ACTION Apartment Association

Audit Subcommittee Discusses Independent Draft Compensation Study

03/05/2018 8:50 AM | Margaret Fulton (Administrator)

At its meeting last night, February 28, the City of Santa Monica Audit Subcommittee met to review the draft staffing and compensation study from the firm Moss Adams. The study, which began in June 2017, reviews policies and practices related to City employee compensation and staffing levels.

Santa Monica Slow-Growth Group Shifts Focus to Crime

03/05/2018 8:37 AM | Margaret Fulton (Administrator)

March 2, 2018 -- It wasn’t long ago that one of Santa Monica’s most aggressive grassroots organizations was best known for challenging the City’s powers that be over the amount of new development it allowed.

But check in with the Facebook page for residocracy.org these days, and a change is evident:

Concern about crime and violence is starting to dominate posts there, pushing aside -- for now, at least -- the anger over new building that gave rise to 2016’s Measure LV, which sought public votes for most development taller than two stories.

Armen Melkonians, who founded residocracy.org in in 2014, said the increasing focus on crime is a natural evolution for the organization as concern about the rise in violent crime intensifies in the community.

California’s housing crunch has turned liberals against one another

03/05/2018 8:02 AM | Margaret Fulton (Administrator)

BERKELEY, Calif. — A median-priced one-bedroom apartment in San Francisco rents for nearly $3,300 a month. In the Silicon Valley community of San Mateo, the median home will set you back almost $1.4 million. Even in semi-rural Petaluma in Sonoma County, at least an hour drive from the city, rent for a one-bedroom can reach $2,000 and more.

To afford a place to live in the Bay Area, stressed workers and students are moving farther and farther out, commuting for hours a day from what used to be farm country. Others pile two and three to a room. In Los Angeles, San Diego and along much of the coast, the picture is much the same.

But now the need for more affordable housing is provoking an intense ideological struggle, and in this left-leaning state, one that pits liberals against liberals.

West Hollywood considers earthquake retrofit costs to owners, renters

03/05/2018 8:00 AM | Margaret Fulton (Administrator)

The city has proposed two options for spreading tenant rent increases over the course of several years to pay for the work. The first would allow owners to increase rent by a certain percentage following a retrofit if operating income fell below that of a particular year to be determined by the city. That rent increase would be permanent.

Another option would allow an owner to pass along a certain percentage of the retrofit costs onto tenants over a certain period.

How can a place with 58,000 homeless people continue to function?

03/02/2018 10:01 AM | Margaret Fulton (Administrator)

Homelessness affects the lives of all Angelenos, not just those forced to live on the streets. And it does so almost daily, in ways large and small.

As Yet Another Tall Hotel Goes Up at 7th and Wilshire, Question Union Influence in Santa Monica

03/01/2018 12:06 PM | Margaret Fulton (Administrator)

Tall Hotels Serve Only the Unions, Not Local or Santa Monica Residents

Local 11 is currently lobbying the Santa Monica City Council to approve a redevelopment plan for the five-acre Bergamot Station Arts Center, which includes a controversial seven-story hotel. Why? Because the hotel developer signed a labor peace agreement with the union, meaning the new hotel could bring with it dozens of monthly dues-payers.

Local 11 has only one problem: Public opinion. Santa Monicans have sent numerous emails to the City Council, stating their firm opposition to the Bergamot hotel development. One resident writes: "Bergamot is one of the jewels in Santa Monica's

cultural landscape, and needs to be protected, not over-exploited.

Pasadena Tenants Union Members Say They Are Going Door to Door Seven Days a Week, in Campaign for Citywide Rent Control

02/28/2018 4:24 PM | Margaret Fulton (Administrator)

Members of the Pasadena Tenants Union, the renters rights advocacy group which launched a rent control initiative petition drive late last year, said they are canvassing seven days a week going door-to-door in virtually every city neighborhood to secure thousands of signatures needed to qualify a charter amendment for the voters on next November’s ballot.

This charter amendment would authorize a form of limited rent control that is pegged to the rate of inflation and includes “just cause” language that would stipulate landlords must have legitimate reasons to evict tenants.

County Supervisors Call For Assessment Of Short Term Rentals’ Impact On Affordable Housing

02/28/2018 2:03 PM | Margaret Fulton (Administrator)

Given an historic shortage of affordable housing, the Board of Supervisors has asked County departments to assess the impact that short-term rentals such as Airbnb and VRBO can have on affordable residential rental housing in the County’s unincorporated areas, home to 10% of County residents.

Read More on page 4: http://backissues.smdp.com/022818.pdf

A TALE OF TWO CITIES by Charles Andrews

02/28/2018 1:56 PM | Margaret Fulton (Administrator)

REVEALING DEPOSITIONS

The lawsuit to initiate district voting here, brought in April 2016 by Latina activist Maria Loya, the Pico Neighborhood Association, and Advocates for Malibu Public Schools, resulted in depositions being ordered, to include all our City Council members, and more. Oops! What were they thinking, to fight this? When you’ve got skeletons locked in your closet, you don’t want to hand a lawyer the keys and a strong flashlight.

Santa Monica Audit Subcommittee Urges City to Pay Down $461 Million in Unfunded Pensions by 2030

02/28/2018 1:50 PM | Margaret Fulton (Administrator)

February 28, 2018 -- The City of Santa Monica is being urged to retire a $461 million debt for unfunded employee pensions in the next dozen years, imposing across-the-board freezes on salaries and/or hiring to pay for the move.

The “2030 Challenge” -- outlined in a letter that also calls for cutting capital expenditures -- goes before the City’s Audit Subcommittee during its meeting tonight at 6 p.m. at the Santa Monica Institute Training Room, 330 Olympic Drive, 2nd Floor Plaza Level.

It would require the City to set aside $40 million a year for the debt, tripling the paydown.