Very long article. Lost stamina and understanding between V and W. Think I will not vote for either as I don't understand them.

Here we go again with the MV Voice in its invariably biased and one-sided reporting. Just the headline alone makes one think there's only two choices (voting for one or the other).

Shame on you MV Voice. And as been asked REPEATEDLY, when are you going to do an article with the facts from the anti-rent control side?

Some items that media (including Voice) keeping leaving out:

- The Council Appointed committee gets to make up rental policies with a simple majority and there are no checks and balances. It is required to be made up of at least 3 non-homeowners (which should also include property managers or subletters, but doesn't). If a bad ruling is made, there is no
Mechanism to challenge or overturn the ruling.

- the committee will be paid for by the City the first year (something not even budgeted) and promises to pay back and be self-sustaining by the second year. How? Leveeing enough fines to do so. So that means, no matter what, fines are going to be issued in the amount to pay for them to keep their jobs and support and pay back a whole year of previous costs.

Hope people have some deep pockets....

Both sound horrible, and confusing. When you throw two measures like these on the ballot you just confuse people and get 2 no's.

[Post removed; poster using different names on a single thread.]

Yes, you do have to read this article very carefully to understand the two measures, but that's the beauty of the way it was written. It contains complete, unbiased information so that readers can figure out how for themselves how each measure might (or might not) be used to add to or subtract actual money from their pockets.

Here's my own personal summary, complete with my opinion (Measure W is a useless crap shoot). But YMMV. If I get anything wrong, I do hope someone will add a correction.

Measure V
o creates a rental-housing committee to decide rate increases and disputes
o defines acceptable reasons landlords can evict tenants
o might be applicable to mobile home residents (by decision of the committee)
o limits rent increases to CPI (2-5%)
o cannot be changed at the whim of subsequent City councils - becomes part
of City charter
o prevents deterioration of properties by committee decision (which creates a
buffer between tenants who risk raising legitimate maintenance problems and
landlords who need a reasonable rate of return on their investment)

Measure W
o institutionalizes the recent Rental Housing Dispute Resolution Program
(voluntary landlord compliance)
o can be amended by City Council without a popular vote
(by five city councilmembers after 2 years)
o has a major policy hole that will be redefined after the election (see
www.mv-voice.com/news/2016/09/28/council-opts-to-leave-holes-in-measure-w)

In short, Measure W was an effort by some councilmembers to please both landlords and tenants. But neither group will be pleased, because nobody knows what it will actually do. Voters who check that box will truly be taking a shot in the dark.

The costly thing about elections is that you do have to study the issues and avoid your own gut reaction, which is just human nature, to protect your finances. TV and mailed ads count on cleverly manipulating your emotions to fool you about the real intent of their propositions. (Everybody knows we still NEED plastic bags, right??? That's what the plastic bag manufacturers have so generously advised us.)

Very few of us have the patience to be thoughtful about these decisions - but if we do take the time, we can protect ourselves from losing more of our financial resources to people who have learned to tap ours in addition to enjoying their own.

Those who don't study (think about the UK's "Brexit" disaster) might be plagued with some unintended and very personal financial consequences of hasty decisions. Don't be one of those.

Rational voters don't like long ordinances, because they know it's almost impossible to read and understand the legalese. Hence, most rational voters will vote no on both measures. Better to,study and get lots of input before putting a long and complicated measure on the ballot.

I recently found a stapled Lucas Ramirez - Kacey Carpenter packet on my doorstep. Adjacent was a "yes on V"...not sure if that came at the same time? (Maybe others were present when their delivery was made and can comment on whether Yes on V came together with the candidates (who both support V).

No on Both!

Here are just some important items that the Voice did not mention about measure V.

1-This new 5 panel rent board can not have more than 2 real estate or landlord advocates, and must be a 3 member tenant advocate board.

2-This new rent board will be totally independent from our current city government. They will be an entire government body with all the power within our current governmental system.The city council and city attorney, and everyone else will have no say or control over what they do. There is no recall provision to remove these people or if we do not like the new laws that they will make. The only option to repeal new laws they make will to constantly raise money and put them on the ballot.

3-This new rent board has unlimited access to the general funds for what ever reason they choose. Measure V gives them this power. Any new laws they pass, and gets challenged in a lawsuit, they can take as much money they need from the general fund to defend the lawsuit.

4-Measure V is not about capping rents, it is about taking away rights from property owners. As an example, written in Measure V is language that states a landlord can not evict a tenant from a property for a family move in, like son or mother, unless that owner owns at least 50% interest in the property, then that family member has to live there for at least 36 months or be subject to penalties.

I expect the proponent's of this measure to come out and deny these as they are hoping to sneak all what's in it, past voters. If they start this here, I will repost an even more detailed response with more about what's in Measure V with the actual language in the measure.

I ask everyone to pass this on to everyone you can so they will know the truth.

Vote No on Measure V.

This measure had no public review, it was written by outside groups behind closed doors, who have yet to be named. With no one from the business side present so as to get their point across.We do not know where all the money came to fund this, like the $7 paid for each signature gathered.

