The Mobile Home Park Space Rent Stabilization Ordinance would only apply to unincorporated areas of the county, regulating site rents for communities of over ten homes.
The coalition’s Patti Rose said the ordinance would tie increases to cost-of-living increases because so many of the MHC residents are on fixed incomes.
Community owners say the measure is a form of price fixing, and limiting increases could affect the extent of maintenance and repairs communities require.
The Western Manufactured Housing Communities Association’s Doug Johnson said rent control is an unfair, expensive and useless government regulation that the McKinley Municipal Advisory Committee has already rejected.
The ordinance says, “The mobile home park owner may implement the increase each year by legally required notice, or bank the increase to be added to the rent at a future date, and provide a notice to mobile home owner tenants of the park owner’s election to defer the allowable annual increase.”
While this initiative would only apply to MHCs in unincorporated areas of Humboldt County, the coalition sees this as a jumping off point to eventually have the cities adopt rent control ordinances. ##
(Photo credit: The Times-Standard/Shaun Walker–Thunderbird MHC in Humboldt County)
