Upland Mayor Bill Velto and all four of his council colleagues this week found themselves in Dutch with some 2,223 of their constituents who just learned the rental/leasing rate on their abodes are about to escalate dramatically.
The residents of the City of Gracious Living’s six mobile home parks are now seeing or are about to experience a hefty rise in the amount of money they are being charged to rent space on a per month basis. For some of those, the jump in the amount they must fork over to their landlords to keep a roof over their heads could be as much as 25 percent.
On the order of 2,81 percent of the city’s 79,040 residents will be affected by the erasure of mobile home rent control Their personal bout with inflation is to come about as a consequence of action taken very quietly by the city council ten months ago.
Indeed, many of those now animated against City Hall see the manner in which the mayor and council acted as being almost as offensive as what they did.
Members of the council have not denied that what they did was self-consciously sneaky nor that some arrangement was made with the landowners who stood to profit by the council’s action to impose a temporal gap between the council’s action dropping the restrictions on rental rates and the imposing of the lease increases to delay the outpouring of the now accumulating sense of outrage.
In June 2025, hidden in a single legislative bundle, was a complete and radical undoing of a protection measure put in place for the benefit of a group or what might reasonably be considered a class of city residents collectively described as among the city’s most economically vulnerable.
According to city documents, the city’s Mobilehome Rent Review ordinance was formulated and put in place no later than at some point in the municipal Fiscal Year 1998/1999, and perhaps existed in a somewhat different form previous to that. In the city’s 2003/2004 annual report, the City of Upland declared it had “maintained rent stability for the [city’s] 860 mobile home occupants” and that it in response to inquiries pertaining to the “Mobile Home Rent Control Ordinance,” the redevelopment agency had initiated the process of amending the city’s then-current mobile home rent stabilization ordinances as part of a five-year review of the city so-call “Consolidated Plan.”
The Mobilehome Rent Review, referred to by its acronym MRR, was also known as the Rent Stabilization Ordinance, or the acronym RSO. Under the Upland Rental Stabilization Ordinance, which was part of the Upland Municipal Code, the maximum increases in the lease for space in the city’s mobile home parts was 3 percent per year.
Typically, mobile home residents purchase their mobile home and then most either purchase land upon which it sits or rent/lease space in a mobile home park.
The smallest standard, modern manufactured mobile homes start at around 450 feet, aligning with the definition of a “tiny house,” though single-wide homes generally provide 700 square feet of living space. Some single-wide mobile homes range to being as roomy as 1,300 square feet and double-wides can offer 1,300 square feet to 2,500 square feet of dwelling space. Often, but not universally, mobile homes are occupied by older, in many cases retired, individuals or couples who are no longer raising families and therefore live alone. Those retired are generally on fixed incomes, so the decision to purchase and live in a mobile home is one that is economically driven. Thus, for mobile home purchasers, a rent stabilization ordinance being in place in a city, such as was the case in Upland, becomes a deciding factor as to whether to purchase a mobile home and where to locate it. Despite mobile homes being technically movable, relocation can be very complicated and prohibitively expensive.
Last year, more than a quarter of a century, without any explanation of the rationale for doing so and without any replacement of or substitution of an amended or altered version, the city council precipitously repealed Upland’s rent stabilization ordinance. In taking that action, it did so by obscuring it near the bottom of a nine-pronged “omnibus ordinance” that drew little attention to, and indeed seemed designed to draw little attention to, its contents. This hindered the ability of the public to be aware of or to participate in the vetting, discussion or approval process for the ordinance or its contents. The ordinance was then passed without any public comment on what would have very likely been a controversial repeal of an existing ordinance.
Thereafter, the city stood by while the impacted individuals remained in the dark. Ultimately, those individuals – the mobile home residents – were notified by their landlords rather than the city. The landlords presented news of the change as a fait accompli, with which those residents had no opportunity to quibble, quarrel, impact or change.
The public record shows that the agenda for the May 27, 2025 Upland City Council meeting listed as item number 13 a “business item” consisting of the “consideration of an omnibus ordinance amending various sections of the Upland Municipal Code.” Upland City Council meetings are normally held on the second and fourth Monday night of the month. In this case, the meeting was held on Tuesday evening, because of that week’s conflict with the three-day Memorial Day Weekend.
