Berkeley Voters Could Face Competing Tenant Protection Measures in November

Berkeley landlords aim to get a measure on the November ballot that would de-fang the city’s rent board and dedicate more money for rent relief — an initiative that could potentially set the stage for dueling ballot measures between landlord and tenant groups.

It’s the latest effort by Bay Area property owners to fight tenant protections at the ballot box. In Concord, a referendum drive is underway to undo the city’s recently adopted rent control plan. A similar referendum in Larkspur narrowly failed earlier this month.

Property owners in Berkeley began gathering signatures on Thursday in hopes of putting their own initiative on the ballot that would make sweeping changes to the city’s rent board, modify grounds for evictions, and exempt more properties from the city’s rent stabilization and eviction ordinance. The plan also calls for a rent relief fund for certain tenants who can’t pay, among other changes.

“I think the voters are ready for a citizens’ initiative like this one,” said Krista Gulbransen, executive director of the Berkeley Property Owners Association, which is behind the effort. “I do believe very strongly that a lot of citizens of Berkeley are pretty fed up with some of the overregulation of the government on small businesses and small property owners.”

The effort follows one from renters’ advocates, who have been collecting signatures since early March for their own measure that would strengthen the city’s tenant protections. In a statement, rent board chair Leah Simon-Weisberg blasted the property owners’ proposal.

“I am confident that Berkeley voters will see through the corporate landlords’ strategy of chaos,” Simon-Weisberg said. “Time and again, corporate money flows into Berkeley elections, only to be defeated by community organizing and the grassroots.”

The property owners’ initiative would exempt more owner-occupied properties from the city’s rent stabilization and eviction ordinance, raise the rent cap slightly to 7.1%, and allow landlords to negotiate with tenants for even higher increases in exchange for more services or amenities.

But perhaps the most substantial of its proposed changes are to the city’s rent board. It would strip the rent board of certain powers, including eliminating its ability to reduce rents in the case of tenant relocation or repairs, determine whether property owners comply with health and safety laws, and intervene as an interested party in lawsuits. It would also eliminate commissioners’ salaries and require the board to be audited every three years.

Should the proposal be challenged in court, the city must defend the initiative and protect its proponents from damages.

For the rent relief fund proposed in the initiative, Gulbransen said property owners are still reeling from rents lost during the pandemic.

“This rent relief fund is critical,” she said. “I have property owners who are still struggling.”

The proposed program would rely on an existing tax on large landlords that voters approved in 2016, called Measure U1.

Gulbransen has criticized city leaders for misusing money from the measure. The Berkeley Property Owners Association sponsored a competing initiative at the time, Measure DD, that would have implemented a more modest tax increase. Voters rejected that measure despite landlords spending over $780,000.

The association’s initiative would ensure that a portion of the 2016 tax is dedicated to rent relief, raising an estimated $1.2 million annually and creating a new committee to oversee the program.

Berkeley’s current rent relief fund, the Housing Retention Program, is administered by the Eviction Defense Center. Anne Tamiko Omura, Executive Director of the center, called the program one of the best in the Bay Area.

“It has put millions of dollars into landlord pockets and kept hundreds of low-income tenants housed,” she wrote in an email to KQED. “My gut reaction is, ‘If it ain’t broken, don’t fix it.'”

Berkeley Rent Board Vice Chair Soli Alpert said he wants to see more money dedicated to the city’s existing rent relief fund, but he’s critical of the association’s proposal, dismissing it as “a distraction.”

“I don’t think the landlords should be in charge of what happens with the landlord tax,” he said. “Pardon me if I don’t think that landlords have the best interests of tenants in mind when they’re talking about the use of these funds.”

Simon-Weisberg and Alpert are the proponents behind another ballot measure, developed and approved by the rent board. It would strengthen existing renter protections by removing an exception for two-unit rentals that were grandfathered into the Berkeley Rent Stabilization Ordinance, subjecting them to both rent control and just-cause protections.

The proposed Berkeley Tenant Protection and Right to Organize Act would also establish the right to form tenant associations. With support from 50% plus one occupied units in a complex, tenants could form a union and demand their landlord negotiate over grievances.

San Francisco became the first city in the country to pass such right-to-organize legislation in 2022.

The initiative by the Berkeley Property Owners Association would establish a higher threshold for creating a tenants’ union, requiring two-thirds of occupied rental units to sign on. Owners would have to confer with associations in good faith, but unlike the tenant advocates’ proposal, the rent board wouldn’t have the authority to define the terms of a “good faith” negotiation.

The property owners’ proposal also seeks a less restrictive form of eviction protection than what the tenant advocates are seeking. Under the tenants’ plan, renters couldn’t be evicted if they owe less than the equivalent of one month’s fair market rent — an amount determined by the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development.

Under the property owners’ proposal, evictions would be prohibited if the tenant owes less than one month of the rent outlined in their lease agreement unless they haven’t paid for more than 90 days, among a few other modifications.

Gulbransen said the association added these changes in response to the tenants’ proposed ballot initiative in the hopes that it would entice more voters to support their competing proposal.