Good evening. Welcome to the November 20, 2025 rental housing committee regular meeting.

This meeting is called to order at 6.03 PM. I'll proceed with roll call. I see all members

are present. Moving on to item three, consent calendar. These items will be approved by

one motion unless any member of the committee wishes to remove an item for discussion.

The purpose of the consent calendar is for the committee to efficiently and quickly consider

routine or administrative business items with one motion.

Public comment will occur after discussion.

We invite you to submit a speaker card now if you'd like to speak on this item during

public comment.

Would any member of the committee like to pull an item?

Pulling an item?

If you're commenting, we can do that.

can do that afterwards. Okay, I now invite public comments, in-person public comments

will be called to speak first. Any member of the public wishing to provide virtual comment

on consent calendar items, please click the raise hand button on Zoom or press star 9

on your phone. This is for consent calendar. Seeing none, I will now bring the item back

for committee action. A motion to approve the consent calendar should include reading

the title of the agenda items.

Do I get to comment?

Vice Chair Cox.

Okay.

Thank you.

I just want to make a few short comments

on item 3.3,

rent stabilization division activity report

for quarter one of fiscal year 2025-26.

Just some things stuck out in the report

and I thought they were worth noting.

One is that there's a new high

in notices to cease.

And so that's a little bit concerning.

But the failure to pay rent notices is at a very low point, which is good.

As far as the market conditions, the vacancy rate for the newly built units is down to 10.6%,

which is about a drop of 3%, which is a positive thing.

And for fully covered units, it's down to 3.5%,

which means that it's getting harder and harder to find a rent-controlled unit in Mountain View,

which is somewhat of concern.

The rents for the newly built units are actually up to $44.61 per month,

and for fully covered units, it's still around $28.96,

which is a ratio of means that the rents for the newly built units are 54% higher,

which is down 1% from last time,

but is still stubbornly high.

So there's a big discrepancy

between the newly built units,

rents and fully covered units.

And so that's a troubling situation for our city.

Anyway, those are my comments.

Thank you for letting me make them.

Anyone else would like to speak?

Otherwise, a motion is in order.

Marsha Coxon.

I make a motion to accept the consent calendar, all the items, including 3.1 minutes for the October 23-2025 RHC meeting.

Item 3.2, Community Stabilization and Fair Rent Act and Mobile Home Rent Stabilization Ordinance Financial Expenditures for Quarter 1 of Fiscal Year 2025-26.

and item 3.3 rent stabilization division activity report

for quarter one of fiscal year 2025-26.

And that has been seconded by a member Emily Statz-Hislop.

Any discussion on the motion?

Seeing none, we'll go to vote.

Motion passes unanimously.

Now we will move on to item four.

This is oral communications.

We will now open the meeting for oral communications from the public.

This portion of the meeting is reserved for persons wishing to address the committee on any matter that is not on today's agenda.

Speakers are allowed to speak on any topic for up to three minutes during this section.

State law prohibits the committee from acting on non-agenda items.

Would any member of the public like to provide comments on non-agenda items?

If you are online, please raise your hand or on phone, star 9.

If you're in person, please bring your speaker card.

Seeing none, we will now move on to item 5, the appeal hearing.

This agenda item will include in-person Spanish interpretation.

Please see one of the interpreters to receive a translation headset.

The Red Dull Housing Committee in hearing the appeal is acting in a quasi-judicial fashion

and will conduct the hearing in accordance with those standards.

Staff will detail the appeal hearing process in their presentation.

Before we get started, RSC members are required to disclose any communications that they have

had with any of the parties to the petition or the parties' representatives and the substance

of those communications since the date that the petition was filed.

The decision of the ROT is to be based on the record presented to the hearing officer.

Information disclosed to an ROT member that is not part of the record is not to be considered

in the hearing.

Do any members have ex-partic communications that need to be disclosed?

Seeing none, we will now proceed to public comment for Agenda Item 5.1.

Are there members of the public who are not parties to the petition who would like to

to speak.

If you are online please raise hand

or press start on your phone.

Seeing none, we will move on to agenda item 5.1,

appeal of hearing officer's decision regarding petitions

numbers 24, 25, 40, 25, 25, 44, and 25, 49.

We will now proceed with the hearing.

Yes, and good evening.

I'd like to introduce you to Estrella Lucera

from my office who is going to present this appeal hi everyone can you hear me yes yes okay

wonderful and i can hear you uh thank you so much chairman um so the purpose of this agenda item

we're going to be considering a tentative appeal decision uh you all at least on the committee have

seen these first slides uh very often so we're going to paraphrase the next few you can just

move to the next slide and astray i'm just going to say this is being interpreted so you may need

to slow down a little oh great okay we can interpret that first part just you need speak

slowly okay okay great uh should i continue or has the translation happened go ahead yeah okay

Okay, great. So we can move to the next slide. We're going to hit all of these.

So staff believes that there is sufficient information in the hearing record. We are

recommending against a de novo hearing or remand. Obviously, the final decision is in the hands of

the committee, but we are recommending a closed record. Next slide. So just a reminder that

the committee must use the substantial evidence standard when you're reviewing the hearing

officer decision. That is, you're determining if the hearing officer decision is justified

by the evidence in the record. You're not determining your own conclusion based on that

evidence uh next slide uh again the committee shall not hear or find facts in addition to the

ones that have already uh that are already in the hearing record so we'll go over this again but as

some table setting in this case there are three petitions from two tenants consolidated for this

one hearing so the scope of the appeal is limited by the appealing parties and appealed elements

here we had one tenant appeal two landlord appeals so this will become clear as we keep

moving forward but there are some limits to the scope of review okay so the schedule here is a

little different than what i think we typically see in an appeal hearing as i mentioned we have

have a consolidated petition with two tenants. One of the two tenants submitted an appeal,

and so did the landlord. The tenant from Unit 11, Mr. Negrete, submitted a complete appeal first,

so he is referred to as the appellant tenant. The landlord is referred to the respondent landlord,

even though they also submitted an appeal. And the tenant from Unit 25, who did not submit an

appeal but had an appeal submitted against for the unit 25 that tenant from unit 25 is referred to as

respondent tenant so as you will see in the schedule for this evening we are going to proceed

as follows the appellant tenant from unit 11 oh well you can read it but you know if there are any

questions let us know note that folks have 10 minutes for the first argument five minutes for

rebuttals, but we're allowing 20 minutes for translations and up to 10 minutes for

translations on the second half.

