Sudden rent hike shocks seniors at Youngstown Mobile Home Park

Amid the ongoing disputes between residents and owners of Petaluma’s Youngstown Mobile Home Park – which include a lawsuit against the city, threats of closure, threats of steep rent hikes and attempts to convert the seniors-only park to all-ages – the residents are now making a new allegation: that on the day before Thanksgiving, the owners illegally and without warning tried to tack on more than $900 to their monthly rent bills.

The $923.41 increase, which park owners have requested but are not allowed to impose before an arbitration period is completed, was noticed Nov. 22 by some of the park’s residents, who then scrambled to spread the word while stopping the online payment portal from taking the unwarranted payment automatically.

It all felt like yet another scare tactic to Jodi Johnson, a longtime resident of the park at 911 N. McDowell Blvd. For renters, such a hefty increase "would mean that they couldn't pay for food, medicine, overdraft, all kinds of different things“ – and resulted in many of the park’s seniors becoming frightened and angry, she said.

Residents immediately notified management, who said the increases were a mistake based on the fact that arbitration proceedings – which under city law must be concluded before owners may impose the rent hikes in the first place – had been postponed from October to January. The arbitration proceedings were triggered after Youngstown’s owners proposed rent increases of more than 150% last August.

“With arbitration’s postponement our system was not updated,” management wrote in an email to residents Wednesday.

That excuse didn’t sit well with residents.

“There can be no mistake, because you can't put into a system that you owe any $923 increase because you haven't even been found that you're going to be awarded anything,” Johnson said.

Petaluma City Attorney Eric Danly confirmed that it is “unlawful for a park to demand any rent in excess of that allowed under the city’s regulations while an arbitration is pending.”

Reached by email, Daniel Weisfield, Youngstown’s property manager and “co-founder” of the Los Altos-based park operator Three Pillar Communities, refused to comment on the matter.

A separate letter sent to residents from the management company stated that “If your tenancy is subject to Petaluma's rent stabilization ordinance, then your rent will not increase until and unless the arbitration process results in an approved rent increase.”

Residents have raised $50,000 to cover their legal costs associated with the arbitration, and have already filed their initial documentation to the city, which is overseeing the process, Johnson said.

Johnson, who has been acting as a spokesperson for her neighbors, said she was also threatened with a cease and desist order by park owners last month, and told by management she couldn’t speak on other residents’ behalf unless they signed a petition.

In response, nearly 90 park residents signed the petition, which was posted as a public comment at the Nov. 20 City Council meeting.

Seniors-only rules

Meanwhile, Youngstown residents have another issue where they say park management appears to be flouting city laws: allowing people under 55 to become renters there.

City leaders recently passed a “senior mobile home overlay” intended to provide additional protections to residents of all previously designated seniors-only mobile home parks by disallowing park owners from converting them to all-ages parks. The new rule went into effect Nov. 15.

Out of the city’s seven mobile home parks, five are seniors-only, comprising 724 spaces. (Mobile home park residents typically own their own mobile homes but must pay a ground rent on the land underneath to the park’s owner or operator.)

Youngstown is one such seniors-only park. But residents say they have seen park management showing available spaces to families, some “with very young children,” while removing signs indicating the park is for seniors – a violation of the city regulations, Johnson said.

“And even as of Friday, (potential buyers) were told that we are in the process of being converted into an all-ages park,” Johnson alleged.

A street-facing sign indicating the park is a senior community, gone as of Oct. 30, is still not back up, she said. According to the city’s municipal code, “signage, advertising, leases, rental agreements, and park rules and regulations” must state Youngstown is a senior mobile home park.

"Youngstown has no comment on the all-ages issue at this time, due to pending litigation. No comment on the other issues,“ said Weisfield in an email to the Argus-Courier.

Residents say they emailed a senior regional manager in mid-November asking to meet to discuss various community complaints, including concerns of continued all-ages advertising and signage.

In response, they say, the manager wrote, “We will not be retracting any changes we have made surrounding converting the park to all ages.”

The city has received the residents’ complaint and is looking into it for verification, Danly said.

"The senior mobile home overlay is a valid ordinance enacted under the city’s police powers and the city has the ability to enforce violations of the ordinance using any applicable remedies in the Petaluma Municipal Code and other applicable law, including issuance of administrative citations and filing of civil actions against parks that are violating the ordinance requirements,” Danly said.

You can reach Staff Writer Jennifer Sawhney at 707-521-5346 or jennifer.sawhney@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @sawhney_media.