Passionate mobile home park residents will be face to face with the city council at their meeting Tuesday, as changes to the mobile home park municipal code is the newest item of business on the agenda.
If this version of municipal code 6.02 is passed, the Santa Clarita Valley’s 2,000 people across 17 mobile home parks affected will have a new form of internal governing, as their panel will be replaced by a subcontracted administrative hearing officer.
“It’s a very passionate issue and a very policy-heavy issue,” Mayor Cameron Smyth said. “It’s important that we take our time to find a solution.”
The panel is comprised of five members, two mobile home park owners, two residents and an impartial fifth member, whose role is to make decisions based on appeals residents make concerning rent increases.
Under the code, mobile home park residents are protected from excessive space rent increases. By adding an administrative hearing officer, decisions regarding appeals would be unbiased instead of owners and residents seeking personal interests.
Originally, this meeting was to be held on April 25, but Smyth requested that City Manager Ken Striplin postpone the agenda item until May 9 to allow more time for discussion with park owners, residents and city staff.
The mayor said he has met regularly with mobile home park advocate Doug Fraser on the issue and said city staff has been in contact with residents.
“The council would prefer that they provide direction to staff instead of the staff dictating the direction of the issue,” Smyth said. “It’s important for council to provide that leadership and provide a working solution.”
In addition to changes to the mobile home park governing, the new version of the code would also have some altered language.
The code was implemented in 1990, but council members Laurene Weste, Bob Kellar and Marsha McLean have all been on the council when amendments were made to the code in 2014 and 2015.
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