CACM AND INDUSTRY STAKEHOLDERS WORK TO REVISE DAMAGING BILL

By Jennifer Wada, Esq.

The 2022 legislative session has adjourned until December. As always, there was no shortage of action in the CID space, but CACM and our industry partners were able to hold off the most egregious proposals this year.

At the front and center was Assembly Bill 1410 (Rodriguez), which ran the gamut with regards to overreaching proposals that would have handcuffed HOAs. As a quick reminder, this bill was first introduced in 2021 and contained a wide array of problematic provisions: prohibiting an HOA from restricting personal agriculture anywhere on an owner’s lot; prohibiting rental restrictions; prohibiting an HOA from enforcing any violations during a state of emergency, including imposing any monetary penalties; and prohibiting an HOA from sending courtesy notices for violations during a state of emergency, among other things. The list went on and on. We were able to stop this bill in 2021 but since California operates on a two-year legislative cycle, the bill was revived in 2022.

Slowly but surely, we kept at it and were able to chip away at the bill. After many discussions with the author and policy committees, we got the personal agriculture piece removed from the bill and clarified that rental restrictions are not prohibited as provided under current law. We were then able to negotiate that courtesy notices can be sent and HOAs are only prohibited from enforcing violations during a state of an emergency IF it was the declared emergency that made it unsafe or impossible for the homeowner to either prevent or fix the violation. These were improvements, but we still had concerns that kept us opposed to the bill.

One significant issue was AB 1410’s requirement that directors and employees take a course in ethics and harassment prevention. CACM was strongly against this, as HOAs already struggle to find candidates to run for the board. After discussions with CACM’s legislative committee and attempts to replace the course requirement with a mandatory code of conduct, it became apparent that any attempt to “fix” this provision was unworkable. In the end, CACM worked with all interested parties to get this provision completely eliminated.

AB 1410 is now on the Governor’s desk awaiting action. The good news is that in the event he does sign it, the bill now only does three things: 1) prohibits governing documents from prohibiting a member or resident of a CID from using social media or other online resources to discuss association issues (which governing documents could not anyway); 2) prohibits associations from preventing owners from having roommates in owner-occupied properties and clarifies that such roommates cannot violate any provision of the governing documents in the separate interest or common areas, including, but not limited to, parking restrictions and guest access to common facilities; and 3) prohibits associations from taking any enforcement actions against an owner during a declared emergency, except for those relating to a homeowner’s nonpayment of assessments, if the emergency made it unsafe or impossible to either prevent or fix the violation.

Most other bills we were watching were amended into other topics that posed no concern to the CID industry. It was a successful legislative session in terms of solid defensive plays. However, we should be ready to play offense in the coming legislative sessions given the emerging issues of aging CID infrastructure and the rising costs of insurance. CACM had numerous discussions with the Legislature and executive branch throughout the year on both topics. While there is general agreement as to the significance of the problems, there are widely varying views on how to fix them. We will be engaging in discussions over the fall to prepare for the 2023 session. But for now, let’s breathe a sigh of relief that we were able to kill a number of proposals that would have harmed associations throughout California. Some other bills of interest that were passed by the Legislature and await action by the Governor include:

AB 2097 (Friedman) - Prohibits public agencies from imposing minimum automobile parking requirements on specified residential, commercial, and other developments located within one-half mile of public transit.

AB 2011 (Wicks) - Enacts the “Affordable Housing and High Road Jobs Act of 2022” to create a ministerial, streamlined approval process for 100% affordable housing projects in commercial zones and for mixed-income housing projects along commercial corridors, as specified. The bill would also impose specified labor standards on those projects, including requirements that contractors pay prevailing wages, participate in apprenticeship programs, and make specified healthcare expenditures.

AB 2221 (Quirk-Silva) - Clarifies ambiguities in existing law to accelerate ADU development.

SCA 2 (Allen) - Places a repeal measure on the 2024 ballot that, if passed, would repeal Article 34 of the California Constitution that was passed in 1950. Article 34 requires development, construction, or acquisition of publicly funded low-rent housing projects to be approved by a majority of voters in a city or county. SCA 2 is intended to prevent wealthy neighborhoods from vetoing affordable housing.

SB 6 (Caballero) - Enacts, until January 1, 2033, the Middle Class Housing Act of 2022, which establishes housing as an allowable use on any parcel zoned for office or retail uses.

The Governor now has until September 30th to sign or veto all bills on his desk.

Jennifer Wada, Esq., is an attorney, CACM’s legislative advocate and principal of Wada Government Relations in Sacramento.