Picking a Number
Large families on low incomes have few choices when it comes to decent, affordable housing. They often rent small apartments, then invite relatives and friends to share the crowded living quarters. For example, as many as 14 persons sleep in cramped shifts in a one-bedroom apartment in the Van Nuys section of Los Angeles. Some reasonable limits on such crowding are in order.
A surplus of tenants in tight spaces creates a breeding ground for contagious diseases. Their sheer numbers cause fire hazards and safety problems. Too many people crammed into too little space also mean more wear and tear on an apartment. The basic question is: How many tenants is too many? The Los Angeles City Council is scheduled to pick a number today.
An ordinance, proposed by Councilman Ernani Bernardi, would allow 6 persons to share a standard one-bedroom apartment, 8 persons a two-bedroom unit and 11 persons a three-bedroom unit. The limits are based on the state uniform building code, which requires rental units to contain one room that is at least 150 square feet in area and all rooms used for sleeping to measure at least 70 square feet. Bernardi’s ordinance would restore a state standard, dropped from the city code in 1985, that requires an additional 50 square feet per person when more than two persons sleep in a room. The council should approve these humane standards in the name of safer, healthier living.
Landlords who are willing to remain in the low-income rental market would also benefit. Some owners complain that the additional tenants use too much water, fill garbage cans to overflowing, create unanticipated maintenance work and generate expenses that exceed the monthly rents of $300 to $500 that they charge. The ordinance would help landlords get control of their buildings.
Dangerous overcrowding is not unique to Los Angeles. It is a problem in poor immigrant and minority communities elsewhere in Southern California. In Orange County the city of Santa Ana is strictly enforcing the state uniform building code on occupancy limits in a crackdown on housing. The city attorney’s office argued successfully before an Orange County Superior Court judge that living rooms that contained vented wall heaters, which are not allowed in rooms used for sleeping, could not be calculated in the sleeping arrangements. Two families were evicted.
But evictions are not the goal of the Bernardi ordinance. Poor families with lots of children have few alternatives in tight, expensive housing markets everywhere, including Los Angeles, where the wait for public housing can take at least a year and often more. Occupancy limits would eliminate some overcrowding, but the more important goal would be to build pressure for a more compassionate public strategy leading to more decent and affordable housing.
