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LA County Supervisors Approve New Renter Eviction Protections for Those Who Lost Income Due to Fires
The Los Angeles County Board approved new tenant protections to stop evictions caused by January's wildfires. The measure, championed by Supervisor Lindsey Horvath, passed with a 4-0-1 vote; Supervisor Kathryn Barger abstained.
The ordinance applies to renters in both incorporated and unincorporated areas of Los Angeles County and provides temporary relief for those who have lost income because of the fires.
The new regulation will prohibit landlords from evicting most fire-affected tenants (excluding high-income renters) over the next six months. To qualify, tenants must submit a form confirming they have lost at least 10% of their income. Renters protected by the ordinance must pay all back rent by July 31, 2026, to avoid eviction.
Eviction protections apply to households whose income is less than 150% of the Area Median Income. This means a family of four needs roughly $147,000, a couple needs around $117,825, and a single person needs about $103,125.
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LA City Council Postpones Vote on Fire Eviction Defense Proposal
The Los Angeles City Council delayed a vote on a proposal to help nannies, gardeners, and other economically impacted residents fight evictions after January's wildfires.
Councilwoman Eunisses Hernandez, who introduced the proposal last month alongside Councilman Hugo Soto-Martinez, said she heard the concerns from opponents and believes with the time granted, "we can come to a solution."
The council voted 11-0 to continue the item to March 4.
Soto-Martinez and Hernandez's initial proposal, including a one-year rent freeze and stronger eviction protections, faced opposition from colleagues and landlords, leading to its amendment.
"This motion has been cut and amended and whittled down," Hernandez said. "It is a completely different motion but still with protections that are incredibly vital for our city."
Hernandez introduced additional amendments to establish a three-month period for tenants to pay back rent and expedite the policy, but it was rejected in a 7-4 vote. She argued the proposal would not be invoking a "blanket, wide eviction moratorium," which many landlords previously criticized and feared would hurt them.
"This is just a small Band-Aid to help folks stay in their housing so that more people don't fall into this `eviction to homelessness' pipeline," Hernandez said.
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State Bill Introduced Proposes Rent Freeze Across Los Angeles County In Response to Wildfire Impact
This month, a bill was introduced at the state Capitol to temporarily halt rent increases in Los Angeles County for one year, post-Palisades Fire and windstorm emergency. Both CES and Housing is a Human Right are co-sponsors of the bill.
Proposed by Assemblyman Isaac G. Bryan (D-Los Angeles), AB 246 aims to freeze rents as of January 7, 2025, and disallow any increases while the freeze is in effect. The bill surpasses California’s anti-price-gouging statute (Penal Code Section 396), which only caps rent increases at 10% during emergencies, by banning all rent increases.
Following reports of substantial rent hikes—including 60% increases in Venice and over 100% in Santa Monica—Bryan presented the bill. Civil penalties of up to $10,000 per violation will be enforced by district attorneys against those who violate AB 246.
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Exploiting disaster: Renters accuse Los Angeles landlords of "abusive and illegal" price hikes
Landlords are reportedly flouting laws that prohibit them from jacking up prices during an emergency
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By Nicholas Liu
January 21, 2025
Los Angeles-area landlords appear determined not to let a disaster go to waste, with tenant rights organizations and displaced people searching for shelter reporting that the prices for apartment rentals and hotels have increased by as much as 100 percent since wildfires engulfed sections of the city.
Because California is in a state of emergency, laws targeting price-gouging, including a ban on landlords raising rents by more than 10 percent of pre-emergency levels, should be in effect. But that hasn't deterred some landlords from apparently raising their rents by far more than that, creating bidding wars — which potentially allows them to "accept" an offer higher than the state-mandated limit — and leading activists to accuse them of callously exploiting displaced survivors who have lost almost everything to the fires.
"Authorities are focused on arresting the looters and boasting about how they've arrested so many of them, but they haven't done anything about these landlords who are looting people's wallets, trying to profit from the misery that they're are facing right now," Larry Gross, executive director of Coalition for Economic Survival (CES), told Salon.
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Fires Add Disaster to the Los Angeles Housing Crisis
Preventing price gouging on rents and predatory evictions are looming challenges for public officials.
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By Mark Kreidler - January 16, 2025
One of the worst natural disasters in U.S. history, the fires in and around Los Angeles will rewrite the story of housing there. Accounts already abound of skyrocketing rents and price gouging as thousands of Angelenos, some of them monied, are forced into an emergency housing market after losing their homes. The cost and environmental impact of rebuilding thousands of lost homes is another thread entirely.
“Prior to this, Los Angeles was facing the most severe affordable housing crisis in the nation,” said Larry Gross, with the Coalition for Economic Survival, an L.A.-based nonprofit that advocates for low- and moderate-income renters. “This is going to exacerbate that to levels that I can’t even imagine.”
“Long-term, low-rent tenants are the ones who are going to have a target on their backs, and for the most part those are low-income wage earners, seniors on fixed incomes, the disabled and people of color,” Gross said. “The rent gouging is a form of looting, and our leaders need to make examples of those who profiteer off the misery and tragedy that we’re facing.”
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How the LA wildfires could exacerbate the region’s housing and homelessness crises
After the fires destroyed thousands of homes, displaced residents face rental price gouging and dire need for essential supplies
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by Jocelyn Figueroa - February 4th, 2025
While California law prohibits price gouging, there is a loophole. These rules don’t apply to new renters, said Larry Gross, the executive director of local nonprofit Coalition for Economic Survival (CES). And while landlords can be fined up to $10,000 for price gouging, that amount may not deter them if they’re able to make half of that with a single rent payment.
At this point, no actions have been filed against landlords. “The city has no issue arresting looters for theft,” Gross said. “What landlords are doing is also theft.”
In response, CES and many other LA-based organizations are pushing the LA City Council to declare a rent freeze and placing a moratorium on evictions. So far, the City Council has delayed the proposal. “We can’t afford to wait,” Gross said.
Where to go for help
Gross urged residents to sign up for the group’s Tenants’ Rights Zoom Clinic, which runs every Saturday at 10 a.m. PST. CES also offers one-on-one counseling. Whether someone has lost their home or is being threatened with eviction, Gross said CES can help.
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| | The Ellis Act Has NO Place in an Extreme Housing Crisis - February 24, 2025 | |
I am a former property manager and I do not believe in the Ellis Act. Period.
The Ellis Act was theoretically designed to let small-scale landlords exit the rental housing market. Which is ridiculous and completely unnecessary, since landlords who no longer want to deal with a building have always had the option of selling it.
In practice, many larger-scale owners buy up properties, Ellis Act the tenants, hold the housing empty for at least five years (per state law), then redevelop the property to bring in higher-paying renters. RSO status is supposed to carry over to new housing built on the parcel, but we all know how that overwhelmingly tends to play out in Los Angeles.
The Coalition for Economic Survival has spent years compiling data on Ellis Act evictions and mapping them with the Anti-Eviction Mapping Project, to give an idea of how severe the problem has become.
The most recent data is from 2024. Here’s the problem: despite the mass displacement of tens of thousands of Angelenos, Ellis Act evictions haven’t stopped.
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Coalition for Economic Survival
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