By Ryan Sabalow | Calmatters
Sen. Aisha Wahab implored her colleagues to think of hospitalized patients and struggling families as she pitched a proposal to give tenants a full two weeks to pay their past due rent before their landlords could start the eviction process.
“This is a very small ask from the state of California,” Wahab, a Democrat representing the Fremont area, recently told her fellow lawmakers. “(It’s) very small to allow people 14 days to either ask for family members and loved ones to give them money to stay housed, to ask their cities or any of the other nonprofits that help people with rental assistance stay housed, or to even be able to wait for their check.”
Despite Wahab’s pleas, her Senate Bill 436 failed to advance out of the Assembly Judiciary Committee last week.
It was the latest example of progressive Democrats’ struggles to add protections for California’s 17 million renters, despite lawmakers otherwise taking aggressive steps this year to address the state’s housing and homelessness crises.
Just this week, after a decade of failed efforts, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed legislation to reform the state’s signature environmental law to stop activists from using it to block housing construction. The proposal easily passed the Senate and Assembly, despite angering the state’s influential environmental groups.
But when it comes to giving tenants more power and easing some of the nation’s highest rents, California voters and the 120 senators and Assembly members who represent them have largely balked.
Last fall, California voters decisively shot down a rent-control initiative that would have allowed local governments to block landlords from raising rents. A more aggressive rent-control measure never received a hearing this spring in the Assembly Judiciary Committee, even though it was authored by San Jose Assemblymember Ash Kalra, the committee chair.
Another bill to limit fees landlords can charge tenants on top of monthly rent was held until at least next year, despite the author being San Francisco Assemblymember Matt Haney, the chair of the Assembly Housing Committee.
The stalled bills were a remarkable display of how difficult it is for lawmakers to pass rental protection measures since committee chairs usually are influential. Wahab chairs the Senate Housing Committee.
Her measure, which would have extended the start of the past due eviction process from three days to two weeks, is the latest setback for the Legislature’s 10-person legislative Renters’ Caucus, which counts Wahab and Haney as members.
Renter protections divide Democrats
What makes the death of Wahab’s bill especially unusual is that it happened during a committee hearing in public view and featured Democrats joining Republicans to shoot it down. As CalMatters reported, most legislation killed in the California Legislature dies quietly behind the scenes, without a vote. It’s also rare for Democrats to vote “no” on a fellow Democrat’s bill.
The Assembly Judiciary Committee’s debate highlighted the tensions between the Democratic supermajority’s progressive and more moderate members on rental protections.
Downey Assemblymember Blanca Pacheco, an attorney, said she used to represent landlords in eviction proceedings, and said the current three-day rule is just the start of an “eviction process can easily take two months, three months, four months.”
“I worry about these mom and pop landlords,” she said. “I worry about these seniors who are going to have a hardship because they rely on this money for their expenses, for their mortgage, for whatever they need. And we’re putting them in a very bad situation.”
Kalra, the committee’s chair, is also an attorney, but he saw things from the renter’s point of view.
“They’re renters because a lot of those in the previous generations were able to buy homes 30, 40, 50-plus years ago that are completely unaffordable now,” he said. “Was that their fault (previous generations) were able to do that? Absolutely not. Is it their fault that they now can rent those properties out for a handsome sum? Absolutely not, but that’s the reality of the situation we’re in.”
Noting that Consumer Affairs recently ranked California as one of the worst states for renters, he said the proposed extra 11 days “actually allows the problem to be resolved before you even get to that (eviction) process, which is to everyone’s benefit.”
Landlord advocacy groups and other critics of the bills also note that California already has among the strongest state renter protection laws in the country.
Landlords and bankers spend big
The bill needed seven votes to pass. It got six. Kalra voted for the measure, joining five other Democrats on the committee, including Isaac Bryan of Culver City and Alex Lee of Milpitas, both members of the renters caucus.
Pacheco cast a “no” vote, one of only seven times she’s done so in 2,271 voting opportunities so far this year, according to the Digital Democracy database.
The three Republicans on the committee also voted “no.” Two Democrats, Diane Papan of San Mateo, and John Harabedian of Pasadena, didn’t vote, which counts the same as voting no.
The death of the eviction relief measure also points to the David vs. Goliath-sized discrepancies in the political spending between renters’ and landlords’ advocates.
The bill’s supporters included around two dozen legal aid, social services and renters’ advocacy organizations, but those groups have spent next to nothing on state politics, according to the Digital Democracy database.
Opposing the bill were some of the state’s biggest political spenders from the business industry, including the California Chamber of Commerce and various landlord, banking and building associations. In total, those groups have given at least $13.7 million to legislators since 2015.
Wahab said in a written statement that landlords’ “money still speaks the loudest,” despite tenant advocates who represent millions.
“Companies that benefit from keeping protections weak for tenants have billions of dollars to fund an army of lobbyists in the Capitol every single day,” she said. “That same machine mobilizes at the drop of a hat to pump millions into elections – even in districts during the legislative process – to scare and intimidate policymakers into voting their way, shaping the playing field long before a bill even gets a hearing.”
During the hearing, Kalra urged his colleagues to remember that just because renters are less politically active than landlords, lawmakers should not forget their plight.
“They don’t show up to your community coffees; they don’t have time to send letters in,” he told his committee moments before its members killed Wahab’s bill. “They’re trying to survive, and I think we need to also have that in the front of our mind as we consider these kinds of policies.”
The legislative session hasn’t been a complete bust for tenant-minded lawmakers – or for Wahab. Her Senate Bill 681, which includes new tax credits for renters, was tucked into a budget-related housing bill the governor signed Monday.
The advocates pushing for Wahab’s eviction relief measure also hope it comes back later this session, which is a possibility – albeit a slim one – since members of the judiciary committee voted to grant the proposal “reconsideration,” meaning it can be resurrected later if lawmakers choose. They almost never do.
Thomas Gerrity, data scientist and product manager for Digital Democracy, and Ben Christopher, housing reporter, contributed to this story.