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Honorable Mayor and City Council Persons City of Santa Ana Hearing: October 4, 2022; Item: 25 September 30, 2022 Page 8 of 11 adjustment procedure which would make such delays Cal.3d 129, 170 (1976). What follows, are comme stabilization ordinance. inevitable." Birkenafeld v. City of Berkeley, 17 its to the new proposals reworking the rent For clarity purposes, our Clients are not contesting the City's ability to enact rent control generally. Rather, they contest those portions of the ordinance which are contrary to settled law particularly as it relates to mobilehome parks, or which are so burdensome as to constitute a taking, or which comprise a violation of substantive due process. The proposed amendments appear to still require some form of completeness, and are unclear as to whether they relate to an individual property, or pen -nit adjustment to a class of rental units as discussed in BirkenfHd. Section 8-3145 delegates a gatekeeper, the "Program Administrator" with the authority to reject applications "that [do] not include required information or documentation or comply with the requirements of this Division.." Proposed City of Santa Ana Ordinance Section 8-3145 (a). A complete application for an individual property effectively prevents adjustments that a) deal with factors that are common to all properties like property taxes, or b) that are initiated based on information received by the rent adjustment official or board without a complete application or on their own motion, or c) allowing/encouraging applications between multiple properties or classes of properties. Accordingly, we suggest adding clarity that the Board can act on its own motion, and has flexibility to consider adjustments based on generally applicable factors, across properties and classes of Rental Units. Additionally, the new proposals regarding the rent review board pose some due process traps for the legislators. We discuss below that it would be most prudent to assure that there are balanced boards between pecuniary interests, and that mobilehome park rental review boards have precedent in other jurisdictions given that their rent adjustment considerations differ from other types of properties. A. Section 8-3142 — Fair Return Petition for Rent Increase: The provisions within the Standard of Review do not take into consideration the realities of owning and operating a mobilehome park. The following are changes to bring the proposed section into better parity with the ownership and operation of a mobilehome park, and applicable law: a. Subparagraph (a): Add additional sentence for Petition on rrrotion of Board, to subparagraph (a): "Tire Board rimy also initiate a Fair Return Petition, upon a majority vote of the Board, where such motion identifies generally applicable factors, and instructs the Program Administrator to prepare such Petition, relating to a single property, or all or any class of Rental Units. Such Petition will proceed to be considered as provided in this Division. b. Subparagraph (b)(7): Delete in its entireiy. Increases in utility charges are wholly beyond the landlord's control and are often passed through to tenants directly. As further discussed above, the costs of utilities are already governed by the California Public Utilities Commission, pursuant to its tariffs and ratemaking under the Public Utilities Act, Cal. Pub. Util. Code § 201 et seq. In particular, Cal. Pub. Util. Code § 739.5 already requires that landlords submeter tenants at the same rate that the regulated public utilities would charge for residential service if it were providing the services directly. By mixing these rates into Kingsley — 426 Santa Ana Ordinances