Regarding the "70%" of currents apartments already having violations, as mentioned in the article, let me tell you what some of the facts are regarding this issue.

1- Tenants disconnect battery on smoke alarm, violation.

2- Tenant jams garbage disposal and does not tell landlord, violation.

3- Tenant has fish tank that leaks and has rotten the wood floors, violation.

4- PG&E changes gas meters and does not relabel with apartment #, violation.

5- City makes new rules and does not tell property owner until they come out and do an inspection. Like wanting to have the cabinet to the electrical main, labeled. Violation.

6-Tenant has leaky faucet or running toilet and does not tell landlord before inspection, Violation.

There are so many examples of other people causing these issues, yet because you are the property owner the city gives you the violation notice.

In this measure V, in states that "improvements to a property" will not be allowed to have a pass thru to Tenants. Only needed repairs to keep it as is will be allowed for any pass thru.

This is the exact language in other rent controlled cities, and why you have and will have neighborhoods deteriorating in our city as well.

Just look at other rent controlled cities and see how they look and at the problems they have.
East Palo Alto, East San Jose, Hayward, San Leandro, Oakland. San Francisco is the number 1 city in all of United States for property crime, landlords are routinely denied to evict trouble makers there, and this same exact language is in Measure V. It will be up to the rent board to decide to allow any type of eviction, and with a majority tenant rent board, they will deny all evictions, just like S.F does.

Measure V is 27 pages long.

Everyone should read it.

If you do not read it and understand it, do not vote for it.

It will be a charter amendment to the city, and will be extremely difficult to change or modify.

That is why a super majority of the city council opposes it.

Vote No on measure V.

Mike [Portion removed due to disrespectful comment or offensive language]
is blaming TENANTS for failed inspections! What a crock!

Anyone that has ever rented in MV knows that the older apartments are never well maintained. The managers receive a bonus based on profitability and there is no better way to decrease expenses than to minimize maintenance and repair costs. The other way is to jack the rents up sky high.

Those are the facts. Don't let the paid landlord lobbyists try to tell you any differently. Voting for Measure V will help combat the illegal actions by these landlords.

@ "Shill at it again",

All you have been doing on these different threads, is calling people names because you can not produce any facts to support the scare tactics that you keep repeating.

1- It is already a state law that these apartment housing units have to be inspected. It is up to the city housing inspector to come as often as needed to do inspections to keep the building in line.

Your side keeps arguing that measure V is needed because people will not call city inspectors for fear of retaliation. Not true because they are already being inspected and there is already state laws where a tenant can easily get an attorney to sue landlord for any retaliation or harassment towards them.

In Measure V, this new rent board will now have the power to say what is the building code and to determine this for themself's, not the people who have a back ground in the housing construction field. This rent board will tell landlords what they will have to do, required by code or not.

2- It would be beneficial if someone from your side, who would be actually informed from both sides of this issue, to actually have a public debate about Measure V. There has never been any public review or debate, and it is surely needed.

As an example, if you do not believe that Tenants disconnect batteries to their smoke alarms, and the landlord gets the violation notice, you do not live in the real world, you just do not know what you are talking about, or you are just automatically trying to discredit everyone who does not agree with you, right or wrong.

Measure V is 27 pages long.

This measure is not about capping rents, it is a power grab. You do not have to have a new 5 panel rent board, a 27 page measure, to set the rent increase limit to CPI.

Vote No on V.

"This measure is not about capping rents, it is a power grab."

It doesn't "cap rents". It caps the INCREASE of rents. Did you even read the measure?

What "power grab"? That sounds paranoid.

"You do not have to have a new 5 panel rent board, a 27 page measure, to set the rent increase limit to CPI."

The council should have done it, but they failed. There are just too many right-wing members. Hopefully, the next batch won't be die-hard republicans, so we can do the right thing by our residents. So, now it's up to the people to decide whether we need a real rent stabilization ordinance.

Again, it doesn't seem that you have read the measure. It does more than just "set the rent increase limit to CPI." Today, most properties are not well maintained. An audit showed this. I think you need to learn about what renters have been putting up with here before expressing an opinion. Retaliation is rampant. Tenants are forced to make their own repairs or they get their rent raised to push them out. (read: ABOVE market rent)

I agree that Measure V is not absolute perfection. It's still the best option available.

When the people find that they can vote themselves money, that will herald the end of the republic. -Alexander Tytler

@ "@mike",

Regarding "power grab", I clearly listed 4 issues in my post, 7 posts above this post, on Oct 14, 2016 at 10.42 am. Go read that post that details this.

You refer to an audit, and make an assumption that this says landlords are not maintaining their property, and the only way to fix this is we need a "new rent board" that takes away power from the building department, the housing inspectors, code enforcement, city council and city attorney. The rent board takes away power from all these departments, they are a totally independent city government agency with unlimited access to the general fund.

I call that a power grab.

Why do you not produce this "audit" that you claim?
How many of these violations where caused by the Tenants?

