law now prohibits. Signatures are being collected to put it in front of voters next year.

Connect Orange County is coming up on August 22nd at The Resort at Pelican Hill in Newport Coast. More information about the event and registration information can be found here.

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