Last May, the landlord of Barrington Plaza, on Los Angeles’ pricy Westside, affixed notices to the doors of 577 apartments, initiating the largest mass eviction from rent control housing in the city in at least four decades.
Following tenant protest, City Councilmember Traci Park, who represents the district, sought guidance from the office of Los Angeles City Attorney Hydee Feldstein Soto over whether the city had grounds to intervene in the evictions. Feldstein Soto’s office argued that the evictions were legal, suggesting there was little the city could do to prevent them from taking place. But some experts, including the general counsel for the Santa Monica Rent Control Board, say the city of Los Angeles is failing to use the powers it has to challenge the evictions and ought to do so, given the scope of the impact on tenants and the city’s affordable housing stock.
The city could launch an investigation into whether the evictions violate state and local law; it could join an ongoing tenant lawsuit against the landlord, file its own civil action to halt the evictions, or even withhold building permits to ensure the landlord complies with renter protections, according to several lawyers familiar with California tenant law consulted by Capital & Main.
Leah Simon-Weisberg, who is the elected chair of the Berkeley Rent Board and a tenant attorney, is concerned about the precedent that the Barrington Plaza eviction sets. “Can you imagine if the city really doesn’t do anything about this, what is this going to mean? Is every big building just going to go empty?”
Former Councilman Mike Bonin, who represented the 11th Council District, where Barrington Plaza is located, before his retirement in 2022, called Feldstein Soto’s legal determination “bad advice” that threatens the city’s efforts to combat homelessness. “You literally cannot make progress in the fight against homelessness if you lose affordable housing,” he said in an interview last fall.
Los Angeles’ response to the eviction stands in contrast to those of two neighboring cities. Last fall, West Hollywood and Santa Monica, both with high concentrations of renters, passed resolutions supporting the Barrington Plaza Tenants Association lawsuit filed against Douglas Emmett Inc. for violating local renter protection laws.
Douglas Emmett Inc. has said the evictions are needed so that the $2.5 billion publicly traded company can make much-needed safety upgrades, including adding fire sprinklers to the buildings. There have been two fires at the complex within seven years. In 2020, a foreign exchange student died after one of the towers caught fire.
Fire safety experts have said that fire sprinklers can be installed at Barrington Plaza for a fraction of the cost cited by Douglas Emmett.
The company has said that the city mandated the $300 million fire safety upgrade, but city building officials told Capital & Main that the fire safety improvements are not, in fact, required. When asked to provide evidence of the requirement, Douglas Emmett declined to do so. Company spokesperson Eric Rose cited pending litigation with the company’s insurance companies as the reason.
In an email to Capital & Main, Rose said, “We stand by all previous comments.” He cited a news release that was part of a Securities and Exchange Commission filing last May, which said the work was required by the city but did not specify why that was the case.
Douglas Emmett has also said that the fire safety upgrade is expansive and requires the buildings to be empty. Fire safety experts said in interviews and in an internal city email obtained by Capital & Main that fire sprinklers can be installed in the complex for a fraction of the cost cited by Douglas Emmett. A fire safety expert also said that the work can be done without emptying the building.
In May, Douglas Emmett invoked the Ellis Act, a 1985 state law that is used by landlords covered by rent control who wish to remove their properties from the rental market. Once Barrington Plaza is removed from the rental market, its owner will be freed from some requirements for rent-controlled buildings. They include offering tenants temporary replacement housing or a per diem when planning a major renovation and allowing tenants to return when the renovation is complete.
Douglas Emmet’s invocation of the Ellis Act drew a lawsuit from tenants, which was filed in Los Angeles County Superior Court in June. At issue is whether the property will be permanently removed from the rental market. The tenants argue that this is what the 1985 state law requires. They claim the landlord intends to evict the tenants, renovate the building and, once the renovations are completed, re-rent the property in violation of the law.
In legal filings, Douglas Emmett disputes the tenants’ interpretation of the Ellis Act, and says the law merely prohibits them from “promptly” re-renting the property. The company argues that, considering the anticipated four-year renovation and uncertainty about Barrington Plaza’s future use, Douglas Emmett is in compliance with the law’s requirements.
“If you’re kicking out all of your tenants, you have to actually intend to get out of the residential rental market.”~ Alison Regan, general counsel, Santa Monica Rent Control Board
Councilmember Park’s office issued a statement saying that as soon as Douglas Emmett invoked the Ellis Act in May, she “took immediate action to safeguard the rights of tenants, including asking our City Attorney to explore all options to intervene in the eviction.” But Barrington Plaza tenants say she has not acted forcefully enough to oppose the evictions. In 2022, Douglas Emmett donated $566,000 to an independent expenditure campaign that supported Park. In the same election cycle, the company gave $200,000 to an independent expenditure committee targeting Feldstein Soto’s opponent, Faisal Gill.