Okay.

We'll move into summary of the petitions.

So this is a consolidated—this petition consolidated three petitions pertaining to

two units.

They are petitions for downward adjustment of rent on the basis of decreased housing

services.

The first kind of pool relates to both Unit 11 and Unit 25, that the landlord decreased housing services for both units, all units, by removing the pool, removing an assigned covered parking space and eliminating a second unassigned uncovered parking space, and removing small storage units located at the carports.

The second issue was that the landlord decreased housing services in Unit 11 only by failing to sufficiently intervene and mitigate harassing, disturbing actions of a neighbor towards the tenant in Unit 11.

The upstairs neighbor's behavior towards the downstairs neighbor, Unit 11.

All right.

Summary of the hearing decision.

So the hearing officer found that petitioners had met their burden of proof that they had suffered a reduction in housing services related to the pool, the parking, and the storage units without a sufficient corresponding in rent, reduction in rent.

we wanted to draw attention to the fact that the landlord did voluntarily offer a rent reduction.

That's in the first column.

And so the issue here was, was that reduction sufficient?

And the hearing officer found that the voluntary reduction was not enough,

and so she ordered these higher amounts.

Although the detail isn't presented here on the slides,

Each of those dollar amounts are justified in the hearing officer decision and are based

off of evidence in the hearing record.

So the hearing officer took into account testimony, took into account submitted documents from

the tenants, and did her own research to confirm what she was able to.

I don't know if we want to break down the amounts here, but maybe we can get to it with

questions.

All right, next slide.

So on that second issue that affects only Unit 11, the hearing officer found that the

petitioner did meet his burden of proof, suffered a reduction in housing services related to

the loss of quiet enjoyment due to the behavior of the tenant, a neighbor that was not sufficiently

mitigated by the landlord.

So moving on to a summary of the appealed elements.

Both the landlord and tenant submitted appeals, but we're going to run through the appellant-tenant

appealed elements first, then the landlord appealed elements.

So our appellant-tenant appealed three elements.

One argues that the hearing officer erred in awarding 165 for the parking and that the

officer did not take into account increased wear and tear on vehicles that are parked

in an open air lot now. Second, that the hearing officer erred in awarding 162 for the loss

of storage units and did not sufficiently take into consideration the inconvenience

of going to and from the storage units. And three, that the hearing officer erred in awarding

only 165 per month for the loss of quiet enjoyment as that did not adequately value the tenant's

peace of mind. The respondent landlord appealed two elements. One, that the hearing officer

erred in finding that there was any reduction in housing services related to the loss of

the second parking space. And two, that the hearing officer erred in awarding 162 per

for the storage units that was too high.

The tentative appeal decision, as you'll see,

affirms the hearing officer's decision in its entirety.

So the tentative appeal decision kept the same amounts

for each of the appealed elements.

So in response to the appellant tenant appealed elements,

keeping the reduction for loss of parking at $165 per month, keeping the reduction for the loss of storage units at $162 per month,

which I believe the hearing officer justified it with $137 for the loss of storage unit plus $25 per month for transportation and inconvenience,

and maintaining a reduction of $165 per month for the loss of quiet enjoyment.

So this one would incur, well, they all incur refunds, but specifically for the loss of quiet enjoyment, that once that situation has been sufficiently dealt with, the rent would jump back up.

All right. And similar to the respondent landlord elements, the tentative field decision does find that the loss of the second parking space is a reduction in housing services, despite the fact that the second parking space was never in the written lease agreement.

There was evidence of oral agreements, and there was a history of habitual use of a second parking space, and that housing services, as defined in the CSF R.A., is not limited to the four corners of the lease.

And so tenants are entitled to that 165 per month reduction, and affirming that the loss of the storage units is appropriately set at 162 per month.

You've seen these slides before, but any decision by the committee could potentially

lead to litigation, which would have an impact.

And we are recommending you to consider the tentative appeal decision, either accepting

it or modifying with instructions.

And that's the end of our staff presentation.

All right then, we will now move on to the addresses.

Will the appellant tenant, Ms. Vinogrede, or their representative, please come to the

podium if you're speaking in person or click the raise hand button on Zoom if you'd like

to speak.

The speech timer will be displayed on the screen.

You will have 20 minutes to allow for interpretation.

Good evening everyone.

Inicio con dos aclaraciones.

La primera, en ningún momento hemos pensado que el oficial de audiencia haya cometido un error en su cálculo por la reducción de los servicios.

Good evening.

I HAVE TWO DECLARATIONS.

FIRST OF ALL, I NEVER THOUGHT THAT THE MEDIATOR, THE OFFICIAL THAT MEDIATED OUR CASE COMMITTED

ANY KIND OF ERROR IN THEIR CALCULATIONS.

ACCORDING TO ME, ALL OF THEIR CALCULATIONS WERE CORRECT IN THE REDUCTION OF SERVICES

that occurred in my unit or in the apartment complex.

Second of all, I'd like to state that in no way

do I mean any disrespect towards Mr. Orvik.

We respect him.

The only problem that we had was with the way

that he managed the building

and the situation that we're in.

Thank you.

