The Brief

Rent gobbles up more than 30% of income for most tenants in the city of Los Angeles, putting 59% of L.A. renters in the federal government’s “cost-burdened” category. In a few weeks, many of those tenants could see their rent rise again.

New rent caps are scheduled to take effect next month for apartments covered by L.A. rent control. Increases could be as high as 5% — unless the City Council acts quickly on a pending proposal that would lower rent caps to 2%.

It’s been more than one year since an independent rent control study was submitted to the city, recommending changes that would reduce annual rent hikes. But so far, no council votes have been scheduled.

Tenant advocates say they’re frustrated by the delays on updating a formula that is now more than 40 years old.

“Other things have been prioritized, with the wildfires ... and the budget crisis,” said Pablo Estupiñan, a coordinator with the Keep L.A. Housed coalition. “There's a lack of commitment from council offices on moving forward.”

The report was commissioned by the City Council in 2023. It was submitted to the city in May 2024 by the Economic Roundtable, a local nonprofit research group. LAist made the study public after obtaining it through a public records request.

The 193-page report highlighted provisions in L.A.’s Rent Stabilization Ordinance that have benefited landlords at the expense of tenants. Based on the report’s findings, the L.A. Housing Department issued recommendations that — if passed — would lower allowable rent increases to 2% starting July 1.

A politically charged debate 

A spokesperson for Councilmember Nithya Raman, chair of the council’s Housing Committee, said her office is working to schedule a vote this month on updating the rent control rules. But it’s unclear if the full council can pass an overhaul before council members begin their four-week summer recess on July 2.

Throughout this process, landlords have urged elected leaders to not further limit their ability to offset rising costs of property ownership.

The city "is creating a stifling environment,” said Fred Sutton, spokesperson for the California Apartment Association. “You had a four-year rent freeze. You had eviction moratoriums under COVID... The City Council is continuously sending signals to the entire world that it is not a safe place to do business.”

There were significant challenges for L.A. landlords during the pandemic, according to the Economic Roundtable report. Local restrictions on rent hikes and evictions for non-payment of rent came at a time when building maintenance, utility and insurance costs were rising faster than inflation.

Coupled with broad economic pressures, the city’s policies have convinced some landlords to leave the L.A. rental market. Bruce Painton told LAist that after owning a 33-unit rent-controlled apartment building for 11 years, he recently sold.

“Some months I had no income — it was all expenses,” Painton said of his experience during the pandemic. He said he now plans to buy real estate in Texas.

“They don't have all the fees and problems that we have in Los Angeles,” Painton said.

Will the City Council be able to vote on the new rent control rules before their summer recess begins?

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Makenna Sievertson

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LAist

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Balancing landlord and tenant interests 

The Economic Roundtable report found that many landlords were able to absorb the shock of the pandemic because of turnover rates in rent-controlled apartments. About 40% of units became vacant between 2020 and January 2023. Under the city’s rent control rules, landlords are allowed to raise rents to higher, market rates when new tenants move in.

On the other side of the equation, the report found a significant number of L.A. renters are living on a financial knife’s edge. About 1-in-10 L.A. tenants are spending more than 90% of their income on rent alone.

Council members have been hearing from tenants like Cristina Campos, who told LAist she can’t afford the city’s current annual increases. She and her husband have lived for 23 years in a rent-controlled South L.A. apartment, where they raised two children who are now in college.

Campos said she already struggles to pay rent, and other units in their neighborhood are now renting at cost far out of her family’s reach.

“I always say, I don't want to go live with my neighbors under the bridge,” Campos said, speaking in Spanish. “But I might have to leave the unit if they keep raising the rents so high.”

Cristina Campos has joined organizers with the Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment to call for lower rent control caps in L.A.

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David Wagner

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LAist

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Other tenant protections have stalled

The L.A. City Council passed some of the longest-lasting tenant protections in the nation during the COVID-19 pandemic. But recently, votes affecting tenants and landlords have become more politically fraught inside City Hall.

A proposal to temporarily freeze rents and limit evictions after the Palisades and Eaton fires failed after weeks of heated debate in council chambers. Similar protections were instead enacted by the L.A. County Board of Supervisors.

Dan Flaming, co-author of the Economic Roundtable report, said rent control policies are technically complex and politically charged. The issue directly pits the interests of landlords against those of renters, he said.

“It's contentious,” Flaming said. “It’s challenging for the council to parse this and enact changes to the status quo.”

How rent control currently works in L.A.

Rent control in L.A. generally applies to apartments built before October 1978. Those older units make up about 70% of all apartments in the city.

