Happy Halloween – Code Enforcement Returns to Venice
By Karl
Abrams
Have you ever wanted to file a
complaint--anonymously of course--against your rental neighbor? You know. Maybe
their yard is far too messy for your taste, or too many people seem to be living
there, or perhaps it is unsafe in your opinion. Or maybe you have a sneaking
suspicion that they’re just not up to code?
Well, all you have to do is call the Los
Angeles Housing Department (LAHD) and they will gladly investigate these code
violations, provided, of course, that they are renters – like many of us
here in Venice – of either duplexes or apartment buildings or even houses
with two or more single family dwellings. LAHD will even give you a special
hot-line phone number so that you can remain anonymous and the City can attain
that utopian ideal called Code Compliance. Of course, you can even do it online
and every effort will be made to respond to your request within 24 hours.
This is all part of the amazing
Systematic Code Enforcement Program or “SCEP.” It is designed to
routinely “inspect...rental properties...on a four-year cycle and to
respond to reports of property violations.” If enforcement steps are
needed, the file will be forwarded to the Office of the City
Attorney.
There is no fee for reporting
a violation and tenants who do so are protected by law. They cannot be
“evicted or harassed by [their]
landlords.”
But what happens if
this Code Enforcement concept is used by a greedy Landlord who calls in the
complaint? One possible scenario is that the Landlord can kick out the renter,
fix the place up and bring it to code. This will replace the renters with new
renters who can pay higher rents that will cover the Landlord’s code
costs.
If you are the target (all
renters are vulnerable), LAHD will:
1.
Send the property owner a Notice of Inspection in the mail 30 days before the
scheduled inspection and
2. Post a
Tenant Inspection Notice (SCEP) 5 to 7 days before the inspector
arrives.
The property owner will then
be mailed a Notice and Order to Comply to violations within 30 days or so. At
this point, the owner will be summoned to an administrative General
Manager’s Hearing. The Landlord can then argue that the cost of code is
too much at the low rent the Landlord has been asking. Permission may then be
granted to remove the renters, renovate, rejuvenate, and gentrify the dwelling.
The Landlord gets the higher rent and you’re back on the streets in search
of a rental in San Bernardino.
According to reliable sources in the
Oakwood Neighborhood of Venice, another scenario has been
“developing.” It seems that an anonymous caller has snitched on a
rental unit on Westminster Avenue. The owner of the unit has been charging
low-income affordable rental rates for the property for some time now. This is a
good policy. However, the inspector has written a long list of code violations
against the owner which include expensive repairs such as “increasing the
height of the ceiling” and other near impossible tasks. The list of
violations was not written in the presence of either the tenants or the landlord
as called for by good manners. It seems that the inspector, who arrived without
even a clip-board, submitted the long list to LAHD before anyone could even
contest it. The owner-landlord must now consider selling the property for lack
of repair funds.
We wonder…just
who is going to buy that property and raise the rent beyond its previously
affordable rates? Is it the anonymous caller?
Posted: Wed - November 1, 2006 at 03:44 PM