I believe that when damage has occurred, that that

should be resolved and that we should be, we should, you know, that damage should be

restored or we should be refunded for any kind of damage that occurs.

For example, just be, you know, because I don't have the storage space that I had before,

I spent $3,031 this year just in storage costs alone.

That doesn't include any kind of inconvenience or the transportation costs of any of my goods.

AND I'M NOT REALLY WORRIED

ABOUT THE MONEY.

ALL I WANT IS MY STORAGE

PLACE BACK AND I'D ALSO LIKE

THE COVERED PARKING SPOT THAT I

HAD FOR MY CAR BEFORE.

AND THOSE ARE THE THINGS THAT I

WAS MOST WORRIED ABOUT AND THAT

I WANT BECAUSE THAT'S WHAT WAS

STIPULATED IN THE CONTRACT THAT

I SIGNED, THE LEASE AGREEMENT

THAT I SIGNED.

The second point is referring to the resident of the 22nd, which is above our.

Our petition is to be that the commitment that the Mr. Orbeck argued, which until the moment

He mentioned that he was going to act with his lawyers to get this person.

We are being threatened, accused, because the situation is worse day-to-day.

We have had to improvise some things to be able to move on to the department and not be victims of their agresions.

The next point I'd like to make has to do with our neighbor in unit 22 who lives above us.

Now, according to the appeal resolution or the resolution by the mediator,

Mr. Orvik was supposed to have taken care of this situation.

And he had mentioned that a possibility of maybe having his their lawyers try to

to maybe evict the person that lived upstairs, but none of this has happened.

And the person that lives above us, our neighbor, continues to harass and threaten us.

Oh, sorry.

And we continue to be victims of this harassment.

It's an ongoing threat to us.

The amount of money that was supposed to be given to us

this isn't compensatory to the kind of living situation that we've had to endure.

You can't put a price on health or any kind of tranquil kind of living situation.

And the situation continues.

It hasn't been taken care of.

And that's the fault of Mr. Orvik, who has not taken care of the situation.

According to the law, we all have the right to live in a place where we feel safe and

secure and the problem has actually gotten worse due to the inactions of Mr.

Orvik. Thank you.

Thank you. Respondent landlord or representative of the respondent

landlord please raise hand on zoom if you like to speak and staff will

I will attempt to promote you to be a panelist.

You will be given 10 minutes on screen.

Good, hello?

We hear you.

Okay, great. So my name is David Orvik. I am the landlord. Our company, Orvik Management Group,

manages the apartment where Mr. Negrete lives at. So just a few things to hopefully resolve this.

We do want to return his covered parking space and storage unit back to him.

Okay, now that our construction has been completed there, it is available, and we will be discussing that with him. Okay? So hopefully him and I and as well as Ms. Steele and 25 can move on from those items.

Okay. And then, I mean, really quickly in response to Mr. Negrete's claims about the tenant that is an issue upstairs from him, we are aware of this. We are taking action. We do have an attorney that is filing the eviction.

We've taken many steps that we were hoping would be more swift than the process that this is on,

but didn't receive the cooperation necessary from that tenant upstairs in order to resolve this.

So this was the process that we're taking.

It is lengthy.

The tenant is basically maximizing their ability to lengthen this process, and that's what we're in the middle of.

I don't think that we are neglecting this.

I do regret where we're at in this.

I obviously wish that this was resolved quicker and better or not ever an issue at all.

But we are in the middle of a lengthy process that we had tried to avoid in the past and just were not able to.

But I do hope it's clear that we are making attempts to resolve this nuisance from the tenant upstairs.

And we do want to return their parking space and storage back to the tenant.

So I think that's really all I want to say.

I mean, we are accepting the tentative appeal agreement, but I do want to make that clear for where we stand with some of these items.

Thank you.

All right.

Now we've moved on to the respondent tenant.

If Ms. Steele would like to make a comment or the representative, please come to the podium or raise a hand on Zoom.

You will be given 10 minutes.

Timer will go on screen.

Yeah, okay.

I'm Ms. Steele, and I don't really have too much to say that I didn't say the first time

that we came in to talk about this.

So I would prefer having my parking spot and storage unit replaced.

But, you know, because my car, the wear and tear has been horrible in just the amount of time that we've been parking outside the uncovered parking spaces.

But I really, other than that, don't have much to say.

So thank you.

Thank you.

All right.

Appellant tenant, so Mr. Negrete and representative,

you will have 10 minutes to rebut any statements

made by the respondent landlord.

Please limit your comments to rebuttal

rather than repeating information already presented.

If you wish, if you don't want to, you don't have to.

Okay.

What can we do in the meantime?

Good evening, my name is Mercedes Martinez.

And on top of what Mr. Victor had said,

What I want to know is what are we supposed to do?

It's been way more than two months

since we've been putting up with this harassment

from our neighbor and it's almost been going on

for one year and what are we supposed to do

in the meantime while this situation is supposedly

being resolved while we're having to wait?

That's all.

Thank you.

Okay.

Respondent landlord slash representative, you have five minutes to rebut any statements

made by the appellant.

Please limit your comments to rebuttal, then any repeating information.

Okay.

I don't have too much, but I believe, I mean, in her response, what are we supposed to do?

I believe that's what the monthly rent reduction that was awarded is to compensate for, the $165.66.

I believe that's the answer to her question, which is really all I have to rebuttal towards.

All right.

Thank you.

Moving on to respondent tenants.

Ms. Steele, you have five minutes to rebut.

any statements made by the Appellant if you wish to speak.

All right.

Moving to the committee.

Any members have any questions for staff?

Alternate Bulge.

Thank you.

Yeah, I'm just curious for actually from my own understanding of obviously all tenants

have the same legal protections.

And so there is a due process requirement whenever a landlord is enforcing the terms

of a lease.