I can guarantee you this, if measure V passes, these properties will really start to get blighted as landlords will not be allowed to have any improvements done, to be allowed as rent pass thru's. Only repairs will be allowed. These areas will deteriorate just like they have in other rent control cities.

For over a year this rent control discussion has been going on.

Your side says Tenants are being harassed and there is no way you can prove it. It was made clear a year ago, take out your smart phone and record it. You will have your prove. It's been a year now, let's see some of these tapes.

Your side say's landlords are just raising rents to evict Tenants. The city council, at a fairly recent council meeting, stated that they keep asking to see these notices, but no one comes forward. At one meeting a woman was making this statement to the council, a council member asked if they could see the notice, she said yea yea, I have it right here, he asked again if he could see it, and she turned down the aisle and walked out the door.

You have a measure that was written behind closed doors. No public debate or review. And it was on purpose written to be a charter amendment to the city so it could be improbable that it could ever be changed or amended.

The super majority of the city council opposes it, everyone should as well.

Vote No on Measure V.

It affects all residents in the city, it is the worst of all options.

Measure V is a Horrific measure that deserves a No Vote.

My family owns a 5 plex, Mother and Father, sister and me.
We each have a 25% ownership interest in the property.

My sister lives in another state, she has a son and daughter.
The son wants to go to Santa Clara University next year.
The year after that, the daughter wants to go to Palmer College.
We have already been talking that they will be living at our 5 plex.

We want them to live in the only unit that has a 2 bedroom.
Under this new law, if it passes, we will not have any legal right to move in any family member, if it is occupied.
You will have to have a 50% ownership interest first, and then go ask permission first from the rent board.


Each of us has a 25% interest, we have no legal right to do this as you first need a 50% interest!

How can this be even legal.

How can any of you justify this!

How can anyone support a council member or a candidate, that supports this measure.

We will just be continuing with these divisive acts against minority groups in our city if we send divisive candidates into the position of city council members.

Our city used to be a tolerant one. Our councils represented everyone, fairly an equally.

Now we have become like Washington and brought that nasty politics to our city, we no longer look at people and guarantee that everyone has all the same rights as others, but now it is about group politics to see who can we take rights away from to give to others.

This issue is far to important to bury.

It is helpful to have as an open dialogue without restrictions.

The city faces no bigger issue than measure V.

An open civil discussion benefits everyone.

Let's keep this at the top, till election day.

Agree with Mike, this is SO important. And unfortunately not enough information presenting the other side is getting out. I just left msgs with the California Apartment Assoc, Prometheus, Tod Spieker and San Josean's for Real Housing Solutions asking if they have flyers we can pass around!

Wow. Anyone see the anti-rent stabilization YouTube video ads? There is so much dark money pouring in to keep allowing the landlords to gouge their tenants. I read that they have hired agents to post on message boards and websites pretending to be residents! From the spamming on the Voice lately, it's hard to argue against that allegation.

I was on the fence, but with this obvious flood of misinformation, it has pushed me over to vote for both Measure V and W.

@ Disgusted,

I can agree with you on the spammers being on here.
But fortunately, since the facts about what is in measure V and W has been coming out here, those spammers have been discredited and have been disappearing, along with their name calling of others.

They have an agenda and to get measure V passed, they first tried to keep quite about what's in it. Then they posted false information about it and it's other rent control measure W, then they did personal attacks against people who are against measure V.

Let me help you out, you say there is an "obvious flood of misinformation" please state what they are, do it here so I can answer those questions, and I can even copy the exact language from measure V so you can read it for yourself.

I believe that people deserve to know the truth, and all the facts so that they can make up their mind.

This discussion is good. Let's keep it going.

Only the facts if you please.

He or she is obviously paid by the real estate lobbyists. Claims to live in OMV. Riiigghhttt...

Has yet to even state ONE problem with Measure V and cannot come out of hiding to identify themselves.

So far all I've seen from those against rent control iscopious amounts of facts and economic study that say rent control does not work. For neither tenant, landlord or city well-being.

And yet posts such as yours @disgusted, continue to point fingers, make accusations, use divisive tone and imply "falsehoods, spam, and allegation". Calling little mom and pop rental units greedy landlords, spouting that all landlords are evil but never giving one specific instance.

YOU are the one without fact or substance. YOU are the ones making accusations. Rent control advocates want only what is best for THEM, not the community as a whole.

VOTE NO ON V & W

It's rent stabilization. If it truly "controlled" rent, then the rents would remain the same when the tenants moves out and is replaced. All this measure does is prevent price gouging via rent rises. The next tenant can be gouged and neither measure prevents that.

These are facts and not the made up cr*p from the landlord lobbyists.

Most everybody in MV is supportive of real rent stabilization. Only a bitter few landlords and right-wing political idealogues are against this.

@ What rent control?,

Let me point out one issue to you.

We all know that markets have cycles, they go up, then they go down. It happened in the 1980's, again in the 1990's, in 2001, and it looks like we are starting the next cycle down.

In every down cycle, rents fall and vacancy's go up.

In the 1980's landlords where offering free microwaves- which was an expensive item back then, and free trips to Hawaii for new tenants.