With about 64% of L.A. households renting rather than owning their homes, the city’s rent control policies play a huge role in housing affordability for hundreds of thousands of families.

Existing tenants in rent-controlled units can only have their rent raised by a set percentage each year. The limits change every year, ranging from 3% to 8%, depending on how high inflation is running in the L.A. area.

Landlords who pay for a tenant’s gas and electricity can add another 1% for each utility they cover, bringing L.A.’s maximum allowable rent hike to 10%. That’s much higher than in most other Southern California cities with rent control policies.

By comparison, rent hikes are capped at 3% in Santa Monica and Santa Ana, and up to 5% for certain units in unincorporated L.A. County.

A "For Rent" sign hangs outside an apartment building in northeast Los Angeles.

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David Wagner

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LAist

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Where do council members stand?

LAist contacted all 15 City Council district offices to ask where council members stand on updates to L.A.'s rent control policies. Only three took a firm position.

Spokespeople for Councilmembers Hugo Soto-Martinez and Eunisses Hernandez said they support capping rent hikes at 3%, in line with demands from Keep L.A. Housed.

A spokesperson for Councilmember Bob Blumenfield said he supports the recommendations from the L.A. Housing Department, which call for a new range of 2% to 5%.

Councilmembers Imelda Padilla, John Lee, Ysabel Jurado and Tim McOsker did not take a clear stance on the issue. Neither did Council President Marqueece Harris-Dawson or Housing Committee Chair Raman.

A spokesperson for Councilmember Curren Price noted that he recuses himself from votes on the city’s rent control policies because he is a landlord.

The offices of Councilmembers Adrin Nazarian, Katy Yaroslavsky, Monica Rodriguez, Heather Hutt and Traci Park did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

Why this matters now

The lack of clarity from city leaders comes just weeks away from new rent caps taking effect, despite acknowledgements from L.A. housing officials that the formula used to determine those limits is out of step with other rent control policies across the state.

Increases of up to 3% are scheduled for July 1, with the utilities bump bringing the maximum rent hike to 5%. That’s slightly down from the 4% to 6% range last year, when inflation was higher.

The authors of the Economic Roundtable study identified L.A.’s 2% utilities surcharge as a policy heavily weighted in favor of landlords. Those extra annual rent increases are higher than the actual increased costs of providing gas and electric service each year, the study found. Over time, the increases can exceed landlords’ total cost of providing those utilities.

Building on the study’s findings, the L.A. Housing Department recommended doing away with the 2% utilities bump. Housing department officials also agreed with the study’s recommendation to base annual rent hikes on a different measure of inflation, one that measures rising consumer costs but excludes shelter from the equation.

The Keep L.A. Housed proposal would further lower annual rent increases. Under the L.A. Housing Department’s recommendations, landlords would get at least a 2% increase each year. But the tenant advocacy group wants to let the city’s allowable increases go as low as 0% in years with flat or negative inflation.

Keep L.A. Housed also wants to end the current 10% bump landlords are allowed to charge when tenants bring additional residents into their household. The Housing Department did not recommend eliminating the increase for additional occupants.

Tenant advocates and some city councilmembers rallied outside L.A. City Hall last year to call for lower increases in rent-controlled housing.

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David Wagner

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LAist

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Under proposals from both the L.A. Housing Department and Keep L.A. Housed, allowable rent increases would be 2% starting on July 1. If the council fails to act, rents will be allowed to rise between 3% and 5%.

Christina Boyar, an attorney with Public Counsel and a member of Keep L.A. Housed, said minor policy tweaks can greatly affect housing stability. Rent increases of an extra 1% or 2% each year compound over time, and can quickly outpace inflation and wage gains for many tenants.

“While it may seem like a small difference,” Boyar said, “that is hundreds of dollars for working families who are already struggling.”

Boyar pointed to a 2020 study from the U.S. Government Accountability Office that found a $100 increase in median rents is associated with a 9% increase in homelessness.

Shifting control of L.A. city homelessness spending away from the agency long entrusted with it to a department in city government could take a year and a half, city officials said Wednesday.

Bringing that spending in house was one of several options discussed by city councilmembers during a meeting of their housing and homelessness committee. Another option they’re considering is having the money be managed by the county, which started setting up a homelessness department about a year ago.

The city directs roughly $300 million per year to the L.A. Homeless Services Authority. L.A. County supervisors voted last April to withdraw funding for the agency, citing ongoing problems with the agency's oversight of homelessness funds. Now 10 months later, city officials are debating what to do with the troubled agency.

Just after Wednesday’s discussion ended, L.A. Mayor Karen Bass’ office released a statement urging the council not to withdraw funding from LAHSA without a plan in place.