And the landlord representative talked about there being a legal process ongoing and that

I believe what he said was that the tenant who is doing the harassing has been exploiting some of their legal due process rights to draw out the process, and they're obviously bound to all of that.

So my question is that if a harassing tenant is utilizing all of the legal protections that they are due, what is the landlord's liability during that window of time when action has started and that harassing tenant is exercising their due process rights?

So, I think in the context of this hearing, the hearing officer gave the landlord multiple

opportunities to submit evidence that they actually were taking action and no evidence

was submitted, which was the basis of the decision.

If evidence had been submitted, she might have taken into consideration the time that

it would take to complete that process.

But because nothing was submitted,

the evidence is that nothing was being done.

So that's why the decision was written the way it was.

Thank you very much.

Vice Chair Cox.

Yeah, I just wanna make sure I've got all the facts straight.

In particular, there are two tenants

and both tenants had lost their covered parking

lost their covered parking and small storage space.

And it was my understanding that that was due

to construction activities that were initiated

by the landlord, is that right?

That's correct.

Okay, okay.

And then we heard testimony that one of the tenants has,

now that the construction activity is finished,

he has gotten back his covered parking space

in storage space, that's not true?

That's not evidence that's in the record.

Oh.

This was, the evidence we have is this was to be permanent.

That the property owner was creating

accessory dwelling units in that parking space.

Something may have changed.

Okay, okay.

Our record is that there was,

this was a permanent reduction of housing services.

Okay, okay, and so we need to go by,

based on what's in the record.

With respect to the pool, I mean,

was the pool removed completely?

That's my understanding.

Okay, and this, as far as you know,

it all has to do with the construction of the new ADUs, right?

Yep.

Okay, okay, yeah, thanks for that.

I'm following up on what Committee Member Balch had asked.

I'm just wondering if you can say, like,

how long can it take for, you know,

when a landlord has decided that he needs to evict the tenant

because the tenant is causing a nuisance

between when he recognizes he needs to take action

and the tenant can finally be removed.

Can you say anything about that?

That's a really hard question.

Eviction proceedings have priority in the courts,

so they are supposed to be an expedited proceeding.

That being said, our court system is backlogged.

They don't move very fast in the courts,

and there are ways that the process can be extended.

So I don't think there is a typical time for an eviction.

It is supposed to move fast,

but it probably does not move as fast as property owners would like.

Okay.

I also would like to add that we have not seen the first step in that procedure

in the evidence, so we have not seen a copy of the UD form.

the unlawful detainer form that you file with the court to start the process.

Okay, so no record like that was put in evidence during the hearing.

Okay, thank you.

Does any other member have any questions for staff?

Does anyone have any questions for either landlord or tenants, plural?

Member Brown.

it's for uh david were the adus completed i believe that the the seven or eight adus were

like that was part of the hearing discussion uh yes they should have been um finaled today

i haven't gotten confirmation but they are um should have been final today with the final

inspection. That's been some good timing. And I remember that there was discussion about the open

parking spaces and there being enough that each tenant was allowed to have the covered parking

space and had access to via oral agreement to one uncovered space. And in the hearing you said that

the uncovered spaces were part of the pool of things going to be used by the ADUs.

Any resolution to that? It was the other way where the covered spaces

are where the ADUs were or where the ADUs are built.

Oh, okay. Thank you.

Seeing no other questions for staff or appellants or respondents, I will bring this back for the committee.

The RRC will now deliberate. It would be appropriate at this time to entertain a motion to...

Okay.

Vyashar Cox.

I'm going to make the motion to accept the tentative appeal decision in its entirety.

And let me give you some of my reasons.

Okay.

First thing on all of these hearings is to note that the hearing office has wide discretion in the determination of the amounts that are awarded.

And as long as she supports her decision with a reasonable methodology, it's the duty for the Rental Housing Committee to uphold her decision, because that shows that it's based on substantial evidence.

So in particular, I'll tick off a few of the things that were discussed in the hearing officer's decision.

You know, with regard to the reduction in services due to the loss of the second parking space.

It's really important to note that it is not required that the parking space be mentioned explicitly in the lease for it to be considered part of the housing services.

You know, I mean, the bottom line is that, you know, I mean, if the tenant has a reasonable expectation and continued use of a facility, you know, that he gets as a result of renting the apartment, that's a housing service, whether it's mentioned explicitly in the lease or not.

and so I agree with the tentative decision based on that.

The compensation for the removal of second storage,

for the storage space was determined by the hearing officer

based on her review

and the cost of comparable storage spaces available in Mountain View.

It doesn't need to be equal to the cost of the tenant's choice

of a substitute storage space.

So, I mean, bottom line is it pays to shop around

and that's a reasonable way that the hearing officer used

to determine what the compensation should be.

And so I'm in favor of holding that too.

The one I struggled the most with is that

the loss of quiet enjoyment of the petitioner's unit

and that it's taking this long to resolve.

This is a problem both for the tenant and the landlord

because the tenant has to deal with not having the quiet enjoyment,

particularly when he's trying to sleep at night,

and that's key if you have a job during the day.

On the other hand, the landlord does seem to be moving expeditiously

with trying to take care of it,

but as Ms. Van Dursen pointed out,

we have to go by what is in the evidence of the record

and the records of the steps that he's taken aren't there.

And so he could have put a stronger case forward on this.

He needs to compensate the tenant for that loss.

You know, another thing that was even brought up is that, you know,

I mean, like, this is a guy who was walking around a lot at night

and, you know, has squeaky boards and stuff like that

that, you know, I mean, he also understood that, you know,

he should take action on.

and you know but

I just find this to be a really unfortunate

circumstance but I don't see a better way

around it than that and so that's

why I also

think that the hearing officer did something

reasonable by figuring out

how much of the rent time was when

the guy needed to be sleeping

and compensated for that

so anyway those are my

statements on this and

I listen

I look forward to hearing

what others have to say

Member Brown has seconded the motion.

