Anaheim, the “4th Worst City in the Nation for Renters,” Needs Santa Ana-Style Rent Control!

A few weeks ago there was an Anaheim Housing Community Forum at the Ponderosa Community Center. Well, here, check out the flyer:

We’ll describe that “town hall meeting” in a moment, but we’re getting ahead of ourselves – just a few weeks earlier, Forbes Magazine published their report “The Best and Worst Cities for Renterswhich was assessed Anaheim FOURTH WORST of the nation’s 95 largest cities (better only than New York, Newark, and Long Beach, and slightly worse than Oakland.) Forbes:

4. Anaheim, California

“The Anaheim score: 13.54 out of 100…

“The home of Disneyland ranks second when it comes to affordability:

• The sixth worst price changes, with average rents increasing by $105 per year…
• 7th worst place for rent as a percentage of income at 25.8% (tied with Long Beach and Los Angeles)…
• Anaheim is also the second worst city for the number of available rental units per 100,000 households, with 7…”

That’s Forbes , but if you don’t want to believe them, here’s a report from an actual Anaheim staffer from last April (about the need for an amorphous “housing trust fund”):

“The average rent for a one-bedroom apartment in Anaheim is currently $2,055. For individuals working a minimum wage job, or $16/hour assuming they work full time, The average rent for a one-bedroom apartment is 74 percent of gross income. According to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, a household’s total housing costs must not exceed 30 percent of family income to be considered affordable.”

The Ponderosa Community Center was packed that night – mostly with locals who spoke Spanish and/or English and ALL wanted rent control. There were also maybe a dozen of us housing activists, along with people from the nonprofits at their tables, and our own Mayor Ashleigh Aitken and Mayor Pro-Tem Norma Kurtz, who were “there to listen.” You can watch the entire production here if you’re so inclined.

After the city staff gave their short talks, everyone split into groups, discussed their priorities and designated spokespeople to speak. Every spokesperson stressed the need for rent control. (US activists also demanded a long-awaited “inclusionary housing ordinance,” which would require new developments to include a healthy percentage of affordable housing, as many cities in Oceania do, but that’s a story for another post.)

Community Advocate Sofia Romero (left) was particularly eloquent as she described the struggles of her neighbors who were struggling to pay their Anaheim mortgage. increasingly higher rents – increased once and sometimes TWICE a year, from $150 to as much as $250 a month. She told me about her neighbors being evicted, about having to live in an apartment with two families, about having to choose between rent, food, and medicine. But I’m sure you’ve heard it all. Right?

And then it was Mayor AshleighIt was her turn to wrap it up. She was supposed to “answer” us. She was very verbal, because she’s a lawyer and she’s very good at it. She talked about how hard they’re trying, how complicated it all is, and how no one can agree on what an “inclusionary housing ordinance” is, or what “affordable” means. Maybe we should be clearer.

And while EVERYONE there was talking about the need for RENT CONTROL in Anaheim, She did NOT say a WORD about it. EVEN THOUGH Duane Roberts specifically asked her if she still stood by her comments in December 2022 to Jill Repogle of the LAist when Jill asked if she “support a rent control ordinance such as the one in Santa Ana?Mayor Ashleigh responded then, and apparently still does:

“I don’t. We have rent control at the state level. I don’t think that’s something that we should be addressing at the local level.” (LAist editor’s note: Rent increases are capped at 10% at the state level, but the law doesn’t apply to homes built in the past 15 years. Most apartments and single-family homes are exempt.)

“I think rent control, if you look at it long term, slows down development in the city. In a city like Anaheim, we need to be working with developers to build more housing, not putting up barriers that only make it harder.“

So the mayor “thinks” rent control would “stifle development.” Because we’re a pretty big city. Well, we can debate that all day long. But she mostly thinks the 2019 state law from 1482 is good enough, and Anaheim renters don’t need anything more than that. Well…

When AB 1482 passed in 2019, it seemed like a big deal – a rent control law (or, euphemism alert, “rent cap” or “rent stabilization law”) passed statewide! And it was certainly better than nothing at the time. It included some important protections against no-cause evictions. But here’s the thing – the result of extensive negotiating with lobbyists for deep-pocketed apartment owners, it’s raising rents increase annually by the cost of living (CPI) PLUS FIVE PERCENT – up to a maximum of TEN PERCENTAnd there is no enforcement mechanism either.