In 2001 the market rent for a 1 bedroom in Mtn. View was $1500. In 2003 it was $850 with a 30% vacancy factor on top of that.

Apartment owners all over the bay area where struggling to pay their bills. Many lost their properties and had to file for bankruptcy.

What you do not understand is, these mom and pop landlords can not survive in the next recession with rent control on top of them. These are artificially low rents during a recession and you can not cap these rent increases to CPI and expect these businesses to survive.

You are not capping anyone's else's expenses that a landlord gets bills from.

One example, lets say the rents fall again in the next 2 years to $1000 a month, not as low as the last recession.

The city of Mtn.View has been doing double digits rate hikes on water 10%, trash 10% and sewer 19% every year now.
Roughly that is an monthly increase of $14 per unit.

Then you have the monthly fee that the rent board will charge landlords, $15 per unit.

The rent increase allowed would be $20 per month.

The cost increase for the landlord is $29 a month per unit with a rent increase of $20 per unit.

So you see that there is a minus of $9 per unit to the landlord already, and I have not even touched the tip of the iceberg with regards to all the other expenses that come with running these businesses. They all go up. Why did you not put a CPI cap on anyone else?

The landlord will never be able to get back to being in a position where he will be able to pay the bills and keep the property up.

This has been proven over and over again. Rent controlled cities, like San Francisco, has fewer rent controlled apartments today than they did when they started rent control. Why, because landlords can not stay in business under rent control and they go out of business.

It totally defeats your arguments to say we have to have rent control to protect family's, when all you are doing is removing these older- most affordable housing stock in the city from the rental market.

I have finished, now you can go about denying everything.

But I ask before you start bashing landlords again, let's see your spread sheet from a landlords profit and expense statement. You keep calling them greedy, I would like to see your facts that document your allegations.

@ Disgusted: You state above "with this obvious flood of misinformation, it has pushed me over to vote for both Measure V and W ". And you complain about "dark money, hired agents and spamming"? That's EXACTLY what you've been doing on this site. It's pretty clear you haven't been "pushed over the edge" - but you're trying desperately to make sure the taxpayers in this City are! There has been so much false info pushed by the Measure V people - so many manipulations and taking over of websites - that it would be laughable if it wasn't so pathetic.
Yes - no matter how you try to twist it - V is RENT CONTROL and it has even more problems than that. It is a charter amendment, which means when it fails to do what it promises (and it will fail) - it will take a very expensive and delayed election to overturn. The "rental board" could well cost the taxpayers of this city not only a great deal of money, but could destroy the good apartment buildings we have left and drive out the good landlords.
The desperation shown by those pushing Measure V is getting pretty tiresome. Measure V is wrong for renters, wrong for taxpayers, and the people who understand how dangerous it is will vote NO ON V.

How will Prop v fail to do what it's supposed to? It prevents landlords from jacking the rents sky high while failing to maintain the properties. Your scare tactics that the sky will fall years down the road is unfounded.

If the landlords and their paid shills had economic science behind their position, then where is the white paper showing specific studies that prove that Measure V's rent stabilization will destroy the city? All we've seen is a bunch of comparisons to New York or SF which have very different rent control rules.

Instead, all we have here hundreds of thousands of dollars of dark money being spent on a campaign of lies. Saying that the city will be bankrupted from having to defend the rent control boards actions???? I'm sorry, but SF, Berkeley,EPA and even New York have not been bankrupted. This one transparent LIE proves that the landlord lobby is in the wrong. Shame on them!

There are plenty of economic studies showing the negative impacts of rent control. Proponents claim their flexible rent control is better, but it still contains all of the wrong incentives and will still lead to fewer units.

There are plenty of studies about apples, yet they don't tell the full story about oranges.

Name just ONE legitimate study that correlates MV's special brand of rent stabilization with sever damages to the economic prosperity of the city that passes it. Good luck! If there was one, don't you think it would have been shared with the community?

@ "@@IR",

Measure V has been written by a tenant advocacy group out of San Francisco. Measure V is basically the same language as the San Francisco rent control.

1- Explain why in measure V that an owner needs to be at least a 50% ownership interest to do a family eviction-move in.

2- Explain why you can only have one family member living on a property, and have no more rights to do a family eviction-move in

3- Can you provide a study that says that "sever damages to the economic prosperity of the city" will result unless we prohibit landlord family members from living on a property that they own.

4- A story was written in the newspaper about a landlord in San Francisco who tried to evict a drug dealer from his property, rent board denied the eviction then the other tenants sued landlord for providing an unsafe place to live.

5- Rent controlled cities like San Francisco, which is the number one city in all of United States for property crime, East Palo Alto, Hayward, San Leandro, Oakland and East San Jose, all have strict restrictions on when a landlord can evict a problem tenant. These rent boards are made up of a majority tenant advocates and always side with the Tenants. That is why these cities have higher crime and are less desirable to live in. This same language is in Measure V.

