Stopping the evictions?

An editorial in this week's Guardian (yes, I know) applauds Chris Daly's efforts to stop evictions, and mistakenly calls this a good idea...

"Daly's bill, which cleared the Land Use Committee Dec. 14 and will go before the full board Jan. 3, is aimed at the rash of evictions of low-income tenants whose apartments are turned into condominiums. The way the state's Ellis Act works, any landlord has the right to go out of business – that is, to stop renting housing units – and to evict all of his or her tenants. That leaves the building vacant and allows the landlord to sell it to people – generally better-off people – who want to buy their units as tenancies in common. In a lot of cases, the TIC owners then turn around and apply for permission to convert their apartments to condos."

Once again, Daly is messing with a free market. Just when buyers might just see some inventory to choose from in our fair city, Daly is looking to fatten the pockets of those who own real estate by restricting people's ability to do as they wish with their properties.

Finding a way to lessen evictions of elderly or disabled tenants is not a bad thing, it's the manner in which he is trying to go about it. Especially with his attempt to force all condo conversions through the Planning Commission.

"Daly wants to require that condo conversions involving two, three, or four units (and that's most TICs) go before the Planning Commission – and that the commission enforce a 24-year-old law that bars conversions that involved evicting a protected class of tenants. If the commission actually follows those rules, then Daly's bill would have an immediate dampening effect on the most serious, and dangerous, Ellis Act TIC evictions."

And meanwhile, those who thought they might just have been able to afford one of the lowest-priced TICs in San Francisco would be screwed. This attempt to 'help' would only temporarily slow the inventory while attorneys representing building owners squash this attempt just as they have squashed EVERYTHING Daly has done to screw with the housing market.

Doesn't he get it yet? Unconstitutional legislation aimed at helping those who need it most is STILL unconstitutional.

And rather than looking for viable ways to build more housing to help his constituents, he just takes the easy route and throws wrenches into the system. These are only temporary band-aids for much larger problems. If he (and others in office) keeps avoiding the real problem, we'll be in a worse situation next year and the year after that.

For those of you who live in two, three, or four unit TIC buildings, this could be disastrous for your ability to acheive condo conversion. Even if you bought a legitimately vacant building, if your conversion ends up in the Planning Commission, you can add at least a year to your process. If you're lucky.

As always, you may want to add your voice to the discussion at the board's meeting on January 3rd. Send your supervisor an email if you can't make it and let them know how you feel about this one.