Demolition Plan Called an Affront to Rent Control : Housing: Officials propose speeding up razing of vacant buildings, citing safety and fire hazards. But city attorney assails plan.

A Santa Monica Planning Department proposal to make the demolition of vacated residential buildings easier and faster has renewed the fervor of rent control.

City Atty. Robert M. Myers, one of the authors of the city’s tough decade-old rent control law, lashed out at the proposal to ease regulations for demolition as an affront to rent control that would “advance the objectives of landlords and developers at the expense of protecting rental housing and protecting neighborhoods from excessive building activity.”

City staff--including the planning, fire and police departments--had recommended that the council allow quicker demolitions to rid the city of what some officials said are fire and health hazards. Many vacant houses are illegally inhabited by homeless people.

The planning staff proposal would have allowed demolitions after planning approval for a replacement project had been obtained but before a building permit was granted. The change would speed up demolitions from as much as several months to a few years.

The City Council on Tuesday diplomatically gave a little to each side of the debate by directing Myers to draft an ordinance that would allow legal tenants to remain in their buildings a little longer than under the current process while speeding up the demolition process for some landlords.

The council also agreed to further investigate safety and health concerns over vacant buildings.

Police and fire officials say allowing buildings to remain abandoned is tantamount to an invitation to youths and the homeless to commit crime. “To cook, (the homeless) start fires, using anything from the kitchen sink to the fireplace to the floor,” said Fire Chief Thomas Tolman.

But some council members blamed landlords for the sometimes hazardous conditions of the vacant buildings and directed staff to make such landowners more responsible for preventing crimes and fires from occurring on their property. “This thing became a problem because landlords have not met their obligations of maintaining these properties,” said Councilman Ken Genser.

The council also suggested that the city’s Nuisance Abatement Board should be more aggressive in cracking down on landlords who allow their properties to become run-down.

Currently, landlords must have a building permit for a replacement project before they can be issued a demolition permit. In addition, they must evict all tenants before they can begin the building permit process.

Councilman Kelly Olsen proposed that the new regulations allow property owners to process their building permits while obtaining Rent Control Board clearances so tenants can remain in their apartments through the process.

Olsen also proposed allowing the immediate issuance of demolition permits once a property has received a “Category C” removal permit, given to buildings deemed by the rent board as uninhabitable and unable to be made habitable at a reasonable cost.

Currently, even with a Category C permit, an owner is still required to have a replacement project and building permit approved by the Planning Department before demolition can begin.

Single-family homes in areas zoned for multifamily housing would also be allowed to be demolished without a building permit in hand.

The rise in the number of vacant buildings is primarily a result of property owners’ frustration with the city’s tough rent control law. Some landlords have used the state Ellis Act to legally evict tenants and get out of the rental business, but because of the city’s lengthy and bureaucratic process to tear down a building, many have simply abandoned their buildings.

The Planning Department estimates that there are 212 vacant buildings in the city, 59 of which are “problem” sites with a history of repeated complaints or reports of criminal activity. However, some city officials dispute the figures, saying some buildings have re-entered the rental market and others have already been approved for demolition.

The planning staff, in making its proposal, had concluded that “no useful purpose is served by the preservation of boarded-up housing units and, indeed, that such buildings create a significant potential for public hazard nuisance. . . . It is preferable to address such situations before structures become nuisances, rather than to react to complaints after serious problems have arisen.”

“In our view, this is not a rent control issue,” said Planning Director Paul Berlant. “It is an issue of somebody geting hurt, possibly getting killed.”

Before the Tuesday night council meeting, Myers sent out a sharply worded memo about the proposal, conveying his opposition and that of Rent Control Board Administrator Mary Ann Yurkonis.

He accused the planning staff of developing the proposal in consultation with landlords and developers without adequate consultation with tenant representatives.

He chastised the planning staff for saying that there is no useful purpose to preserving boarded-up buildings: “(Staff) has apparently forgotten about the housing crisis faced by this city. The physical loss of any rental housing in Santa Monica adds to that crisis.”

The Santa Monica Area Chamber of Commerce and the police and fire departments supported the staff proposal. At Tuesday’s meeting, a Chamber of Commerce-sponsored group called the Committee for Public Safety presented 325 signatures to the council in support of the proposal. The group also decried the state of vacant buildings in the city and blamed the problem on politicians bent on preserving local rental housing.

But Myers was able to persuade the City Council to address the safety and health problems of vacant buildings by placing the onus on property owners.

The planning staff’s approach “rewards criminal law breakers and makes it easier for landlords and developers to destroy rental housing,” Myers said.

Myers had proposed an ordinance that would require owners to maintain and secure their vacant buildings or face administrative fees and criminal sanctions. The council, however, simply directed city staff to further study the matter to determine the type and cause of problems in abandoned buildings and what authority the city has over those properties.