6- People who are low income, working here just trying to get by on their pay checks, would be personally in a much better place living in a area with a lower cost of living, where they will have the same pay, housing costs a fraction of what it is here. They then would have the opportunity to save money for retirement and possibly buy their own place. They can not do that here.

To me, you are doing the most cruel thing to these people when they could have a far better life in a different area.

7- Measure V is no different than any other rent control city. If anything it is worse. Even San Jose allows a rent increase double of what Measure V is, if it where law today.

8- Measure V is a power grab, pure and simple.
This new rent board will be its own government entity with no oversight from anyone. They will take as much money from the general funds as they see fit.

There is no recall provision to remove them. There is no way the city council, city manager, city attorney, or any other person can tell them what to do.

We can not change anything they do unless money is raised to put it on the ballot again.

It is mandated in Measure V that this 5 member board must be a majority 3 member tenant advocates, and no, property owners can not appoint who they want on the board to represent them. That will be up to the council.

There is nothing fair about Measure V.

If you wanted a fair approach you could have done it.

You could have done a means test for the low income, and apply some kind of caps on that,you could have put a CPI cap on all expenses, you could have created a dialogue with the city resident's first to find a solution where everyone contributed to solve the issue. But you did not do that.

Vote No on V.

There has been so much press supporting and promoting this, PLEASE be sure you're spreading the word to VOTE NO. Seriously folks, so many residents here need to know and understand the full negative effects this would have on our community (as has been stated so many times in these threads), make sure to get the word out. Don't assume people know or have read up on this. Talk to your neighbors, talk to your friends, parents of classmates etc.

Measures V/W look good, sound lovely, why not many might say, this will help those poor renters who can't afford to live here. And voters may get to the polls and think this without knowing the details and negative effects it will have. read Mike's posts. They are supported by fact and statistics.

VOTE NO ON V & W. Inform others. Protect our city.

You still did not answer the key question: "Name just ONE legitimate study that correlates MV's special brand of rent stabilization with severe damages to the economic prosperity of the city that passes it."

Until you and your fellow lobbyists do so, it's just your opinion.

The facts are that passage of V would immediately prevent long term community members from being forced out. Nobody is questioning that. Your opposition is simply a set of baseless scare tactics.

Ready to answer the question now?

It's a poor analogy. Every city passes its own version of rent control. So as of yet there are no studies about the impact of Vand W because they haven't been enacted yet. However, there are plenty of studies about past rent control measures passed by other cities. Technically none of them are exactly like V or W. But that doesn't mean you are comparing apples to oranges. It's more like comparing different varieties of apples. So the preponderance of the evidence does not support rent control and even in general price controls. So it would seem to me that the burden of proof should be on proponents to show that V will avoid the past mistakes inherent in rent control. As many have pointed out V contains many provisions similar to past rent control laws that saw a huge drop in the stock of rent controlled units .

Here's an article on SF rent control . Very revealing about rent controlled housing stock and the income of tenants in rent controlled units

Web Link

The link below is a survey article that summarizes first and second generation rent controlled policies.

Web Link

@ "@Mike",

The burden is on you, as a proponent of a Charter Anendment to the city. Which is comparable to the U.S Constitution.

You need to answers people questions and explain why certain language is in measure V.

As of today, your group has not held one public hearing to do a Q & A from the public. You should have done several.

You had no disclosures at all, who all the people where who wrote measure V.

You have not had any disclosures where all this "dark money" came from to fund it. Like the $7 per signatures for the signature gathers who got paid.

You have not, and the Voice has not disclosed 99% of what's in measure V to the public. All your group has been telling people is it caps rents.

It's even worse than that, when someone points out what's in measure V all you do is call them names, deny what the actual text of the language says, then you try to distract from the actual point by saying something like "don't look here- look over there"

Everybody who lives in the area know's that they do not want to live in East Palo Alto, East San Jose, San Leandro, Hayward,Oakland etc. These are all rent control cities, why are they so undesirable to live in? Everybody now's that those cities have issues and you do not need a study to see that.

Measure V is not "a special brand of rent stabilization" what are you smoking to say that?
Is that what your poll testing says you need to say now? Spell out in detail what differences are in Measure V compared to S.F rent control.

Explain why in measure V that an owner needs to have at least a 50% ownership interest to do a family eviction-move in.

Explain why you can only have one family member living on a property, then you have no more rights to do a family eviction-move in.

Provide a study that says that"sever damages to the economic prosperity of the city" will result unless we prohibit landlord family members from living on a property that they own.

Defend your measure V and start answering questions, the public has a right to know.

Vote No on V.

Mike, mike, Mike...

Why should anyone answer your off-point questions when you cannot even point to ONE STUDY that condemns Measure V as significantly damaging to MV? The rent stabilization ordinance is a very far cry from the strong rent control that NYC has. NYC is what the studies refer to.

Come on. This is your job! Even a flippin' white paper? No? Hello?

You're right. No one needs to answer his questions, we all get exactly what he's saying. He's said it repeatedly, he's said it responsibly, he's said it professionally and with civil discourse. And believe me, the rest of us can see the world of difference between each side.