“Withdrawing from LAHSA too quickly, without a plan and without the capacity, will no doubt cause unintended consequences that will leave more Angelenos to die on our streets,” Bass said in her statement. “What we need is a serious, thoughtful transition plan — the last thing we need is a new department and more bureaucracy.”

What’s on the table?

A staff report presented to the homelessness committee last April included several paths forward. Those options are:

• not changing anything major
• keeping the city money at LAHSA but beefing up city oversight
• shifting the funding from LAHSA to direct city control
• shifting the city’s funding from LAHSA to the county homelessness department to administer it

Councilmember Bob Blumenfield, who sits on the council’s housing and homelessness committee, said he’d be open to having the county handle the city’s homelessness spending if the county doesn’t charge the city for overhead costs.

 ”If they're doing that, then I might be willing to say, 'OK, let's give them some of our money.' … That's going help our programs and give us a more efficient route,” Blumenfield said. “We also need to get down to brass tacks and understand what it means financially.”

Currently, about 3.6% of the city’s spending through LAHSA goes to administration costs, according to LAHSA’s budget. That rate is 8% for the county’s funds at LAHSA, which will be pulled from the agency July 1 and shifted to the new county department.

Councilmember Tim McOsker said he was leaning toward working with the county on a limited number of programs, like interim housing.

City officials said they currently lack staff dedicated to advising them on homelessness policy and setting up the infrastructure to potentially take on direct oversight of the spending.

“There are no dedicated policy staff on homelessness in the city [government],” said John Wickham, a legislative analyst official at the city who presented the staff report of options to the committee Wednesday.

Additional accountability

The statement from Bass’ office encouraged the city council to develop a “thoughtful transition plan” before shifting funds away from LAHSA.

The statement touted a new Homelessness Bureau the city created for the budget that started last July to focus on “oversight, accountability and results” to the city’s homelessness spending.

But city officials noted at Wednesday’s committee meeting that no one has been hired yet at the bureau, nine months after the council approved its funding.

“We have not hired a single person for the bureau yet,” said committee chair Nithya Raman, who championed the bureau a year ago. “We need more capacity to be able to manage this work at the city and to make sure that every dollar is working well. We just do. We're not staffed to be able to handle that right now.”

Limited time for discussion

Wednesday’s discussion didn’t start until just before 4 p.m., following two hours of discourse on other items at the meeting and lasted about 45 minutes.

“It's getting very late,” Raman said around 3:45 p.m., before the committee began talking about the possible funding shift from LAHSA.

It’s been two years since Councilmember Monica Rodriguez introduced the item that was up for discussion Wednesday, with the staff report of options delivered almost a year ago. She told councilmembers Wednesday that they’ve been wasting precious time and need to be decisive.

 ”In the 316 days since this report was issued, we are finally here engaging in this conversation,” Rodriguez said. She recently criticized Raman, the committee’s chair, for not scheduling the discussion sooner.

“ No longer can we afford indecision in making decisive actions around how we change this system. We must act. We must act now,” she said.  ”We still have a broken and dysfunctional system without a singular entity directing our work around homelessness.”

Raman has said she plans to hold one more discussion — expected to be March 18 — before the committee decides next steps. From there, it will be up to the full city council to decide. The committee’s recommendations are influential, as the panel’s five members are one-third of the full council and most of what it would take to form a deciding majority on the council.

No written agreement

Officials also noted Wednesday that under their current approach, there’s no written agreement laying out what LAHSA and the city’s responsibilities are. They said one is in the works.

“What I've seen in my short period is that … if we didn't ink it, nobody could think it and then they get away with not doing the work,” said Councilmember Heather Hutt. “I think we need to be more intentional about identifying roles.”

LAHSA is in ‘crisis,’ CEO says

LAHSA was created by the city and county in 1993 to oversee homeless services. It’s governed by a CEO who reports to a commission of 10 members. Half of the members are appointed by the mayor and the other half by each of the five county supervisors. Bass also serves on the commission, having appointed herself in fall 2023.

While it’s long-faced criticism, it’s been under particularly close scrutiny for more than a year.

An audit and court-ordered review found it failed to properly track its spending and whether services were being provided.

LAHSA also has been facing criticism more recently for months-long delays in paying tens of millions of dollars to reimburse service providers — a problem officials vowed to fix nearly two years ago. Several providers recently told LAist they've had had to dip into reserves or take on debt.

While addressing the commission that oversees the organization last Friday, CEO Gita O’Neill said LAHSA was “in crisis. And I say this not as a criticism to any of our really hardworking staff. They've built what they were asked to build.”

