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Recommendation to direct City Attorney to prepare an urgency ordinance to address tenant harassment within the City of Long Beach; and direct City Attorney to bring this urgency ordinance back to the City Council for consideration at its September 8, 2020, City Council meeting.
DISCUSSION
The COVID-19 pandemic continues to impact our local, state and national region. In the last six months, many working families have faced unexpected circumstances in loss of jobs, lack of funding resources, health, among other factors. In May 2020, the City Council unanimously voted for an eviction moratorium that helped protect tenants from being evicted during these trying times.
In the past few months, there have been increased and significant reports of tenant harassment from tenants throughout the City of Long Beach. This includes, but is not limited to, interruption or termination of housing services, failure of timely unit maintenance, abuse of the Landlord's Right of Access into a dwelling unit, demanding that tenants sign over their federal stimulus checks to pay rent, influence or intimidate tenants to vacate the unit, threatening tenant's credit rating if unable to pay rent, providing false information of current COVID-19 emergency housing policies, taking action or terminate tenancy, removal of personal property from the dwelling unit, offering payments for the tenant to vacate, improper notices and timing to vacate, refusal of the payment process for rent, removal of housing services for the tenant to vacate, failure to serve a notice of anti-harassment rights and loud, unnecessary construction while residents are sheltering in place.
The City Council requests an ordinance to include the following anti-tenant harassment provisions. No landlord shall:
1. Influence or attempt to influence, through fraud, intimidation or coercion, a residential tenant to transfer or pay to the landlord any sum received by the tenant as part of any governmental r...
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