But think about it. Raising rents by the CPI is only fair, but why should landlords – whether they are corporate like most of them or “mom & pop” – be allowed to do this? Increase THEIR PROFITS by 5% per year, on the backs of working people?Last year in Anaheim that meant a annual increase of 8.8 PERCENT. Legal. And when such a ceiling is officially set, that is what most businessmen go for.

Are don’t hate landlords to ask why they are allowed to increase their profits by 5% every year, or even encourage it. Some of my best friends are landlords (literally). We get along just fine with our landlord. And I didn’t write this song, although it’s a good time for a musical break:

The Orange Juice Blog does not condone lynching landlords; instead, we support real rent control. But here’s the thing – many apartment owners in Anaheim and elsewhere do not even comply with the lawcausing rents to rise more than AB 1482 allows. And tenants often don’t know that their landlord is violating AB 1482, or don’t know what to do about it, or are afraid to say anything about it – afraid of being evicted, and some of them are afraid because they’re undocumented.

Some landlords in Anaheim have been CREATIVE in getting around the law. For example, we’ve heard of several cases of tenants being forced out while improvements were being made to the property, and THEN being replaced by new tenants paying much higher rent.

And as mentioned above, AB 1482 has no “enforcement mechanism.” SOME cities have offices, departments and staff dedicated to helping tenants fight illegal rent increases. But not Anaheim. Anaheim will tell people to take their complaints to the overburdened Public Law Center, and they should have good luck.

It must be mentioned more than once that nearly everyone on the Anaheim City Council was elected with independent expenditures from the Apartment Association of OC and other landlord groups, which are always tied to Anaheim’s other all-powerful special interests – Disney, developers, and the other usual suspects. Could this have something to do with the council’s total lack of interest in rent control, or even in helping to enforce state law? Hmmm…

What on earth can be done in Anaheim for renters, who are the MAJORITY in this city, ESPECIALLY in the five boroughs of Flatland?

Since 2020, Santa Ana has had a rent control ordinance rent increases at CPI – cost of living – no more. (There is some room to cover necessary repairs and improvements.) Doesn’t that sound reasonable? Of course the Apartment Association has been raising hell, issuing warnings, going to court constantly, and hasn’t won. They warned (sounds like Mayor Ashleigh) that “development would be stifled” – didn’t happen. They warned that rent control would actually backfire and make rents RISE – an Orwellian brain teaser that also never came to pass.

And Santa Ana’s ordinance also created a Rental councilSo unlike in Anaheim, tenants with problem landlords have somewhere to go.

But what I found most helpful and hopeful for Anaheim was: HOW DID SANTA ANA GET THIS ORDINANCE? The well-organized, hard-working TUSA (Tenants United in Santa Ana) was a few hundred signatures short of getting an ordinance on the ballot, so… THEY FOUND CANDIDATES FOR THE COUNCIL (Mayor Sarmiento, Jessie Lopez, Johnathan Hernandez and finally Thai Viet Phan) WHO DID THIS FRAMEWORK IN THE FORM OF THE STUDENTS AND WON.

And so, to this day, Santa Ana has a progressive majority of 4 members, good government, that stands up for the big special interests of that city: the police union, developers, and landlords. Rent control was the solution.

Can this happen in the Anaheim flatlands? Could rent control be the catalyst for a new populist movement here, the first since we had district elections? Can city council members HERE get involved in rent control, and FINALLY a council that isn’t in the hands of landlords, Disney, developers, the police and fire unions? It’s probably too late to start that movement, to find those candidates, for THIS year. But I know at least one, and you have to start somewhere:

photo by Greg Diamond

Francisco Rosas, a veteran and District 4 resident, enraged by the council’s unconditional unanimous vote for Disneyland Forward and the Magic Way giveaway, is running against (appointed) council member Norma Kurtz. And he’s joining the effort on the issues of:

• RENTAL MANAGEMENT
• Affordable housing through an inclusive housing regulation
• a “Gate Tax” for our entertainment giants
• Real campaign finance reform (and more.)

Where are the Franciscos for Districts 1 and 5? Let’s fight for rent control now and finally take over the Anaheim City Council in 2026 with honest candidates who work for the people, not the special interests. IF SANTA ANA DID IT, WE CAN TOO – SI SE PUEDE!

Vern out.