omha.info - OCEANSIDE: Mobile-home registration fee will climb

Council approves three-year transition to soften the blow
OCEANSIDE ---- Mobile-home park owners and most of their residents will be charged a higher annual fee so Oceanside can recoup its expenses for administering rent control.

The city has charged every mobile home under rent control $54 a year since 1991, but officials say that amount no longer brings in enough to cover expenses such as park inspections and consulting fees.

On Wednesday, the City Council agreed to raise the fee 145 percent over three years. Coupled with annual adjustments for inflation, the change should eventually make the rent-control ordinance self-sustaining, staff members said.

Margery Pierce, director of housing and neighborhood services, had recommended the entire 145 percent increase this year, making the fee $132. That way, she said, Oceanside could immediately stop using its general fund to wash away the program's red ink.

But council members said a sudden jolt wasn't right during an economic downturn.

What I really want to do here is give a soft landing to everybody," City Councilman Jerry Kern said.

With roughly 2,250 of 2,600 spaces under rent control, Oceanside's mobile home parks provide some of the city's most affordable housing. Park owners and tenants essentially split the registration fee.

Residents said they would support a higher rate because their priority was to preserve rent control, even if it meant paying more.

"Here I am in my 70s, living on a fixed income in the middle of a recession, and I'm asking you to raise my fees," said Norman Kelley, a homeowners association board member at the Mira Mar Mobile Community. "That should demonstrate to you how important this matter is to myself and many of us in the park."

Park owners, though, have grumbled about the plan.

Julie Paule of the Western Manufactured Housing Communities Association, a trade association for park owners, suggested a less onerous increase, or, barring that, a five-year phase-in.

"Any relief on that front would be appreciated," she said.