Moving on to Alternative Balch.

Thank you.

I wanted to make a couple of comments.

First of all, I'm going to second what Vice Chair Cox said.

Really the issue here is about reasonableness.

We talk about this a lot that the CSFRA gives very little latitude, almost none, to this

body.

We are really assessing whether there was a reasonable conclusion here, not necessarily

what we might have had our opinion say.

So I think we just have to be clear on that.

But I think also there are a couple of points here about additional benefits that are not

in a lease.

In other words, the additional parking spaces, as well as what landlords can do or what the

liability is when there is a conflict between tenants.

We're going to talk about this later.

Mountain View has set up a highly litigious situation between landlords and tenants.

In that situation, it really behooves both parties to be fully educated on their rights

under the law and to operate to the maximum extent of those rights.

So tenants should be educated and landlords need to be educated as well.

And it is true that, my understanding, it is true anyway, that the presumed benefits are not just what's in the lease.

And so if a property owner wants to exercise their full rights under the law,

they have to be very careful about what benefits they offer, whether it is in the lease or not.

And secondly, this issue about upholding the lease terms.

If a landlord sees that there is a violation of a lease, it's going to behoove them to exercise their rights maximally and to promptly proceed with the eviction process.

Because otherwise, all sorts of liabilities start to stack up.

That's the reality of what we've set up here, and I think both parties, both tenants and

landlords have to operate with a very keen awareness of what their rights are under the

law.

Thank you.

Member Statsis.

I apologize if this falls into the question category, but I had to go back and read the

decision.

Mr. Orvich mentioned that the parking and storage

could be restored.

I don't think in the hearing officer's decision

it's addressed that should covered parking be provided

or storage again be provided if that reduction would cease.

And I'm not familiar enough with regulations

if that can be addressed in a compliance hearing

or if we may want to consider remanding

to the hearing officer to adjust the language in the event that.

The evidence in the record was that it was a permanent reduction.

So there isn't a restoration, but if it were restored,

the landlord could come in for a compliance hearing.

Thank you.

Anyone else would like to give comment on the current motion?

I agree with what Robert said.

I'll write that.

Seeing no more discussion on the motion, I will give my two cents.

So I believe I agree with the tentative appeal decision.

I think everyone who discussed tonight is in favor of it.

I just echo the things that my fellow committee members have said.

The hearing officer's decision is reasonable.

We're not here giving a 96% reduction.

We are here to see logical processes followed as well as evidence to give for things such

as how the landlord was addressing the tenant upstairs.

And that's really all I have to say.

Let's go to a vote.

Motion passes unanimously.

And that closes the hearing.

Moving now on to item 6.1.

This is our new business, the adoption of anti-retaliation and anti-harassment regulations.

Public comment will occur after the presentation item and committee questions.

We invite you to submit a speaker card now if you would like to speak on this item during public comment or raise your hand on Zoom or press star 9 on your phone.

We will begin with a presentation from staff.

Thank you very much, Chair, members of the Rennel Housing Committee.

Tonight's purpose is to request an adoption of the CSFRA and MHRSO regulations,

providing protections against tenant retaliation and harassment by amending the existing CSFRA and MHRSO regulations number two definitions

and incorporating new regulations, specifically CSFRA regulations chapter 14 and MHRSO regulations chapter 13, anti-retaliation and harassment.

The first study session of the Rental Housing Committee occurred on March 27th.

The Rental Housing Committee at that time reviewed existing federal, state, and local policies of comparable jurisdictions and directed staff to come back with draft regulations.

Again, a study session was held last October the 23rd, where the Rental Housing Committee

reviewed proposed regulations, asked some clarifying questions, suggested minor edits,

and overall supported the recommended draft regulations.

So the requested minor edits from the Rental Housing Committee have been made in Attachment

1 regulations that are in front of you.

There were seven items that were clarified and we have

itemized them in our memo. As you can see

certain words were added to

make the intention clearer from the previous language.

There were also some questions asked by the rental housing committee that were addressed in the memo.

There were like three questions.

One question was, are unwelcome hostile commons included in these regulation examples?

And you can find those in the quoted sections.

Another question was, is tenant-to-tenant retaliation harassment included?

And the answer to that is that these need to be addressed through the tenant's right of quiet enjoyment under state law

or through the Mountain View Mediation Program, as examples.

And the last question was if there's a retention of complaint forms.

In that respect, we will be following the city standard record retention policy, which gives a two to five years for these types of documents.

So again, the recommendation is to adopt these regulations.

And this is the end of the presentation and happy to answer any questions.

All right, we will move on to questions from committee members.

Does any committee member have any questions?

Alternative Balch.

Yeah, thank you.

I'm curious, we talked about this a little bit last time.

Do we have any kind of data to indicate the lack of harassment actions that have been brought before courts because there's an assertion that the current statutes for the state of California are inadequate?

I haven't been able to find any data like that,

and for something consequential of enacting law,

I would like to be able to learn about what we know

about how the law is used or not used today.

Sure.

So I don't think there's anything incorrect

in front of the court.

I think state and federal law lack a lot of examples

and explanation of situations that could be explained

as retaliation and harassment, and that forwarded the request from the rental housing committee

to make regulations here for Mountain View.

Do you have anything you would like to further question on?

I'm sorry.

No, thank you.

Vice Chair Cox.

Yeah, just a follow-up question on that.

So these regulations are being put forth by the RHC,

and when they're voted on,

then they become official regulations

for the city of Mountview, that's right?

And you're met?

For C-Sefere and F-RSO units.

Okay, okay.

So then, is it also the case

that the rental housing committee

has the ability that if they find out

that the specific regulations that we might vote on tonight

are inadequate in some way,

meaning that are overreaching in some way,

that we can bring it back at a future time

and then revise them to improve them?

