LAGUNA BEACH : Planners to Weigh Mobile Home Plan

The Laguna Beach Planning Commission will consider a proposed ordinance tonight that would offer a broad protection package for mobile home owners forced to move when a park closes.

The ordinance would require landowners who wish to convert a mobile park to another use to either buy the mobile homes at fair market value or pay to relocate homeowners to a comparable coastal park in Laguna Beach. Relocation costs would include moving expenses, first and last months’ rent at a new park and the difference in rent between the two parks for a year, if the second park is more expensive.

If ultimately approved by the City Council, the ordinance would be one of the most comprehensive mobile home relocation plans in the state, said Kathryn Lottes, Planning Department assistant director.

K.P. Rice, president of the homeowners association at the Treasure Island mobile home park, said: “Fundamentally, what the relocation ordinance does for us is it pays us if they take our homes away.”

But an attorney for the owners of Treasure Island, the city’s largest such park, called the ordinance “absurd” and said it will “almost certainly lead to litigation” if approved by the City Council.

In particular, Charles Black objected to a provision that says the price of a mobile home would be based on its value in the current setting. Such a provision can significantly boost the value of homes in oceanfront parks.

“The tenants don’t own the property; they own the coach,” Black said. “By virtue of this ordinance, we think the city is attempting to transfer a significant portion of the value of the property, which my clients purchased, to the tenants.”

Treasure Island residents have locked horns for more than a year with the park owners, Merrill Lynch Hubbard, an investment unit, and Costa Mesa businessman Richard Hall, who plan eventually to redevelop the land. The homeowners say they hope someday to buy the property.

The park was purchased in August, 1989, for $43 million. Rice said residents estimate that the total value of the homes at the current location would range from $25 million to $50 million.

The ordinance also addresses the impact that park closures would have on the community’s stock of affordable housing. Depending on whether the park is converted for residential or other use, the park owner would have to provide some “affordable units” on or off the site.

Should the commission endorse the plan tonight, it will most likely be presented to the City Council in January, Lottes said.