Nowhere in the agenda for the May 27, 2025 meeting is there a description of what those “various sections” of the city code consist of. Nevertheless, technically and legalistically, the city was in compliance with the requirement contained in the Ralph M. Brown Act that it make public disclosure of the action ahead of the vote. The Brown Act, California’s open public meeting law, requires that an agenda providing a bare-bones description of what is to be discussed and/or voted upon by a local legislative body be posted at least 72 hours in advance.
At the May 27, 2025 meeting, the discussion with regard to the omnibus ordinance was extremely abbreviated. Though the item was up for discussion during what was considered to be a public hearing, no members of the public offered a comment on the proposed changes. The council considered the item on the basis of the ordinance’s title only and waived the necessity of have to read the full contents of the ordinance, which further obscured what was occurring, noting only that Ordinance No. 1997 “amending various sections of the Upland Municipal Code as specified” and was being given the first of two approvals by the council, pursuant to a vote. On a motion by Councilman James Breitling that was seconded by Councilman Rudy Zuniga, the item was passed unanimously.
It was then scheduled for a second reading, i.e., consideration and vote, at the city council’s June 9, 2025 meeting. Ordinances under California general law must be voted upon and passed twice and then be subject to a 30 day delay before going into effect. In this way, it was the vote to take place at the June 9 meeting that will provide the final determination as to whether the omnibus ordinance would go into effect.
The City of Upland in this case, through the personage of clerk Kerri Johnson, had arranged, at a cost of $522.87, that the largest circulation daily newspaper in Upland, the Inland Valley Daily Bulletin, to publish on June 3, 2025 a legal notice of the pending finalization of the adoption of the ordinance, containing a summary of the omnibus ordinance.
With the all-capital-letter caption of Notice Of Proposed Adoption of Ordinance No. 1997, the legal advertisement stated, Please Take Notice that on June 9, 2025 at 6:00 p.m. in the Council Chambers, Upland City Hall, 460 North Euclid Avenue, Upland, California, the City Council of the City of Upland shall consider the adoption of Ordinance No. 1997, entitled “An Ordinance of the City Council of the City of Upland amending various sections of the Upland Municipal Code as specified.” The aforementioned ordinance was introduced for first reading on May 27, 2025 by the City Council.
A summary of the omnibus ordinance followed, stating the city council’s anticipated action would “amend and update various sections of the Upland Municipal Code as part of the City of Upland’s annual review” of its codes.
“First,” the summary stated, “the ordinance would amend Section 2.12.010 to remove the requirement tht the city manager’s appointment of the director of finance must be approved by the city council. Second, the ordinance would update Section 2.14.020(C) to permit the city clerk’s designee to issue confirmation of receipt of campaign disclosure statements required by the Political Reform Act. Third, the ordinance would amend Section 2.48.090 to provide that notices inviting bids under the city’s formal bid procedure shall be posted on the city’s website instead of in a newspaper of general circulation, and to remove the requirement that the city solicit bids from a bidder’s list. Fourth, the ordinance would update Section 2.56.060(C) to increase the city’s gift limit under its conflict of interest regulations from $420.00 to $630.00. Fifth, the ordinance would amend multiple sections of Chapter 3.32, “Claims Against City.” The ordinance would replace Sections 3.32.020, 3.32.030 and 3.32.040 regarding facsimile signatures of warrants, payroll checks, and submitting certified manual signatures. Additionally, the ordinance would replace Section 3.32.050, regarding operation of the city’s check signing machine, in its entirety. Sixth, the Ordinance would remove Section 12.12.050(G) (2), defining eligibility criteria for discounted water charges under the city’s water service regulations.”
Of note, is that the summary was generally more forthcoming with respect to the nature of the other elements of the city code being altered than with respect to the mobile home rent increase limitations, which was made in the most cursory and indirect manner.
At the June 9 meeting, the discussion of and vote on the omnibus ordinance was not allotted a separate public hearing but rather placed on the meeting’s consent calendar along with 16 other items. The consent calendar is normally reserved for items that are considered routine and noncontroversial, and which are grouped together to be collectively voted upon with a single vote. On a motion by Councilman Breitling seconded by Councilman Zuniga, the consent calendar was unanimously approved by the mayor and council.
