The biggest news of late from Sacramento is the fact that the Sheila Kuehl Bill (SB-61) was defeated in the Assembly. SB-61 would have eliminated the sunset provision in the pilot program which requires owners to give a 60-day notice to terminate tenancy. In Santa Monica rent control properties, it mostly affects us when we are doing an owner occupancy eviction.

The interesting thing about the defeat is that it is an indication of the power of the moderate Democrats to take a walk and not vote for a fellow Democrat’s bill. This is also an indication of the strength of the CAA lobbying effort. In May, 800 owners descended upon the Capital in order to make a strong impression on legislators about this bill and the sex offender problem in California.

California is the only state in the country that does not allow us to screen our prospective tenants regarding their status as registered sex offenders. This was highlighted across the country when Katrina hit and hundreds of thousands of registered sex offenders were sent throughout the country seeking apartments. All the other states are allowed to screen based on their status. This isn’t to be used as means of discrimination. However, I believe that it is in everyone’s best interest for an owner to be able to prevent a registered sex offender from living next door to the offenders preferred target, whatever that may be.

To make matters even more difficult for owners, the Governor has recently signed AB-1323 which requires rental property owners to provide new Megan Law disclosure statements in their rental agreements. For the last 6 years, we have been required to give tenants the State’s toll free telephone number that provides the location of registered sex offenders. We now must give them specific language about the Megan’s Law website, which is www.meganslaw.ca.gov.

The new notice language should read as follows:

NOTICE: Pursuant to section 290.46 of the penal code, information about specified registered sex offenders is made available to the public via an internet website maintained by the Department of Justice at www.meganslaw.ca.gov. Depending on the offender’s criminal history, this information will include either the street address which the offender resides or the community or residence and the Zip code in which he or she resides.

Our ACTION leases will be updated in order to reflect the changes in the 60-day termination notice and also the new Megan’s Law Disclosure.

Governor Schwarzenegger also signed AB-437 (D-Parra), which requires California Megan’s Law website to include the conviction date for the sex offense crimes and the release dates from prison. The purpose of this bill is to provide more information that will allow the public access to assess the risk posed by registered sex offenders. Unfortunately, as an owner you are unable to utilize this information in order to base a decision as to whether or not to rent to a prospective tenant. This further puts us in a bind because as owners we have an obligation to protect our tenants from a known threat and yet we risk a $25,000 fine for failure to rent to a registered sex offender. Only in California could you have such a paradox.

CAA has been putting the pressure on legislators by going to the media, which highlights the irresponsibility of our California Legislature that is choosing to protect the rights of registered sex offenders over the public safety issue and the rights of tenants in California. There have been editorials in the Wall Street Journal and a 12 minute radio show on KFI AM 640 in Los Angeles. If you would like to listen to the KFI clip you can go to www.calimage.net/clients/caa/movie5a.htm. During the show the host reacts strongly in support of the October 6, 2005, Wall Street Journal editorial entitled The Sex Offender Lobby written by Katherine Seipp who sharply criticizes Assembly Members Mervyn Dymally, Jackie Goldberg and committee chair Mark Leno for their opposition to AB-438 which was sponsored by CAA and authored by assembly member Nicole Parra. The radio host frequently quotes the article and vehemently calls for assembly speaker Fabian Nunez to replace the “trio of evil” with normal Democrats. We will keep you posted as to our progress in Sacramento.

Even Oprah Winfrey has jumped on the band wagon and continues her crusade to stop sex offenders. You can do a search at her website, which is www.oprah.com.

There has been a lot of press these days about the perceived problem of excessive home owner mortgage debt. We have all heard the antidotes and the examples of people using creative financing to obtain their homes. Finally a nationally representative statistical sample of American homeowners was completed by an Opinion Research Corporation. The findings were some what surprising. For example, 38% of homeowners said that they have already paid off more than 50% of their home mortgage. Nearly a third say they have already paid off their mortgage debt in full. Another 38% say they expect to be fully paid off within the next 10 years. Only 4% of the owners say that they do not plan or expect to pay off their mortgage and 6% expect to eliminate their mortgage by selling the property.

I believe that home ownership is the single best form of wealth generation for Americans. It is the primary wealth generation method for most Americans and is the best form of providing for retirement. Certainly better than Social Security and putting IRA money in the stock market. Although prices will not always continue to go up at the current torrid pace, I believe that values will continue to hold and there will be fewer foreclosures than the doomsayers are projecting.

In my opinion, one of the greatest crimes of rent control is that it kept so many young people from attempting to buy homes in the last 20 years. We have all seen the MBA’s and Doctors and others that are financially capable of buying homes, stay in their two bedroom $600 a month apartment because they felt “they were getting such a deal.” All they did was miss the greatest run up in home values this country has ever seen. Of course, the rent controllers won’t talk about the opportunities they have caused their constituents to miss.

What a crime....