Yes, you can always change amendments to the regulations.

Okay, thank you.

Are there any other questions from committee members?

Seeing none, we will now move on to public comments.

In person public comments will be called to speak first.

And people commenting online, please raise your hand or press star 9 on your phone to

get in queue.

And Neil?

Good evening, commissioners.

I'm here representing the California Department Association, and I'm once again urging you to reject these regulations.

They're unnecessary given state law, and the amount of quote-unquote forms of harassment that state law and civil code already cover negates a need to duplicate what is already provided.

And so, you know, we're basically asking to reject it and instead follow through with a more robust educational component that allows tenants in the city to understand what their rights are under existing law rather than create a more complicated bureaucracy to continue making operating and managing property in the city more and more difficult.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Anyone on Zoom?

Again, you need to raise your hand or press star nine

in order to speak tonight.

Seeing none, we'll bring this back to the committee

for deliberations and feedback.

Chair, can I just note that you did receive

some correspondence and that is part of the record?

Yes, that is part of the record in a packet.

You can find the correspondence online

on our Legistar page for the meeting.

Does anyone want to see?

9inview.legistar.com.

All right, does anyone want to speak on this item?

Member Satsaslav.

Thank you, Chair Ma'a.

I want to acknowledge that there was public comment

and I believe we didn't receive any written public comment

and just one speaker, Mr. Babar,

during our study session.

I just want to note, while I understand the issues raised,

Not one of them seemed to point to where in state law

and what mechanisms and how a tenant can enforce

these rights in court.

They just made general statements.

I would welcome a discussion like that

before the committee of raising here's the mechanisms.

That's from my understanding.

And you have to get an attorney.

You have to navigate the court system.

It's a very hard, high threshold to prove these allegations.

Also, just want to note that what's being put forth is not necessarily an enforcement mechanism.

It's a way of collecting data and also understanding what's happening and helping tenants understand what their rights are and what is legal for a landlord.

It's an opportunity to educate without any other enforcement mechanisms.

all the landlord has to do is give notice of the tenant of these regulations and also has the right to respond and set the record straight

and perhaps have an opportunity to mediate.

So I do want to invite property owners, managers to the conversation when we're doing these regulations,

but you've got to come and give us something to work with.

So thank you.

Alternate Balch.

Thank you.

Before I talk about what I was going to talk about, I do want to address your comments.

This is an acting statute, so this is not just about data gathering.

We talked about that last time.

Attorneys are always required.

We're talking about statute that effectively a legal action would be brought in front of

a court.

So there is no, I mean, to operate with a court,

you need an attorney or you can represent yourself,

but that's always the way.

Last, at the study session, we did talk about specifics.

We specifically cited actual numbers of statutes

which were readily available.

I discovered them in the moment with Google.

So I think that there is a lot of information

that we talked about, but really,

I didn't really see a lot of engagement

at the last study session about discussing

how the current statute is used

versus how the new one would be used.

That's why I've been asking for data.

I really haven't seen data.

I don't believe data exists.

I haven't been able to find data

that actually tries to quantify the shortcomings

of the current statute and therefore the benefits

of the proposed statute.

As I mentioned at the appeal we had just a few minutes ago,

we have created and we're strengthening an increasingly litigious society.

Landlord liabilities are increasing both with economics and statutorily.

And that's what we're talking about tonight.

We're talking about continuing to raise the bar from a statutory standpoint,

not to mention the economic standpoint.

I think it's really important for government bodies to have humility and data when we enact law

because there are consequences to every law that we enact.

To the comment about the public input,

we did receive a couple of dozen emails,

which I believe, I scanned them quickly

as we were sitting down,

because that's the first time I saw them.

They were all from landlords and property brokers,

but nonetheless, I didn't notice any

from otherwise in the community.

We do have to think about balance

when we're enacting law that sits on top of the CSFRA

and MHRSO, which already is a substantial body

law in terms of regulating the relationship and responsibilities of landlords and tenants.

I'm also going to go back to something.

We had quite a lot of commentary among ourselves at the meeting last time.

There is an inherent assumption that it is the landlord that is the bad actor here, both

in the CSFRA as well as in the statute.

And to the point I made earlier, we're always talking about an attorney being present.

So legal processes are very costly.

They're costly for the tenants.

They're also costly for landlords.

One of the inhibitors, and I'm not going to speculate on why the prior party took longer

than maybe they should have to start legal action against the harassing tenant, but I

can tell you, once you do that, you are immediately committing to months of expensive litigation

and loss of rent.

So for a landlord to even begin a legal action,

they are committing to four, five, six months of loss right there.

So a landlord really has to think about that and weigh their liability.

Vice Chair Cox made a really interesting observation

at the beginning of this meeting.

He said that something approximately,

the rent for the new construction units

is substantially more than the rent for the old units.

well that dichotomy is going to continue to grow i agree with you it's not healthy

we're going to by continuing to pass more legislation and create more of these processes

we're going to continue to expand that dichotomy because we're going to create we are we've already

created a a two-tier housing system where landlords are trying to absolutely minimize

costs as much as they can under the law because they are highly constrained both in the liability

as well as their ability to collect rent over time,

but the new properties are not subject to the same laws.

So every time we take an action here,

we are gradually steadily increasing that dichotomy

between the old and the new.

So I feel like we have a lot of speculation going on.

I'm not seeing any data.

I would not proceed with legislation

or any kind of new statutes without clear data.

I wouldn't want to do this based on the speculation

that I think is happening now.

Thank you.

Flashback Cox.

Okay, just a few comments.

A minor one first.

I thank the staff for going over

and incorporating some of the things

we talked about in the study session.

In particular,

the issue of the record retention policy.

And I think that the two to five years

for various types of records

is quite a reasonable one.

And I'm glad to see that called out.