VOTE NO ON V & W

I agree with Mike. Measure V is a charter amendment -- the city's equivalent of a Constitutional Amendment. It's the nuclear option. It's very hard to change.

So the burden of proof is on the supporters of Measure V, not the opponents!

The opposition are landlords, their shills and right wing political idealists. They will continue to vote for people like George W Bush and Donald Trump. The questions they pose are red herrings at best. All are answerable, but they don't care. It's against their religion to support anything that protects the economically disadvantaged. Our Hispanic and Latino neighbors are especially vulnerable, but we can't talk about that, can we? "They played the race card! Ho offensive!!!"

Most everyone I know is supportive of rent control, but I don't have many republican friends. Oh, darn.

All of the supporters have not made their case why we should damage the rental market to help a few rich people stay in their rent controlled units.

"All of the supporters have not made their case why we should damage the rental market to help a few rich people stay in their rent controlled units."

#1: There is no evidence that it will "damage the rental market".

#2: Most residents in these older, shabby apartments are NOT RICH. There are thousands in lower economic situations that will directly benefit.

[Portion removed due to disrespectful comment or personal attack]

Off course there is no current evidence of damage because the ordinance is not In Place yet. It's a silly and irrelevant point to say there is no damage when the ordinance is not in effect. There is plenty of evidence on the same type of ordnances and their damage posted above.

Also you have no information on who lives in the potential rent controlled units. In SF they found a high proportion of wealthy people living In Rent cntrolled units. Do you have information that no wealthy people live in these units? There is no means testing in measure.

Finally , I am using common sense. I am reading the empirical studies that have looked at all previous rent control measures and found them lacking and hurtful to the stock of rent controlled units. It's up to the proponents to explain how the same type of restrictions in this measure will not have the negative impact they have had in previous cities. Read the post above which cite a multitude of studies.

[Portion removed due to disrespectful comment or personal attack]


After reading several of the posts, it's clear many of them back measure W which is an unsatisfactory proposal advanced by the city council and the owners who have only one interest: make as much money as possible, even at the current levels of ridiculous rent.

The explanation on the measures is pretty clear and I want to thank Beelia for summarizing.

Measure W is clearly proposing nothing useful to the renters in Mountain View. Nobody cares if a landlord complies to something like the Rental Housing Dispute Resolution Program. It only creates friction between owner and renter and it's a complicated process. Also, measure W is clearly not providing statistical and practical guidelines for reasonable rent increases, aside from the arbitrary 7.2% maximum rent increase that was famously discussed and passed earlier this year at the city hall. Finally, measure W does not protect renters from unjust eviction which I find shocking. I'm sure some jerks need to be kicked out but kicking out people just because it's convenient to an owner is totally inexcusable.

Measure V proposes what is right which is two main things: a limit on rent increase and reasons for eviction. I'm not sure if the CPI is the best statistical approach but I find it a reasonable solution and it's definitely better than a random 7.2%. Reasonable reasons for evictions are a right just like the right to life, education and fair trial.

Make sure you discuss with your neighbors and friends what measure V means to people who rent in Mountain View. It's time we change the rules in the name of fairness. I'm tired of 10% rent increases every year and nobody gets 10% paycheck increases every year. Evictions without a reasonable reason should initiate criminal investigations on owners.

@"R.J",

Your side continues to lie to people. There is no other way you can say it. To still continue with lies about what the language is in both measure V and W is despicable because your are deliberately trying to defraud the people of Mountain View.
Your side also continues to not answer any questions as to why and what's in measure V.

1- The post is true from Sue. As a landlord it will be illegal for her to do a family eviction-move move in, if measure V passes. Your side is refusing to explain why this needed.

2-You need to read measure W. As you clearly do not know what you are talking about.

3- Measure W caps rent increases to no more than 5% in a 12 month period, just like measure V has a ceiling of 5%.

4- Measure W has a process where a higher than 5% rent increase is asked for, then it goes to binding arbitration, landlord is entitled to fair return, your side keeps saying that. Do you really mean it?

5- Measure W has just cause evictions, just like measure V.

6-The CPI cap increase in measure V, does not even cover the annual cost increases from water-sewer-trash-P.G&E.Let alone all the other expenses that a landlord has, which you did not bother to cap increases on. If measure V passes, that will be an automatic rent reduction to the property owner.

I know you do not care how many of these mom and pop businesses that you will put out of business, nor do you care that these businesses will no longer put in any money to improve these buildings as "improvements" will not be allowed for any rent pass thru. That's written in measure V.

That same language is written in all the other rent control cities around the bay, and that is why you have the most blighted, higher crime, and not as desirable place to live in, in rent controlled booties.

Vote no on measure V.

If you support rent control, vote yes on W.

Dear auto correct, I am really getting tired of your shirt.

My third to last sentence in my post above should read,

" in rent controlled cities, not booties"

"I'm tired of 10% rent increases every year and nobody gets 10% paycheck increases every year. Evictions without a reasonable reason should initiate criminal investigations on owners."

Really 10% rent increases every year. So rents have doubled every 7 years. And of course how are people paying for these rent increases without higher incomes. Something doesn't make sense here.