O'Neill added of LAHSA staff that “morale is very low.”

More than a year-and-a-half after promising to provide up to 40 free carts to eligible street vendors, Long Beach hasn’t even made it halfway to that goal and now plans to cut funding for the program.

As of late February, Long Beach had supplied 11 free carts, with six more applicants waiting for final approvals. Health officials say this is because out of the 123 applicants, the vast majority haven’t completed all the steps necessary.

Long Beach originally allocated $429,500 for the free-cart program, but the City Council recently approved reducing that by $200,201, citing “low participation” and the need to balance a city budget that’s facing deficits.

Applications are still open for vendors seeking a free cart, but city officials are reviewing “the application process and overall program,” Health Department spokesperson Jennifer Ann Gonzalez wrote in an email.

Vendors, for their part, say the process was plagued by delays and complications.

Anita McCoy, who sells pastrami and hot dogs through her business Lucky Bee, said it took roughly eight months to receive a cart that was worth about $17,500. She was grateful but said it took countless emails and phone calls to the Health Department to finally get the finished product.

“I had to be diligent in my pursuit,” McCoy said.

De’Mon Tyndell, who runs The Quesadilla Calling, received his cart roughly a year after applying.

At one point, after months of email exchanges and “doing applications on applications,” Tyndell told city staff, “I don’t even want to do this anymore.”

Although he has the cart, Tyndell said he doesn’t use it for his various pop-ups throughout the week because the roughly 800-pound mobile kitchen is not “user friendly” to transport.

De’Mon Tyndell says the free cart he received from the city hasn’t been practical to use.

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Thomas R. Cordova.

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Long Beach Post

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Moving it requires a trailer with a winch because the cart’s built-in wheels are too small for it to be towed around, Tyndell said.

As a result, the cart has been sitting in storage for the past six months while he uses a flattop grill and tables he can easily load in his van.

The free cart program was aimed at small-time entrepreneurs who needed help complying with new rules the city drafted on street vending. To qualify, applicants needed to live in Long Beach, have no more than two full-time employees and operate only one cart. If approved, they could receive one of four types: fruit carts, grilled food carts, tamale carts and ice cream carts.

But many people trying to run a low-margin business don’t have time for a complicated application process.

For McCoy, selling pastramis and hot dogs from a corner in North Long Beach is just one of her side businesses. That means she doesn’t have to be out every day to bring in enough cash to sustain her operation. That flexibility gave her the time to pursue the free cart with a sense of urgency.

“I was begging them [to give me a cart] because I knew the program was going to be cut,” McCoy said.

Meanwhile, since early last year, the city has begun penalizing street vendors who don’t comply with its rules.

Health Department officials say it’s a necessary step to prevent food-borne illness caused by vendors who haven’t gone through a health inspection.

From early last year through Feb. 23, city staff seized and discarded food from 72 vendors and issued 103 administrative citations against vendors without an active business license. In 71 cases, they’ve also impounded street vendors’ equipment.

Penalties for the citations range from $100 to $500, depending on how many times a vendor has been cited.

Enforcement is carried out based on complaints. The Health Department says its staff first tries to educate vendors on how to comply, then they issue a notice of violation and finally an administrative citation. If vendors don’t heed that citation, a team responds to discard food and impound equipment.

Starting in 2022, California banned cities from outlawing street vendors altogether, but municipalities are still allowed to regulate when, where and how they can sell for health and safety reasons.

Since Long Beach adopted its rules, the city has received 358 applications from vendors seeking a business license to operate legally. As of Feb. 23, the city has granted just 55 (15.4%).

Rather than risk being cited, Tyndell limits his selling to pop-ups at farmers markets, outside bars and various events around the city where he can more easily get permits. Recently, he got a spot selling inside Good Times Billiards — a pool hall in Lakewood — and hopes to add a second location inside another pool hall on Broadway in Alamitos Beach.

That business is awaiting city approval, but Tyndell said he aims to open by the end of the month. There, he says, he’ll finally use his free cart to serve up gourmet quesadillas.

A Vietnam War memorial that became a symbol of government corruption was torn down Wednesday in Fountain Valley.

Former Orange County Supervisor Andrew Do had awarded $1 million in taxpayer dollars for the memorial in 2023 — to a nonprofit where his daughter, Rhiannon Do, was an officer.

The project was never completed.

When LAist visited the memorial last year, it was unfinished and cracked. And an architect who visited the site with LAist estimated that the monument cost a fraction of the taxpayer money awarded to build it.

