Controls on Rent Hikes Are Ended : Owners of Mobile Homes Lose Fight in Westminster

Amid boos and catcalls, and despite warnings of recall actions and court challenges, the Westminster City Council voted unanimously Tuesday night to repeal the city’s ordinances governing rent increases for mobile home park residents.

About 400 people attended the meeting, almost all of them opposed to the repeal. An estimated 5,000 to 8,000 of Westminster’s 73,000 residents live in the city’s 19 mobile home parks.

The council action repeals the 1981 ordinance retroactively and releases about $1.5 million to the mobile home park owners that had been placed in a trust account pending the outcome of litigation.

Back Rents Due

An additional $1 million in back rents--demanded by the owners but never paid--will also become due and payable once the repeal ordinance takes effect in 30 days, according to both park owners and residents.

San Juan Capistrano has the county’s only other rent-control ordinance for mobile home residents.

John Barry, president of the Los Alisos Mobile Homes Protective Assn., told the council that the park residents are no more than “hostages” without “the fair-rent ordinance.”

The 1981 Westminster ordinance has been a constant source of litigation. It has survived 18 tests of constitutionality, according to mobile home residents. One suit challenging the legality of the ordinance is now before the state Court of Appeal.

Problems to Continue

The repeal, however, is not expected to end Westminster’s legal problems with rent control. “I guarantee you that if you pass this law tonight, your cup will runneth over with lawsuits,” Barry told the council.

Councilman Elden Gillespie, before the meeting, said, “I have no doubt whatsoever that we will be sued.”

Last year, three new council members were elected on an anti-rent-control platform. The three newcomers and two incumbents--who also had opposed rent control--indicated on several occasions that they would wait for final court action before taking any action on the ordinance.

The repealed ordinance allowed rent increases based on the rate of inflation. The increases took effect annually on July 1. If 51% of a park’s residents opposed a proposed increase, negotiations were required with park owners.

If negotiations stalled, an arbitrator was called in to settle the dispute--a development that City Administrator Chris C. Christiansen estimated has been used only six times since the ordinance was passed.

On four of those occasions, the park involved was Los Alisos Mobile Home Estates, a sprawling, 662-coach community on Garden Grove Boulevard owned by Lee Miller. Miller, the owner of another mobile home park in Westminster and president of the Mobile Home Educational Trust, an association of park owners, said the ordinance “was written so park owners could not present evidence they wanted to present” during arbitration.

On all four occasions the arbitrator decided for a smaller rent hike than that asked by Miller, or no increase at all.

Average Rents

Before July 1, 1981, Los Alisos asked for an average monthly rent of $217.48, according to Los Alisos resident Dick Johnson, a former president of the Los Alisos Mobile Home Protection Assn., a coach-owners’ organization.

For the fiscal year beginning July 1, 1981, the average rent asked by management climbed to $242.47, Johnson said, and the following year rose again, to $287.13.

For the year beginning July 1, 1983, the average rent asked by management again increased, to $310.09, and this year rose to $381.42.

For the same four-year period, increases allowed by arbitration brought the average monthly rent to $215.40 in 1981-82, $218.11 in 1982-83 and $229.18 in 1983-84. Arbitration decreed a lowering of the monthly average to $201.66 for the current fiscal year, Johnson said.

County Average

Miller, owner of Los Alisos, said his increases have been fair and are below the county average. While the average rent has increased from $217 in 1980 to $381, Miller said, it is still slightly below the county average, which he said is $403.

For the coming fiscal year, Miller said, he anticipates increasing rents by the “consumer price index plus 1% or 2%.” Long-term leaseholders can expect an increase of about 6.75%, he said.

Many mobile home owners say a fair-rent ordinance is necessary because of their special circumstances. Unlike apartment dwellers, they say, they cannot simply move if they disagree with a proposed rent hike. To do so requires substantial coach-moving expenses, they say.

Investments in Homes

The residents also say their considerable investments in the mobile homes must be considered.

Miller, however, said coaches can be moved or sold if the owners so desire. “It’s a matter of how much profit the residents want to make,” he said.

Mobile home resident Archie Miller said he “wonders how many people will have their rents raised how much.

“Everybody here is scared,” he said. “What do we do, how far do we go?”