(A) Mobilehome parks represent one of a few affordable housing options left to senior citizens that permit exclusive residence in a detached dwelling by those individuals over the age of 55 years.
(B) Senior mobilehome parks afford seniors the ability to live in their own homes rather than in apartments and provide a senior living community in low-rise setting that typically provides a clubhouse for community events and socializing as well as recreation facilities inside the park so that the residents can easily walk to these facilities and events. Many of the seniors living in senior mobilehome parks enjoy having their grandchildren visit them in the parks, but they, like the seniors without grandchildren, purchased mobilehomes in a senior park in order to live in a quieter community with others in their own age group and purchased their homes in these parks because they were senior parks that only accepted prospective purchasers of homes in the park if at least one occupant of the mobilehome being purchased was 55 years or older.
(C) Residents of senior mobilehome parks relied upon the representation of the park management and park owners that only seniors could purchase homes in those parks and obtain tenancies in those parks. These representations were set forth in the leases or rental agreements they were required to sign upon purchasing a mobilehome in the parks and moving into the parks and in the rules of those parks, which the residents were also required to sign and acknowledge. Now some owners of senior mobilehome parks have indicated that they can and may change their parks from senior mobilehome parks to family parks, over the objections of their senior residents, by changing park rules using the procedure in Cal. Civil Code § 798.25.
(D) While the seniors now living in senior mobilehome parks could remain in a park after it changes to an all ages mobilehome park, those seniors would no longer enjoy the companionship of a senior community and would likely lose the quiet environment that generally exists within these communities. A limited supply of senior parks exists and allowing conversion of those parks would most likely result in diminished supply and fewer housing options for senior citizens. Moreover, since mobilehomes are not mobile in any practical sense due to the high cost of moving a home, the risk of damage to the home in moving, the loss of improvements such as porches, patios, carports, and landscaping, which cannot be moved, and the lack of available rental spaces in senior parks, or in any mobilehome park in the city or surrounding areas that will accept re-locating homes, senior residents of a mobilehome park that becomes an all ages mobilehome park would have to sell the homes in which they have lived for many years and in which they have invested both financial and personal resources in order to move to another senior facility. After selling their mobilehomes, these seniors may no longer have sufficient funds to purchase a mobilehome in another senior park or senior facility. The aforementioned factors make it unlikely that seniors would be able to relocate to another senior mobilehome community if the park owner converted their senior mobilehome park to an all ages mobilehome park.
(E) Article XI, Section 7 of the California Constitution authorizes cities to adopt local police, sanitary, and other ordinances not in conflict with general laws.
(F) The California Legislature has authorized cities to provide zoning for senior-only mobilehome parks pursuant to Cal. Health and Safety Code § 18300.
(G) Prior to the adoption of this article, the City Council determined that an urgency ordinance was necessary to protect the public health, safety, and welfare of the citizens of the city, and further determined upon that basis that an urgency ordinance was necessary to prohibit conversions of senior-only mobilehome park conversions within the city. Accordingly, an initial urgency ordinance was approved on August 8, 2017, which was effective for 45 days from the date of that adoption (i.e., until September 22, 2017). Then, the City Council approved a second urgency ordinance, which was effective for 22 months and 15 days from the expiration of the first urgency ordinance (i.e., until August 7, 2019).
(H) Prior to the expiration of the moratorium, the City Council adopted this article, finding that the permanent extension of the prohibition on conversion of senior mobilehome parks to all-ages mobilehome parks was necessary to protect the supply of affordable housing for seniors within city limits and, thus, was necessary to protect the public health, safety, and welfare.
(Ord. 2168-C-S, passed 6-25-19)