What does make sense is the implied bigotry towards landlords from the pro V people. Really it's a crime to not rent to someone and of course who decides what is a reasonable reason?

Mike has either not read or has not understood Measure V. He thinks raises are capped at 5pct when actually the landlord can get 10pct! Now watch Mike try to wriggle out of this....

Notice that he and his landlord cronies still have not found a single study showing how Measure V's rent stabilization will cause devastation on the community. Now watch how he tries to wriggle out of this one too!

It's clear to everyone that the opposition to Measure V is organized, well funded, but not especially competent. Really shows how Measure V is the way to go.

Vote Yes on V!

All of the arguments put forth by the pro V crowd have been addressed. Especially the argument about empirical studies. One can only hope the pro V side will continue putting forth the same old tired arguments that have already been addressed and that reasonable people will take notice and make up their own minds.

[Post removed due to disrespectful comment or personal attack]

Still waiting for you to answer the most basic of questions:

The opposition position is that Measure V will destroy MV. Please provide a study, a white paper or SOMETHING that proves this.

If you cannot provide this very basic information, you are obviously on the wrong side of Truth.

What is very clear from reading (and understanding) Measure V, Is that it will provide relief to THOUSANDS of MV residents. Absolutely no study is needed for this most obvious fact. Your position is tenuous st best. The anti-V real position is to allow landlords to gouge their residents, evict them at will and fail to keep the properties safe and sanitary. This is absolutely true. Nobody honest can dispute it.

Measure V will pass. Come to the side of goodness and vote Yes!

@"Mike"

" Measure V will pass. Come to the side of goodness"

If your side would tell the truth and answer the publics questions about measure V, your side will lose.

I like to be able to sleep at night, honesty is the best policy, so I will

Vote No on V.

This will require that people start talking and telling others what's in V, to defeat it.

Still waiting for you to answer the most basic of questions:

The opposition position is that Measure V will destroy MV. Please provide a study, a white paper or SOMETHING that proves this.

If you cannot provide this very basic information, you are obviously on the wrong side of Truth.

What is very clear from reading (and understanding) Measure V, Is that it will provide relief to THOUSANDS of MV residents. Absolutely no study is needed for this most obvious fact. Your position is tenuous st best. The anti-V real position is to allow landlords to gouge their residents, evict them at will and fail to keep the properties safe and sanitary. This is absolutely true. Nobody honest can dispute it.

Measure V will pass. Come to the side of goodness and vote Yes!

Most telling from the rent control advocates are comments from their very own "RJ" about anyone questioning rent control. Apparently anyone who doesn't agree with rent control are:

Dummies
too stupid
complete nonsense
garbage

but lets stick with facts.

Posting to keep this top and center, too important to let it slip down.

VOTE NO ON V & W

@ "Mike"

That's all you have, distract and lie and divert people's focus onto a different issue and away from what's in Measure V.

You side as been repeatedly saying that measure V will cap rents and have just cause evictions. That is what Measure W says and would do.


If all you wanted to do was to have those two items it would have taken one page to write. Instead, you wrote a measure that is 27 pages long and is a power grab both from the city government side and from a private business.

If your side would be honest, and that includes the Voice, you would have been holding public Q&A and telling everyone what all is in it. You have done none of that.

You are asking for a charter amendment the city, this is a nuclear option, you need to step up and answer questions about measure V. You are committing fraud against the city and its residents by your deceitful actions and refusal to discuss it.

If anyone supports up to 5% rent increases in a 12 month period with just cause evictions, then
Vote Yes on W.

Vote No on V.
It is a power grab.

@ Moderator,

The seventh post above this one, the one I made.
You removed my Post due to "Post removed due to disrespectful comment or personal attack"

That is absolutely false! My post contained no such thing.

You are just trying to smear me and the fact you did this is disrespectful and a personal attack towards me.

Agreed. 100%. And yet RJs comments are left alone. Which to be honest is probably better so everyone can see how the rent control side thinks and feels.

So Much information is being withheld from the public. It is so important for the public to know and understand that Measure V is a Charter Amendment, it is the city's equivalent of a Constitutional Amendment. It's the nuclear option. It's very hard to change.

Measure V does not cover 1995 and newer apartments, single family homes, condos, town-homes, row houses or duplexes. They are EXEMPT!.

So the burden of proof is on the supporters of Measure V, not the opponents! They need to explain why the languages below is good for the city. It is not about capping rents, with just cause evictions, as they have been telling people, but a power grab from the city government side and from private businesses.

