Wachs’ Plan Seeks Rent Protections for Elderly

Mayoral candidate and Los Angeles City Councilman Joel Wachs played to his political base Wednesday by proposing to protect low-income senior citizens from any rent hikes that exceed their annual Social Security cost-of-living increases.

His proposal to amend the city’s existing rent-control law drew early support from senior citizens, a key target of the San Fernando Valley lawmaker’s campaign for mayor.

Meyer Bernfield, a Studio City retiree and former president of the Federated Council of Senior Citizen Clubs, predicted the proposal will galvanize support for Wachs among seniors. “I’m sure he’s doing it for political reasons,” Bernfield said. “But I also believe Joel feels for seniors.”

Larry Gross, executive director for the Coalition for Economic Survival, welcomed the Wachs proposal and urged that it be broadened to protect welfare recipients from annual rent increases that outpace their government benefits. “I hope too that it doesn’t become just a political football,” said Gross, a longtime tenants’ rights champion.

Meanwhile, apartment owners, besides having qualms about the equity of such a plan, contended that in today’s depressed rental market the Wachs’ plan might be moot.

“I own a building, and my rents are what they were in 1985,” said Jerry Factor, past president of the Apartment Assn. of Greater Los Angeles. “It probably would have little practical effect in this market.”

In past years, rent control has been an explosive and emotional issue at City Hall, as Wachs, author of the city’s original rent stabilization ordinance, well knows. But it has not been a burning issue for several years due to the area’s depressed real estate economy that has helped stabilize rents.

Some saw the latest Wachs’ initiative as conflicting with his call last week for City Hall to declare a moratorium on new taxes and business regulations until the mayor and City Council have adopted a comprehensive blueprint for stimulating the city’s economy.

“It’s pandering for votes,” said state Assemblyman Richard Katz (D-Panorama City), who is also running for mayor. “I heard Joel saying recently he didn’t want to make it more difficult for business. It’s a contradiction.”

But Wachs denied any conflict, saying his proposal of last week was intended to protect jobs-producing industries from new City Hall impositions. Apartment ownership is “not on a business that’s a jobs producer,” he said.

But Factor disagreed. “When our incomes go down, we do less painting, less maintenance, less landscaping and that means less jobs,” he said.

“The apartment business is one of the state’s big employers,” said Dan Faller, president of the Apartment Owners Assn. of Southern California. “It shows you how much Wachs knows about business.”

Wachs’ proposal would actually hurt senior citizens, Faller said. Why, the landlord representative asked, would landlords rent to seniors if it meant more regulations and controls, when they could rent to someone else?

Wachs conceded he has not had time to completely flesh out his proposal. But his intent is for the rent break to be available only to low-income tenants, tentatively those who derive 50% or more of their income from Social Security, Wachs said.

Barbara Zeidman, head of the city’s rent-control agency, said studies have identified about 70,000 rent-controlled households in the city that have at least one senior citizen resident. There are 465,000 rent-controlled units in the city.

The city’s rent-control law provides for caps on the yearly rent increases allowable to continuing tenants. In the past four years, the increases have been either 5% or 4%, which track fairly closely with the Social Security increases.

For instance, starting July 1, the allowable rent increase will be 3%, the same as the Social Security increases for 1993.

Over the past few years, the Social Security cost-of-living increases have ranged from a low of 3.7% in 1992 to a high of 5.4% in 1991.

Wachs unveiled his plan at a news conference initially intended only to publicize his motion for the City Council to go on record to oppose any erosion of Social Security benefits. He said he will formally introduce it before the City Council on Friday.

The Wachs proposal comes as President Clinton and some congressional leaders have indicated a willingness to look at holding the line on annual Social Security cost-of-living increases to help cut federal budget deficits.