Do is currently serving a five-year prison sentence in Arizona after admitting to directing money to several nonprofit groups and businesses that then funneled some of that money back to himself and family members for personal gain. LAist has been investigating the alleged corruption since 2023.

Do was also ordered to pay $878,230.80 in restitution for his role in the bribery scheme that saw millions in taxpayer dollars diverted from feeding needy seniors, leading authorities to label him a “Robin Hood in reverse.”

Supervisor Janet Nguyen, who now represents Do’s former district, which includes the memorial site, said it would have been too expensive to repair or relocate it.

“Let’s restart and do it right,” she said at the time.

Go deeper ...

Here's a look at some of LAist's coverage of one of the biggest corruption scandals in Orange County history:

LAist investigates: Andrew Do corruption scandal
Ex-Orange County Supervisor Andrew Do is ordered to pay $878,230.80 in restitution
'Robin Hood in reverse.' O.C. Supervisor Andrew Do resigns and will plead guilty to bribery conspiracy charge
Former OC Supervisor Andrew Do turns himself in, begins 5-year federal prison term
6 questions we still have after disgraced former OC Supervisor Andrew Do’s sentencing
A quiet retreat for the judge married to disgraced OC politician Andrew Do

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• Read tips on how to get involved.
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Low-polling Democratic candidates for governor of California struck a defiant tone Tuesday in the face of mounting pressure from party leaders to drop out before a key deadline this week.

With nine major Democrats still vying for the state’s top job, party insiders have fretted for weeks about a splintered primary vote that could result in the two leading Republicans — commentator Steve Hilton and Riverside County Sheriff Chad Bianco — finishing first and second in the June 2 primary and ensuring a GOP victor in November.

In an open letter to campaigns published Tuesday, California Democratic Party Chair Rusty Hicks called that scenario implausible but “not impossible” and urged Democratic candidates to make an honest assessment of their chances before Friday — the deadline to file and officially appear on the ballot in June.

“If you do not have a viable path to make it to the general election, do not file to place your name on the ballot for the primary election,” Hicks wrote.

But candidates who have been mired in single digits for months, including state Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond and former state Controller Betty Yee, showed no immediate signs of heading toward the exits.

At the Alameda County Registrar of Voters office in Oakland, Yee filed the paperwork to officially place her name on the ballot.

“When I was signing the declaration of candidacy, my hands were shaking because I just thought about my mother, who is 102, and how within a generation she’s able to see her daughter do this,” Yee told KQED. “We’re undergoing a process of constant assessment, and every time we do that, we just see that this is still a wide-open race.”

Thurmond, who is Black and Latino, accused the state party of “essentially telling every candidate of color in the race for governor to drop out.”

“Aren’t we supposed to be the party who embraces democracy — a party of, by and for the people?” Thurmond said in a video posted to social media. “Well, the establishment might not be, but our campaign is, and that’s why we’re in this race to win it.”

Hicks did not call on any specific candidates to leave the race but asked those who continue their campaigns beyond this week to “be prepared to suspend your campaign and endorse another candidate on or before April 15 if your campaign cannot show meaningful progress toward winning the primary election in the coming weeks.”

The chair’s plea comes weeks after Democratic delegates failed to agree on an endorsement at the state party convention in San Francisco.

Since then, polling in the race has been largely static, with investor Tom Steyer (who has spent tens of millions of dollars on television ads) being the only Democrat to see significant traction in recent surveys.

Rep. Eric Swalwell, former Rep. Katie Porter and Steyer were the top polling Democrats in polls released last month by Emerson College and the Public Policy Institute of California.

Below that trio is a crowded field of Democratic hopefuls that includes Thurmond and Yee, along with former Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra, former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, San José Mayor Matt Mahan and former Assemblymember Ian Calderon.

Meanwhile, Hilton and Bianco have faced little competition for the Republican primary vote.

Jon Slavet, a GOP tech entrepreneur who was polling at around 1%, suspended his campaign Tuesday.

“The last few months have been a gift,” said Slavet, in a video posted on social media. “It’s also shown me that building a winning coalition, brick by brick, will take time.”

With Slavet out of the field, a primary election simulator created by Paul Mitchell, vice president of Political Data Inc., put the chances of a Republican vs. Republican general election at roughly 25%.

In his letter, Hicks said a Bianco-Hilton general election would not only upend Democratic leadership of state government but also depress Democratic turnout in the California congressional districts the party is hoping to flip in November.

“The result would present a real risk to winning the congressional seats required and imperil Democrats’ chances to retake the House, cut Donald Trump’s term in half, and spare our Nation from the pain many have endured since January 2025,” Hicks wrote. “We simply can’t let that happen.”