So thanks for doing that.

Beyond that, I think for me, it just comes down to,

we need to think, I'm thinking back

on why we started this in the first place.

And the reason, I mean, we had a call for new items

to go before the RHC this year,

and this was one of two major items

that we were going to be taking up

beyond our normal workload of appeal hearings

and other kinds of examination of fiscal reports

and that kind of thing.

For me personally, I think that the best time

for people to start from the public

to start commenting on that kind of thing

is at the beginning,

so that we know that once we've set off on a process,

that, you know, I mean,

if they voice vocally and early,

you know the idea that we're on the wrong track here or we missed something important

you know that gives us the opportunity to fold those comments into you know the discussion and

direct us in the appropriate way and you know I don't feel that while you know there's been an

attempt for the landlords to give us comment on this process I wish it had come earlier because

I mean, you know, it just came after the major study session where we were talking about the particulars.

And now, you know, again, a repeat when they finally come before us for a vote to say, you know, we don't agree with this.

Don't do it.

Okay.

As opposed to, you know, here's some things that could make this better.

There was no input like that.

so um so again going back to the beginning of this from my understanding the reason we went

down this path was because while california law does allow a tenant to uh sue the landlord based

on uh things like you know harassment and uh and uh retaliation it doesn't provide

clear enough coverage in the legislation itself about what exactly that means.

And so it puts up a pretty high bar for a tenant to be able to go into court and say

that he really doesn't, to say that he believes that he has sufficient evidence, you know,

to make a clear case on this. And so by adding these regulations that give specific examples,

which are, you know, illustrative, are relatively comprehensive, but not completely, okay?

You know, a tenant can, by looking at those, he can tell whether or not he has a reasonable case.

Now, maybe we should have gone further and, you know, because it's true,

landlords can be harassed by the tenants and the tenants can cause problems.

And maybe we should have gone further by including examples of those kinds of things to make it easier for the landlords to go after bad tenants.

But there are both good landlords and bad ones, good tenants and bad ones with respect to specific things.

And, you know, the purpose of doing this was primarily because it's an unequal situation.

Typically, the landlords have access to more wealth and resources

to make what they want happen, happen.

And a tenant, you know, often our tenants are, you know,

are just, you know, very ordinary, simple people, okay,

that, you know, are not lawyers or, you know,

even have friends who are lawyers, okay,

that can help and assist them in this.

Now, you know, they might get some help from the RHC staff, okay,

But having things listed out clearly of specific examples of what harassment and retaliation mean, I do think it's a step in the right direction, even if it is a cost somewhat to the landlords that, you know, because of the clarity, they might be subject to having an issue raised and successfully litigated,

which might not have been because the whole process

of navigating the courts for the tenant is so difficult.

So anyway, that's my long way of saying that,

you know, I'm still on board for supporting this,

but as I asked earlier, you know, there's the issue

that if we haven't done it right this time,

we can come back a year or two from now,

get some specific evidence and talk about whether we need

to do some changes to this stuff.

So that's what I have to say.

I want to hear what other people have to say.

Member Brown.

Once again, I agree with Robert.

I think that the thing that I would have liked to see in opposition to this isn't evidence of cases that don't exist,

because that feels impossible to prove,

but evidence of cases that are being brought under the current state laws

where tenants are successfully vindicating their rights

using California state or federal laws.

If I had been shown evidence that the system is working

and tenants are currently being protected using those

and that this was not necessarily

because they were successfully vindicating their rights,

then I would question if we're doing something,

but I did not see that.

That was not presented to us in any of the comments

or in any of the emails that we received.

While I have heard from many tenants in Mountain View that they are afraid to call out retaliation, to call out actions, that they don't know what their rights are and they don't know what they can do.

I have had people come and ask me for help.

Who do they go to?

And I think having something like this, having examples, being able to say that your rights are clear.

Here are examples.

If this looks like you, please reach out.

Like there's a process, there's now a channel.

People can get help.

And I think that that is the thing that is most valuable

to me is being able to provide people with a sense of safety

and for them to know that they have a right to quiet

enjoyment of their housing.

So I also strongly support continuing and checking this

off of our list of major items for this year.

Thank you.

Member Keating.

Thank you.

I support this and I'd like to respond in part to committee member Balsh's comments.

And so when we enact when the voters of Mountain View enacted rent stabilization the CSFRA

It wasn't evident immediately, but really what they did is they created something valuable

for tenants.

If you're in a CSFRA unit, over time, there are limits on how much your rent can go up.

And so you may end up with, depending on what the market does and the inflation rate and

so on, is it a hard or soft rental housing market, but you may end up with an apartment

that is at a rent lower than what would be easy to find in the marketplace.

So you have an interest in wanting to stay in that unit,

and it's your better choice rather than having to rent a comparable unit in the market

at some other place because there's vacancy decontrol,

so you're going for a market rate when you first move in.

Even if you move to another CSFRA unit, it may be more expensive.

So while most landlords remind us they are housing providers and while most landlords certainly provide good and fair services to their tenants, I think there is some instance of landlords having an interest and knowing they have an interest in higher tenant turnover.

So could that lead to harassment that is not addressed and stopped by the landlord?

I think in some cases it can.

And I think it empowers tenants to call that out and to let them know what is harassment

and their rights, even if we don't help them in court.

But I think empowering tenants to know their rights and to help them move forward to defend

their rights is upheld by this draft ordinance.

Thank you.

Okay.

Member Brown, would you like to speak?

I would like to move to adopt the Community Stabilization and Fair Rent Act and Mobile

Home Rent Stabilization regulations which provide protections against tenant retaliation

and harassment by amending the existing CSFRA and MHRSO regulations.

Chapter 2, definitions and incorporating new regulations, specifically CSFRA regulations.

Chapter 14 and MHRSO regulations.

