BILL ANALYSIS Ó
AB 2310
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CONCURRENCE IN SENATE AMENDMENTS
AB 2310 (Ridley-Thomas and Dickinson)
As Amended August 18, 2014
2/3 vote. Urgency
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|ASSEMBLY: |70-1 |(April 24, |SENATE: |35-0 |(August 20, |
| | |2014) | | |2014) |
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Original Committee Reference: JUD.
SUMMARY : Re-establishes a pilot program, which sunset last
year, that conditionally allows city attorneys and prosecutors
in participating cities to bring eviction proceedings against
tenants for committing nuisance violations involving unlawful
weapons and ammunition. Specifically, this bill :
1)Re-establishes the Civil Code Section 3485 (Section 3485)
pilot program for weapons-related evictions that, until
sunsetting on December 31, 2013, provided pilot authority to
the city attorney or prosecutor in participating jurisdictions
to file an unlawful detainer action in the name of the people
against a tenant for the illegal possession or sale of
firearms or ammunition, as specified, on the residential
premises, or for using the premises to further that illegal
purpose.
2)Authorizes only the Cities of Los Angeles, Long Beach, and
Sacramento to participate in the pilot program.
3)Establishes a January 1, 2019, sunset date for the pilot
program.
4)Revises specified information and data required to be reported
annually to the California Research Bureau (CRB), and requires
the CRB to submit a brief report evaluating the merits of the
pilot program to the Senate and Assembly Judiciary Committees
by specified dates in 2016 and 2018.
5)Declares that this is an urgency statute to protect public
safety and makes findings that a special law is necessary to
limit application of the law only to specified jurisdictions.
The Senate amendments:
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1)Require a court hearing an unlawful detainer action pursuant
to the pilot program to enter a specified order depending on
whether grounds for an eviction or a partial eviction have
been established, and allows the court discretion to order
immediate eviction or stay the eviction if the tenant can
demonstrate hardship, as specified.
2)Provide that a property owner shall only be required to pay
the costs of investigation, discovery, and reasonable
attorney's fees upon acceptance of assignment and filing of
the unlawful detainer action by the city prosecutor or
attorney.
3)Increase the reporting requirements to include two additional
pieces of information regarding the tenant against whom an
action is filed.
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4)Allow a defendant to raise, as an affirmative defense, the
failure of the participating jurisdiction to make a good faith
effort to collect and timely report all information to the
California Research Bureau for the reporting period preceding
the unlawful detainer action.
5)Authorize the City of Oakland to participate in the pilot
program.
6)Declare that this bill does not create a reimbursable state
mandate.
FISCAL EFFECT : According to the Senate Appropriations
Committee, pursuant to Senate Rule 28.8, negligible state costs.
COMMENTS : This bill, sponsored by the Los Angeles City
Attorney's office, seeks to re-establish the Section 3485 pilot
program that, until it sunset last year, authorized city
attorneys in participating jurisdictions to bring eviction
proceedings against tenants for committing nuisance violations
involving unlawful weapons and ammunition. Authority for the
pilot program was extended an additional four years by AB 530
(Krekorian), Chapter 244, Statutes of 2009, but that authority
sunset on December 31, 2013, pursuant to AB 530 when no statute
was subsequently enacted to continue the program. According to
proponents, that was an unfortunate legislative oversight, and
this urgency bill is needed to restore the Section 3485 program
to ensure public safety, as well as uninterrupted study and
evaluation of the program.
According to the author, the pilot authority provided to city
attorneys and prosecutors under the Section 3485 program is an
important tool that can be used to reduce gun violence and
protect public safety. The author states, "At times, the
property owner is afraid to evict the tenant because of threats,
gang affiliation or other intimidating conduct. Section 3485
authorized city attorneys to bring an unlawful detainer in such
a circumstance. Allowing the city attorney to bring the action
shields fearful or vulnerable owners from retaliatory threats or
violent reprisals by armed tenants. Eviction of the tenant
committing a weapon or ammunition related violation also
increases public safety and the sense of community among
law-abiding tenants."
The Section 3485 pilot program authorizes city attorneys and
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prosecutors in participating jurisdictions, rather than the
landlord or property owner, to initiate eviction proceedings
against tenants for committing nuisance violations involving
unlawful weapons and ammunition. This special statutory
authority is unusual because traditionally only the landlord has
authority to file an unlawful detainer against a tenant for
recovery of possession of the property.
Under the pilot programs, a city attorney or city prosecutor may
file an unlawful detainer action against any person for creating
a nuisance on the property by using or allowing the premises to
be used for the illegal possession or sale of specified weapons
or ammunition. The city's action would be predicated on its
belief that a specified weapons-related offense has occurred on
the subject real property based upon an arrest report or other
law enforcement report.
In any unlawful detainer action brought by the city prosecutor
or city attorney under the pilot programs, the public prosecutor
must first give 30 calendar days of written notice documenting
the alleged nuisance or illegal activity to the landlord and the
offending tenant. This notice is designed to give the landlord
the first opportunity to file an unlawful detainer action
against the offending tenant. The landlord may then either file
the action or assign the right to bring the unlawful detainer
action to the public prosecutor. If the landlord fails to file
an action, or fails to prosecute such an action diligently and
in good faith, the city attorney or city prosecutor may file the
action and may join both the landlord and the offending tenant
as co-defendants.
As recently amended, the bill requires a court hearing an
unlawful detainer action under the pilot program to enter a
specified order depending on whether grounds for an eviction or
a partial eviction have been established. Specifically, the
court has discretion to: 1) dismiss the action; 2) order
immediate eviction or partial eviction; or 3) stay the execution
of an eviction order for a reasonable time if the tenant can
show, by clear and convincing evidence, that immediate eviction
would pose extreme hardship that outweighs the benefit to the
community.
Under this bill, only the Cities of Los Angeles, Long Beach,
Sacramento, and Oakland are authorized to participate in the
pilot program. Participation in the program also requires the
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city attorney to report specified information to the CRB about
city attorney involvement, property owner response, court
processing, and tenant reaction. The law requires CRB, in turn,
to evaluate and report the merits of the program to the
Legislature. As recently amended, the bill would allow a
defendant to raise, as an affirmative defense to unlawful
detainer, the failure of the participating jurisdiction to make
a good faith effort to collect and timely report all information
to the California Research Bureau for the reporting period
preceding the action.
To allow for better study and evaluation of the program, the
author has adopted several recommendations from the CRB to
revise the data items currently required to be reported.
According to the CRB, these revisions are intended to facilitate
information reported at the individual case level (i.e., for
each instance a notice is provided to the tenant) rather than at
an aggregate level, and to also make reporting less burdensome
by requiring data to be uniformly reported in a template
designed by CRB.
The bill contains a sunset date of January 1, 2019, for all
participating jurisdictions, which allows the CRB four more
years to collect data and examine still unresolved research
questions about the program's effectiveness and implementation.
Analysis Prepared by : Anthony Lew / JUD. / (916) 319-2334
FN: 0005098