How Much Can Landlords Legally Raise Rents In Baldwin Park? The City’s Website Doesn’t Say

It’s not easy to navigate the rules around how much landlords can raise rents in Southern California. Different cities have different policies that apply to different types of housing. Figuring it all out is even harder when city officials fail to inform residents about local rent control limits.

After nearly a week of repeated emails and phone calls, city officials in Baldwin Park have yet to update their website with an answer to a simple question from LAist: What are the current rent increase limits under the city’s rent control ordinance?

The city’s website includes links to conflicting and outdated information. Renter advocates say Baldwin Park’s lack of clarity amounts to a serious dereliction of duty, and raises questions about how tenants are supposed to know their rights.

“There's no excuse for not having that information if you’re a city government,” said Shanti Singh with the statewide renter advocacy group Tenants Together. “They wrote the ordinance. They implement the ordinance. It is their responsibility — for both tenants and landlords — to be clear on what the law is.”

Other cities post current limits online

About a dozen cities across L.A. County have some form of local rent control. Most of them post information online about current limits on annual rent increases. These websites helped inform LAist’s guide to local rent hikes, in addition to our calls and emails to local officials.

Baldwin Park — a majority Latino city of about 72,000 people, where about 41% of households are renters according to the U.S. Census Bureau — is the only city that has yet to post this information online. LAist has pressed the city on this since last Thursday.

Ryan Bell, chair of the Pasadena Rental Housing Board, says current local limits are posted on Pasadena’s city website. As a tenant advocate steeped in the complexities of local rent control ordinances, Bell said even he couldn’t make heads or tails of Baldwin Park’s current rules.

“It seems really unlikely that a tenant would be able to figure it out,” Bell said.

City website gives conflicting answers

Residents who search Baldwin Park’s website can find links to what appears to be a Power Point presentation claiming the local ordinance caps rent increases at 3%. Another link takes users to an undated PDF claiming local rent increases are capped at 5%.

The actual municipal code for the ordinance says increases are limited to 5% or the local consumer price index — a commonly cited measure of inflation — which has been well below 5% since March 2023.

Baldwin Park’s municipal code does not state which month determines the consumer price index-based limit, or what period of time that limit would cover. Municipal codes in other cities spell this out explicitly.

Nearly a week after LAist first sought clarification of the rules, Ron Garcia, Baldwin Park’s Community Development Director, told LAist via email on Wednesday afternoon that April 2023’s local consumer price index of 3.8% will govern increases until Aug. 1, 2024 — after which, April 2024’s index of 3.9% will take effect.

Assistant City Attorney Marco Ornelas told LAist the city follows the timetable laid out under a separate state law, the California Tenant Protection Act. He said the city council is currently discussing a vote to clarify Baldwin Park’s ordinance.

An aerial view of a residential neighborhood of Baldwin Park.

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Tenants aren’t the only ones who say they’re confused. Without clear guidelines, landlords may struggle to follow the law. Landlord advocates also denounced the city’s failure to disseminate clear information on current rent caps. Fred Sutton, spokesperson for the California Apartment Association, called it “another example of the complex labyrinth of housing regulation.”

“From one city to another, rules change dramatically, often making it difficult to obtain answers to simple questions,” Sutton wrote in an email to LAist. “Local lawmakers should stop the knee-jerk reactions and make it easier for people to run their businesses and live their lives. Baldwin Park is a perfect example of failed local housing policy.”

Elected leaders were enthusiastic about rent control

Baldwin Park’s city council first voted to pass a local rent control ordinance in late 2019.

Then-mayor Manuel Lozano said at the time, “What we have here is good, and will protect a lot of the renters in the city of Baldwin Park.”

Current Baldwin Park Mayor Emmanuel Estrada was not a member of the city council at the time. He was first elected in 2020. But he showed up for public comment to express support for the policy back in 2019.

“I support rent control, and I think that the only way rent control is going to work is if we have a strong and affirmative ordinance,” Estrada said before the vote. He did not respond to LAist’s questions for this story.

Baldwin Park City Hall and Civic Center.

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Council members Monica Garcia and Alejandra Avila, who voted for the ordinance in 2019, also did not respond to LAist’s inquiries for this story. Former council member Paul Hernandez, who was in office during the vote, told LAist he always assumed the city would have capacity issues with enforcing the rules.

“I haven't been involved in the city since 2022,” Hernandez said. “But I still get calls, I still meet local residents that are telling me that their landlords are just learning about it.”

Garcia, the city’s community development director, told LAist the city is working on putting out better information.

Garcia wrote in an email on Wednesday, “We are actively in the process of updating the website to provide a dedicated city RSO webpage.”

We will update the LAist rent hike guide once the city makes this information available.