***I have posted the page and sections of measure V below, some are a summary explanation of the text, but there is far more in there. But I want people to read this, copy it and email it to everyone. The only way to defeat this will be by word of mouth.*** PLEASE COPY-PASTE-PRINTOUT-HANDOUT!
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Page 16 (k) Integrity and Autonomy of Committee.
This new rent board will be totally independent from our current city government. They will be an entire government body with all the power within our current governmental system.The city council and city attorney, and everyone else will have no say or control over what they do. There is no recall provision to remove these people or to be able to change any new laws they will make. No check and balances. The only option to repeal new laws they make will be to constantly raise money and put them on the ballot or challenge them in court.
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Page 15 (j) Financing.
This new rent board has unlimited access to the general funds for what ever reason they choose. Measure V gives them this power. Any new laws they pass, and gets challenged in a lawsuit, they can take as much money they need from the general fund to defend the lawsuit.
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Page 9 + 10 (7) Owner Move-in. (A) (B) (D)
Measure V is not about capping rents, it is about taking away rights from property owners. As an example, written in Measure V is language that states a landlord can not evict a tenant from a property for a family move in, like son or mother, unless that owner owns at least 50% interest in the property, then that family member has to live there for at least 36 months or be subject to penalties.
If there is already a family member living on the property, no further owner move in will be permitted.
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Page 13 Section 1709. Rental Housing Committee (a)
This new 5 panel rent board can not have more than 2 real estate or landlord advocates, and must be a 3 member tenant advocate board. Is this equal or fair?
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Page 18 (3) Fair Rate of return - Factors Excluded. (A) (C) (E)
In measure V, in states that "improvements to a property" will not be allowed to have a pass thru to Tenants. Only needed repairs to keep it as is will be allowed for any pass thru.This is the exact language in other rent controlled cities, and why you have and will have neighborhoods deteriorating in our city as well because of this language. No landlord will spend one penny to improve his property when the rent board will not allow any rent pass thru's. For those of you who say it is bad now, wait till all improvements stops and see what happens to neighborhoods then.
The cost of dept service, including principal,interest and fees for any dept obtained after 10/19/15 will not be allowed for any rent pass thru for consideration for "Fair Return".
Income Taxes will not be allowed for consideration for "Fair Return"

There is no business in United States that has these restriction on products or services they provide. To be considered for a truly "Fair Return" you have to take into account dept service, taxes. All businesses have to take these into account to make a profit and stay in business and keep paying the bills.
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Page 7 + 8 Just Cause Evictions Protections. (4) Criminal Activity.
"The Tenant has continued, after the Landlord has served the Tenant with a notice to Cease, to be SO DISORDERLY as to destroy the peace, quiet, comfort, or safety of the landlord or other tenants at the property".

Just look at other rent controlled cities and see how they look and the problems they have. SO DISORDERLY is the key word!
East Palo Alto, East San Jose, Hayward, San Leandro, Oakland. San Francisco is the number 1 city in all of United States for property crime, landlords are routinely denied to evict trouble makers there, and this same exact language is in Measure V. It will be up to the rent board to decide to allow any type of eviction, and with a majority tenant rent board, they will deny all evictions, just like S.F does.
These evictions issues should stay in the court system where an impartial judge makes the decisions, not a tenant biased rent board.
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Measure V,
Everyone should read it.
If you do not read it and understand it, do not vote for it.
It will be a charter amendment to the city, and will be extremely difficult to change or modify.
That is why a super majority of the city council opposes it, and a super majority of council candidates oppose it.
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We all know that markets have cycles, they go up, then they go down. It happened in the 1980's, again in the 1990's, in 2001, and it looks like we are starting the next cycle down. Rents are already falling, vacancies are way up, move in bonuses are being offered for move ins. The period of escalating rents are over, the market is now in reverse.

In every down cycle, rents fall and vacancy's go up.

In the 1980's landlords where offering free microwaves- which was an expensive item back then, and free trips to Hawaii for new tenants.

In 2001 the market rent for a 1 bedroom in Mtn. View was $1500. In 2003 it was $850 with a 30% vacancy factor on top of that.

Apartment owners all over the bay area where struggling to pay their bills. Many lost their properties and had to file for bankruptcy.
You did not have one landlord go to the city council demanding a bailout.

What people do not understand is, these mom and pop landlords can not survive in the next recession with rent control on top of them. These are artificially low rents during a recession and you can not cap these rent increases to CPI and expect these businesses to survive.

You are not capping anyone's Else's expenses that a landlord gets bills from, not one.
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It has been proven over and over again. Rent controlled cities, like San Francisco, has fewer rent controlled apartments today than they did when they started rent control. Why, because landlords can not stay in business under rent control and they go out of business.

It totally defeats their arguments to say we have to have rent control to protect family's, when all you are doing is removing these older- most affordable housing stock in the city from the rental market.
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This measure had no public review, no Q&A from the public. It was written by outside groups behind closed doors, who have yet to be named. With no one from the business side present so as to get their point across.We do not know where all the money came to fund this, like the $7 paid for each signature gathered.
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Measure V Measure W

Rent increase limit 2% to %5 0% to 5%

Just cause evictions._ yes yes

Rent Reduction for
decrease in YES YES
service. Who settles disputes Rent Board--------Professional-Arbitrator,Binding. board.
Retaliation Yes. Yes language.

If you support rent control, Vote No on Measure V and Yes on Measure W.

Measure V is a power grab.

If both measure passes, then Measure V will be the law as it is a Charter Amendment. It will take another 2 years and another ballot measure to fix the flaws.