Subsequent to the June 9 meeting, on June 16, at cost to the city of $537.14, the Inland Valley Daily Bulletin ran a notice of the adoption of Ordinance No. 1997, which again contained a summary of the ordinance’s contents, essentially identical to that contained in the previously published notice.
The appearances of the May 27 and June 9 agendas, the action at the meetings and the legal notices garnered no citizen/resident attention.
The matter remained pretty much unremarked until quite recently when the landlords at three of the city’s five mobile home parks informed their tenants they are going to increase their lease payments by 5 percent. There have been reports that the other two mobile home parks are on the verge of or have already given indication they will seek lease increases of 10 percent this year. In reaction to some immediate protests to the 5 percent increase, one representative of a corporation that owns one of the city’s mobile home parks said tenants should gird themselves for a 10 percent increase next year.
While they remained silent over the last ten months for strategic reasons meant as a favor or benefit to the mayor and four members of the city council, ownership/management of the mobile home parks hailed the eradication of the Mobilehome Rent Review/Mobile Home Rent Control Ordinance as a positive development that was long past due. They point out that the expense of owning, operating and maintaining a mobile home park is not insubstantial and that there are risks involved that can render the parks unprofitable and/or marginally profitable. Ownership must deal with empty spaces in the parks that can be difficult to fill and payment delinquencies are a common experience which will ultimately entail evictions, which can prove expensive. Another issue is the rehabilitation of mobile homes on their premises abandoned by former tenants, the ownership of which has reverted or fallen to them. Dilapidated homes represent potential liability to landlords, they say. A factor to be considered is the relative frequency or ratio between what mobile home owners consider to be “good” tenants and “bad tenants.
In addition, the landlords and their advocates say, the value of real estate has escalated so precipitously in recent years and the regulations with regard to density on residential projects has been so relaxed that those who own mobile home parks stand to make a tremendous profit by simply shuttering their mobile home parks and either developing the property as single-family or multifamily homes or selling the property to a development company with that intent. This justifies, they say, raising leasing or rental rates on mobile home space beyond the 3 percent increase per year.
None of that, those living in the city’s mobile homes say, makes the manner in which the city council blindsided okay. The fashion in which the city council acted in May and June of 2025 lacked transparency, the maintain, and was a betrayal of the mobile home residents who had counted upon city officials to not only be open about how they function but to provide everyone an opportunity to weigh in on city policy before it is formulated, altered or disregarded.
At this point, it is not known how many mobile home owners will elect to move to another location or sell their coaches, quite possibly at a loss, to the mobile home park owners. That represents not just a single boon or double boon to the landlords. When a mobile home sells, the mobile home park ownership/management can stipulate a new rent price altogether, beyond the maximum of 3 percent yearly increase that was formerly in place if no sale took place and the owner remained when the Mobilehome Rent Review/Mobile Home Rent Control Ordinance was intact, beyond the 5 percent increase at least three-fifths of mobile home owners in Upland are experiencing this year and beyond the 10 percent increase it is anticipated the mobile home park owners are looking to impose next year.
The daughter of a couple living in a mobile home in one of Upland’s mobile home parks told the Sentinel, “The residents at my parents’ senior mobile home park in Upland were caught off guard this week by a letter from their landlord, letting them know the city got rid of the rent stabilization ordinance and that their rent would be increasing. Upon investigation, the city council included this repeal as part of an omnibus ordinance and listed it at the end after a multitude of other, unrelated codes. The city’s posted agendas had many ordinances with meaningful names that resulted in public discourse according to meeting minutes, but made no mention of the rent stabilization ordinance until around page 273 of supporting documents. The city, including the representatives of those constituents who would be impacted, made no effort to let them know so they could participate in public discourse.”
She suggested the city council and other Upland officials had deliberately obscured the substance of the omnibus ordinance relating to the rent stabilization ordinance to prevent any effective resistance to what the city council did for the mobile home park owners.
“My gut tells me they waited a long enough time to avoid any chance of amendments or referenda in response,” she said. “It is an obviously sneaky and underhanded way to exploit the least advantaged people in the community. Mobile home parks are disproportionately home to elderly and disabled, most of whom are on fixed incomes. Their tricky methods are now resulting in increased monthly costs for people who already struggle. It also lowers the value of their home when the associated land lease is higher. So, my parents and many like them have lost equity in their investment as a result of this.”