Chapter 13, anti-retaliation and anti-harassment.

And that motion has been seconded by Member Cox.

Does anyone want to speak on the motion on the floor?

I will speak.

Okay, so I agree with Member Brown that we do need to demonstrate that the current state

laws that a lot of the members of who provided comments today has said are working.

As a person who does work with housing law at the state, I do recognize how vague it

is at some times, at the point where it's basically impossible to know what it means.

Much as us with the CSFRA, right, our existing one-time utility adjustment petitions are

technically very clear-cut from our definition of what base rent meant and

yet we're sure we are working on it many years later since the CSF was passed

by the voters so I can see there's always a need to you know review portions

that we have jurisdiction over to see if they are correctly used and then adjust

if they aren't right if we find out that there is a bunch of frivolous

litigation introduced by this then we can always you know scale it back and

figure out where we need to make changes. But until then, we have heard from our various appeals

that do obviously is a minority of the petitions that do come to this body and division. But,

you know, harassment and retaliation is a concept that is common across all of them.

And in history, that it is something that we as a body do not have direct

capability to intervene, right? That is a case for the courts. We're here just to provide

clear definitions in order to address perhaps some deficiencies in state law.

And to perhaps

counter some of the things that have been said to us, we are not here necessarily addressing administrative

complexity. These are just more defined examples of what

is supposed to be covered by said state laws that have been

shaped by decades and decades of case law.

Our interaction with it

It is purely a notice that the tenant may provide the RG staff about their intention

to sue.

But other than that, we could be completely out of the picture, which is no different

than it is today.

As such, I will also be voting in favor of the motion.

Any final speakers on the motion?

Member Statsaslop.

Very quick.

I think what I want to address the need for data,

and I believe this will give us at least some data source

and we can look at it in a couple of years

and see what the engagement then,

the number of complaints filed or whatever,

but we'll have some data.

That's, I think, what I find to be an advantage

to these regulations is having those definitions

and also having a way to actually collect information.

If we're not making a determination if it's true or not,

we're just getting information

about what people are experiencing.

Seeing no more speakers in queue,

we will now move on to the vote.

Motion passes five zero.

And I would like this to be perhaps brought

to our council's attention, just because this is,

as mentioned by a bunch of our, okay, we can do that.

In the meantime, we're moving on to item seven,

committee staff announcements and updates.

Thank you.

So we'll start by looking at item 7.1,

upcoming workshops and housing help center dates.

As usual, we continue to have our office hours

every Tuesday from 10 to noon.

Those are virtual only.

And looking forward to December,

with our workshop schedule,

we are focusing on utility adjustment petitions

as our final deadline is the end of December.

So we are having a tenant-focused workshop December 9th,

as well as a landlord-focused workshop on December 11th.

We are having our help centers for landlords.

We continue to do those every Thursday at this point to continue to add and provide extra

support for our landlords for utility petitions.

And then we are gearing up for our registration and fee payment rollout in December and January.

Oh, yeah, here we go.

I think we also have our Housing Health Center for Tenants every first and third Thursday.

So there is one happening now over at our office on Escuela and also online.

And that's from six to eight.

And we have our community partners in CLUSPA and CSA and the Mountain View Mediation Program there as well.

I also would like to add, and you may have seen that in our consent items, that we would

like to provide the financial end data information on a six-month period due to lack of staff.

Are there any questions or comments from that presentation or anything specified by staff?

You did also receive copies of the landlord and tenant newsletter that were mailed out

last week or the week before.

Go ahead.

I just have one question.

So I mean, in terms of the data that's going to be provided

every six months, I'm wondering,

are you talking only about what was in 3.2,

or 3.2 and 3.3?

3.2 and 3.3.

All right.

Oh well, I'm gonna miss 3.3.

I just wish that the market,

even if you could just do the market stats,

I mean, that would be wonderful,

but anyway.

We might be able to come.

If you could do that.

Yeah, that last page.

I mean, because to me, what that is showing

is that's showing the health of the rental market

in Mountain View, and we got here

because of a lack of health of the rental market

in Mountain View in terms of income inequality

and everything, and so that's why I consider

that a primary thing.

So if you could just provide that last page,

I would think it would be wonderful.

Would you like to speak, Ben Burke Brown?

Through the chair, I think that we should notify

city council that we adopted the regulations this evening

for anti harassment.

I beat you to it.

Would you like that in a form of a motion

or just direction to staff?

If the chair would consider agendizing it

at a future meeting to vote on it or just.

consent is new.

How do you want to do this?

Oh, we can just inform.

Okay, that works as well.

Sweet.

Just forward it over.

Because I do recognize that we are in a time of great national turmoil and immigration

is a top issue.

And one of the things we're addressing in the regulation is perhaps concerns we've heard

from the community about, you know, bringing up immigration status in terms of under the

table dealings.

In the meantime.

Thank you, Chair.

Okay.

You are not recognized, but 7.2,

expected future agenda items for the next meeting.

The next meeting will be held on December 18th,

20 to five at 6 p.m.

We will be hearing an appeal as well as hearing officer

remuneration.

Are there anything else from any committee members

or from city staff?

Question.

Go ahead, Member Keating.

So we've had our different phases

for different size landlords regarding the RUBs petitions.

And so when does it make sense to give us another update

about how many landlords submitted petitions and so on?

So we're currently targeting the small landlords.

They have to submit their paperwork by the end of December.

So early next year, we can give you an update.

Any new updates on our middle-sized landlords?

We can do that at the same time.

Okay, so that'll be sometime in January or February?

Okay, sounds fun.

Anyone else more like to give their last comments,

questions, seeing none?

I'm thankful for staff.

Okay.

Okay, then.

This meeting is adjourned at 7.22 p.m.

The next rental housing committee meeting is scheduled to be held on Thursday, December

18th at 6 p.m.