What Happened at the November 20, 2018, MH Coalition Meeting?

This meeting was held at the Tigard office of Multifamily NW with. John DiLorenzo facilitating.

During information sharing, we learned the following as it relates to marina tenancies:

  1. The 2019 MH Coalition Bill will include 6 topics. Four of these six topics affect floating home owners in rental marinas. They are:
    • The Marina Issues Subcommittee work – see previous blog post for details
    • Dispute Resolution Issue
    • Terminations – changes to the eviction statute
    • Sub-metering: this affects only a small percentage of marinas and does not seem to be a major issues to our tenants at this time
  2. All 6 issues have were given to Legislative Counsel on November 12th (LC’s deadline for us) to begin drafting the actual bill language for us.
    • Our bill language will take the current form of where we were on each of these issues as of November 12th. Because there are still details for us to resolve with these issues, we will need to make out decisions and then do an amendment later.
    • In conclusion, the bill will initially look like these versions – November 12th. If we don’t reach agreement, on a particular issue or the whole package, then the bill won’t go forward as it is introduced, or at all, depending on the status of our agreements.
  3. Other work groups are working on legislation which may affect our laws if passed. We have nothing to do with these groups and have no control over the output of those groups. However, those groups appear to be led my senators and representatives who are trying to improve laws for tenants. Senator Propanski’s workgroup was created because of some issues that he is championing to protect tenants. His work is not guaranteed to make it to a bill, but his work (LC 1334 Draft 2) covers the following:
    • Changing screening for ALL tenants to prohibit Landlords from screening and rejecting tenants on the basis of any prior convictions due to weed use or possession.
    • Amending ORS 90.525 to make it very clear that a Landlord cannot steer a tenant towards using a particular service provider or realtor.
    • Requiring Landlords at the time of evaluation of the prospective tenant or the execution of a rental agreement, whichever is earlier, to provide the tenant with a copy of an informational handout regarding rights of tenants and landlords when a tenant is selling a floating home, in a form proscribed by the Housing and Community Services Department.
    • Allowing a tenant to rent out their floating home while it is for sale IF the landlords also has a floating home on the premises which is actively listed for sale AND being rented.
    • Reducing the time required for a Landlord to accept or reject an application from a prospective purchaser of a floating home from 7 days to 5 days
    • Increasing the penalties for violating certain statue laws (including Terminations by a Landlord) from $200 to $500, and from $500 to $1,000)
    • Extending the Statute of Limitations from 1 year to 2 years for certain violations.
  4. Post-Election:
    • Oregon Democrats now have a Super-Majority in the House which could have a positive outcome for tenant legislation.
    • 1 Senate seat flipped to Democrat which means we will likely see rent caps legislation back on the table again.
  5. We will see Rent Stabilization. We don’t know what form or when, but there is a housing crisis in Oregon right now and there is enough support that it will likely happen.

MH Coalition Issues Discussed:

  1. Marina Issues: Final decisions were made on the following:
    • The new resource will be called the “Manufactured and Floating Home Community Resource Center (MFHCRC)” – we now have representation!!!!!!!
      • This group provides services and information to residents and landlords of manufactured dwelling parks and floating home marinas to promote cooperative community relationships and positive alternatives to the court system. Our confidential, neutral and voluntary services provide assistance in resolving disputes by promoting open communication and a positive environment.
      • Check out the current MCRC website for more through understanding about what this group can help floating home tenant with. THIS IS HUGE!!!!
    • We cleared the $10 assessment procedure with the Assessors office which means we can now have access to this resource, dispute resolution services through the MFHCRC (formerly MCRC), AND our landlords will be required to take marina law landlords training!
      • The marina landlord annual assessments will be based the size of their marinas. We defined small marinas as 20 or less floating homes.
    • Marina Tenants and Landlords would still like to see a Capital Gains tax benefit for Marina Landlords selling their marina to Tenants. However, there are concerns about being able to obtain Ways and Means approval for this in time. Fighting for it at this late in the game could impair our ability to get our bill passed. We will try one more shot and see how difficult getting this would be.
  2. Sub metering was discussed.
    • There is a Submetering subcommittee working on finalizing the issues for us.
  3. Termination of Tenancy was summarized at the end of our meeting. We touched on the following parts of the draft:
    • Currently our draft doesn’t require a Landlord to let a tenant know when they have cured the cause of the termination. Could be problematic because if the Tenant thinks the cause is cured, but the Landlord doesn’t agree, then the Tenant could be “surprised” by an eviction hearing filed.
    • In 2010, this group updated the law to allow Landlords to charge fees for minor violation of the lease, rather than jump to terminations. Most Landlords at the time did not amend their leases to allow fees and therefore cannot charge fees. Those landlords feel they have only 1 tool to prevent minor violations and that is termination.
    • We will continue to address minor violations at the next meeting.
    • A marina landlord brought up “chain barking” as a concerning issue. This is when a dog barks for long periods of time. He would like to see this group address that.