Los Angeles – You may have heard of the city’s much publicized Rent Registry Ordinance (number 184529) that was passed around 2016. The HCIDLA site says, “The Los Angeles City Council enacted the City’s Rent Registry Program (Ordinance #184529) effective October 4, 2016. This ordinance provides that, in addition to paying the annual registration fee, landlords must also provide the rent amount for every rental unit subject to the RSO by the last day of February of each year. Registration is complete only when all outstanding registration fees have been paid and all required rental amount and tenancy information, including emergency contact information, is provided.”

One website said “The rent information provided by the landlord would go into a registry accessible to the public. You could go online, type in your address, and see what the rent is and how much it can go up each year.” Sounds like a nice idea but I don’t think that part has happened.

On the registry form, the property owner must include property information address and APN number, contact information for the person filling out the form, emergency contact information, total number of units, unit number, street name, number of bedrooms, move in date, current monthly rent, effective date of last increase, etc. The form does not request the name of the tenant. Probably many do not know that the ordinance required the city to hire eight more RSD employees for the program to operate at over 1 million dollars per year. (You have to read the city documents to believe it.)

When I requested the first released rent registry for this 1522 Hi Point St address, the city Custodian of Records supplied an un redacted copy, which she should have. But when I requested the latest rent registry for 2017, it was severely redacted (a lot of stuff crossed out). I was shocked especially since other than the rent amounts, much of the information is already a matter of public record thru public records requests to other agencies like code enforcement. Crossed out was contact information for the person filling out the form, emergency contact information, unit number, street address, number of bedrooms,  current monthly rent.  You can see my email below to the Mayor and Custodian.

Passage of an ordinance is often a lengthy process. The city clerk’s office posts online a list of all the public documents and hearings that preceded the passage of the ordinance. That way you see the city’s rationale for the ordinance. However, online news articles state there is a pending lawsuit against the City of Los Angeles by the Apartment Association of Greater Los Angeles (AAGLA). This is one of the same organizations that has not been able to help assure full and equal housing services at 1522 Hi Point St 90035. The AAGLA primarily acts in the interest of property owners, not tenants. See the article Lawsuit Filed in Federal Court Against the City of Los Angeles to Protect Privacy of Tenants and Rental Property Owners by Challenging the City’s Rent Registry

January 12, 2018

LADBS CPRA Not Responded To

June 20, 2018

[Editor: we may have received a response from the city. If so, we will update this page again in a few days.]

 

Tenants at risk under rent control, as usual

Subject: City Refuses Public Release of Rent Registry Information

From: (tenant name and email redacted)

TO: mayor.garcetti@lacity.org; presiliano.sandoval@lacity.org; robert.galardi@lacity.org; karen.baggio@lacity.org; angelo.shannon@lacity.org; hcidla.rso.central@lacity.org; councilmember.englander@lacity.org; steve.ongele@lacity.org; crystal.otero@lacity.org; richard.horn@lacity.org; richard.brinson@lacity.org; maria.a.hernandez@lacity.org; paula.hudak@lacity.org; terry.herr@lacity.org; scott.matsunaga@lacity.org; robert.hughes@lacity.org; councilmember.wesson@lacity.org; charles.v.garcia@lacity.org;

CC: info@smchamber.com; info@da.lacounty.gov; washingtonbureau@naacpnet.org; thefirstjew@yahoo.com;

Date: Thursday, April 5, 2018 10:13 PM 

MORE CORRUPTION FROM GARCETTI’S CITIZEN’S COUNCIL MAYOR HIRES EIGHT NEW RSD EMPLOYEES BUT MAINTENANCE STILL DENIED

WHAT I RECEIVED FROM THE LOS ANGELES CUSTODIAN OF RECORDS IN PART

April 3, 2018 :

“Below, please find a website address link providing you with our response to your California Public Records Act (“CPRA”) request. If you have difficulty viewing the webpage, or if you have any other questions, please contact us at (213) 922-9612 (when calling, please reference CoR File # 18147″

“Please note that to the extent that these records identify tenants, their rent amounts, or other personal information at the subject property, or the personal
information of any other individual, such identifying information will be redacted based on several grounds. Government Code Section 6254(c) provides for an express exemption from disclosure of such information and Government Code Section 6255 provides that the public interest served by not disclosing the record clearly outweighs the public interest served by disclosure of the record. ”

[Editor: this email has been redacted]

MY CONTINUED RESPONSE

The records release are utterly useless. The records person redacted/marked out the street addresses of each tenant, the name and address of the property owner or who prepared the report, the unit apartment numbers, the current amount of rent, the number of bedrooms. There is no way I can tell if it even refers to this address or is something the RSD fabricated. There is no date as to when it was submitted by the owner.

From this report as released by you, if I wanted to move into one of the units, I would not be able to verify the last amount of rent and if there had been legal rent increases, etc. It seems your intent here rather than provide information helpful to the Public rather is to shield the property owner from liability.

The office of the California Attorney general states in summarizing the Public Records Act, “If information is intimate or personal in nature and has not been provided to a government agency as part of an attempt to acquire a benefit, disclosure of the information probably would constitute a violation of the individual’s privacy.” The city response in no way demonstrates that the information redacted “has not been provided to a government agency as part of an attempt to acquire a benefit”, in fact the information allegedly provided by the owner has been given to the city by the owner to continue to be able to register the building and benefit from the rents in a rent controlled building; thus the disclosure would not constitute violation of anyone’s privacy. Based on the purpose of the ordinance, which is to protect tenants and applicants, a release of the unit numbers, number of bedrooms, and current rent [without the tenants names] would not be intimate or personal or violate any one’s privacy since no name will be connected to the information. The AG continues, “When an agency withholds a record because it is exempt from disclosure, the agency must notify the requester of the reasons for withholding the record.” Your release, other than quoting GC 6254, fails to give a reason for the redactions. The AG summary states, “In order to withhold a record under section 6255, an agency must demonstrate that the public’s interest in nondisclosure clearly outweighs the public’s interest in disclosure.” Your release fails to demonstrate your reasoning.

CITY File No. 14-0268-S3 states there are 624,000 rental units, of which the way this ordinance is being enforced, tenants and applicants will be denied information crucial to make informed decisions about the city’s admitted illegal rental practices of landlords, which it appear from this redactions, the city is assisting in the illegal acts of the property owners. There is no indication from the ordinance that tenants and applicants would face redaction of information filed with the city. A scam by the city simply to hire 8 new workers and help property owners shield tenants from unit information.

Waiver of exemption

The city has waived any claimed exemption because when you provided the same records last year for 2016, none of the redactions occurred. You have no grounds to now claim the exemption.

It appears the city thru this ordinance hired eight more employees to assure that tenants do not benefit from the information in the rent registry, and that the ordinance is enforced solely for the benefit of the property owners.

Please release the requested information without further delay.

Tenant #9
cc: Office of the District Attorney; Santa Monica Chamber of Commerce; FTC