PRIMROSE LANE APARTMENT UPDATE
Both the City of Bishop and the Inyo County approved emergency ordinances to keep the remaining residents of Primrose Lane Apartments in their homes.
Or at least that’s what both entities thought.
The latest wrinkle in this story: Primrose resident Nick Bartlett went to Bishop Realty, the property manager, Wednesday to pay his rent. The rent was refused.
According to Bartlett, he had made an attempt to pay the rent on Monday and was told by Jake Rasmussen he was not sure what the apartment owners wanted to do. The following day, the Inyo Supervisors passed its emergency ordinance. Bartlett went back after the ordinances were passed and Rasmussen wouldn’t accept his check.
One of the protections of Assembly Bill 1482, the legislation that would have imposed a maximum 10-percent limit on rent, included a reversal of any rent increases put in place between March 15 and December 31, according to the City of Bishop staff report. The law also prevents landlords from evicting a tenant without “just cause.” “Just cause” for eviction would include non-payment of rent.
The emergency ordinances passed by Bishop and Inyo, put the same protections included in 1482 in place through the end of the year when the state legislation goes into effect.
The local ordinances were not intended to be a form of rent control, simply a mechanism to keep tenants in their homes until the state law went into effect.
An unintended consequence of the legislation happened at Primrose: the notice of rents nearly doubling went out in September, followed a month later by eviction notices, timed to get in under the 1482 wire. The law allows for evictions due to major renovations and renovations had started up at Primrose.
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Even though the housing shortage leaves few options kudos to those who find better situations than a landlord who seems shady.
If the emergency ordinance retroactively nullifies eviction notices for Primrose, would that include no-cause evictions that occurred last year, the year before, so forth and so on?
Law goes retroactive to March 15 2019 as of Jan 1st 2020
It should have been, but they got around the law/ordinance by renovating.
If residents at Primrose Apartments were served eviction notices before the county passed the emergency ordinance, isn’t the ordinance too late to be of any help to them?
It would nullify the previous notice but now they’re creating a just cause to evict by not accepting rent. They are causing the just cause. It was a great thing that both the city and county did by putting in place emergency ordinances for the new law that takes effect January 1st, by enacting that law right now, but it still doesn’t help over 40 of us from being harassed on sometimes a daily basis. Bishop real estate knows all too well the condition this building is in, but could care less about all the great people who live at Primrose