In an emailed statement to Capital & Main, the City Attorney’s Office said it is “unable to discuss our legal strategy with anyone except our clients.” But in September, Elaine Zhong, a deputy Los Angeles city attorney, told members of the City Council’s Housing and Homelessness Committee, “The Ellis Act allows the owner to do these evictions.”
Alison Regan, general counsel for Santa Monica Rent Control Board, agrees with the tenants’ interpretation of the state law. “If you’re kicking out all of your tenants, you have to actually intend to get out of the residential rental market,” said Regan. “You can’t use it to take those rental units off the market temporarily, and then renovate them and then return them back to the rental market, which seems to be what’s happening here.”
Last May, the planning department quietly approved exterior remodeling plans for Barrington Plaza that include new balconies, glazed windows and a revamped pool area with cabanas. The proposed new name, Landmark Plaza, aligns Barrington Plaza with its upscale neighbor, the Landmark, a Douglas Emmett tower leasing one bedroom apartments for $5,750 per month, according to Apartments.com.
“They want to push everyone out and transform the building into a high-priced luxury building and jack up rent,” said Larry Gross, executive director of the Coalition for Economic Survival (CES), which is supporting the Barrington Plaza Tenants Association in its lawsuit.
Deepika Sharma, director of the Housing Law & Policy Clinic at the University of Southern California Gould School of Law, said that the city is well positioned to scrutinize the mass displacement because it houses the departments with oversight over the renovations and the evictions. “I believe the L.A. city attorney could file a case and, at a minimum, make an inquiry,” said Sharma. Such actions would be “in the city’s interest to preserve the remaining affordable housing that we have.”
The Ellis Act is sometimes invoked by landlords who wish to convert their properties to condominiums. So far, the city’s planning department has not received any requests to subdivide Barrington Plaza to make way for condo units, a process that can take from nine months to more than a year.
In an email to Capital & Main, Douglas Emmett spokesperson Eric Rose said once the units are taken off the rental market the company will “have options as to how those units will change, be rehabilitated through new life safety measures or become something different.”
The Ellis Act has resulted in the removal of over 29,714 rent-controlled units from the market in the city of Los Angeles since 2001.
Douglas Emmett hasn’t “told the city of Los Angeles that they’re actually getting out of the residential rental market, and all the evidence is to the contrary,” Regan said. “What the courts have said when they’ve interpreted the Ellis Act, is that you have to use this act in good faith.”
Most tenants left the complex in September, but tenants who are at least 62 years old or have a disability have until May 8 to depart. Barrington Plaza’s three towers include 712 apartments, including those that have remained empty since the 2020 fire.
The Ellis Act has resulted in the removal of over 29,714 rent-controlled units from the market in the city of Los Angeles since 2001, according to a collaborative research effort by CES and the Eviction Mapping Project. In its application to trigger the Ellis Act, Douglas Emmett checked a box indicating it was undecided as to the property’s future use. Regan said that the law should be amended so that landlords who invoke it must say what they intend to do with their properties.
Under the Ellis Act, if Barrington Plaza re-enters the rental market within two years, the company is obligated to pay damages to former tenants. Up until five years, the company must offer the units to the evicted tenants at the same rate that they were paying when they left their homes. Between five and 10 years, landlords are required to offer a right of return, but they can charge market rent. For some landlords, it might be worth the wait.
“If you wait five years and one day, then there are no consequences for you,” Regan said. She said that the Ellis Act creates incentives “for landlords to do this cost benefit analysis and see if it’s worth it to them to sort of be coy about what they plan to do with the property.” Still, the law is designed for landlords that intend to permanently exit the rental market, she added.
Mayor Karen Bass, who has made the construction and preservation of affordable housing a priority, told Spectrum News in a statement in June that the evictions would “worsen the housing crisis” and “make it more difficult for people to find housing that’s available and affordable to them.” Her office said in an email that the mayor’s office has and “will continue to receive legal advice from the City Attorney on the site.”
“It would be hard, I think, for her to have a legal position that’s different than the city attorney’s legal position,” said Jim Newton, a former Los Angeles Times columnist and a veteran observer of Los Angeles City Hall. “But there’s nothing that prevents her from having a public or political position that’s different.”
When asked whether the city was contemplating any legal actions against Douglas Emmett, Ivor Pine, Feldstein Soto’s deputy communications director, said in an email that the City Attorney’s Office “will advise the city’s decision makers if we become aware of any issues that involve violations of the Ellis Act or any other legal issues that fall within the City Attorney’s jurisdiction.”
Los Angeles Superior Court Judge James Chalfant denied the Barrington Plaza Tenants Association’s request for a preliminary injunction to block the evictions in August, writing in his opinion that the tenants would have to move out anyway to allow for the renovations. The case could be decided as early as mid-April, according to Frances Campbell of Campbell & Farahani, LLP, an Agoura Hills-based law firm that is representing the tenants.
Robert Lawrence, a tenant who faces a May 8 move-out date, said city leaders’ response to the eviction has been “completely disappointing and underwhelming in terms of what they’ve done for us.”
