Victory for Just Cause Oakland and Measure EE

Victory for Just Cause Oakland and Measure EE
By Lynda Carson 11/20/02

Oakland Ca-Updated figures from the November 5, election results gave a sigh of relief to Measure EE supporters. The latest count of absentee ballots released Friday November 15, confirm that Just Cause and their ballot initiative Measure EE still held the winning lead at the polls after 10 days of vote counting have passed.

In a tight election count, it has been an emotional rollercoaster ride of updated election figures. Landlords and renters alike anxiously awaited the daily election counts to be posted by the Alameda County Registrar of Voters. Now that the absentee ballots have all been counted, no one expects that the final count of the provisional ballots will shift any changes away from the existing Oakland Measure results.

Certification of the election results by the Registrar is required 29 days from the election, and the Oakland City Council is expected to follow up with their certification at the December 17 city council meeting around 7.p.m.. Oaklands new anti-eviction laws shall be in effect around 10 days after the City Council certifies the election results, and the City Attorney is expected to enforce the new laws.

Calls made to some of the notorious landlord kingpins in opposition to Measure EE have gone unanswered or been hungup on when asked for their comments about the election results.

Tenants and supporters of Just Cause Oakland have been excited by the results even if it has been a long haul to reach this moment, said tenant activist Sue Doyle. During the election evening much credit went right to where it was deserved as the applause roared through Just Cause Headquarters while the legendary names of Meika Johnson, Andrea Cousins, Ryan Hurley, Adam Gold, Mamie Chow Wang and many others were toasted with love and affection for their tireless efforts to bring Just Cause to a reality in Oakland, as Joel Tenya rallied the crowd to a fever pitch of excitement.

As the votes were first being counted during the election night, some of Oaklands finest showed up at Just Cause headquarters to offer support or carouse and dance the night away, while the "DJ" kept the musical tunes flowing along with the food and drinks. As the vote counts were displayed upon the wall for all to see, the expressions upon the face of the reveler’s changed and contorted along with the numbers as they swayed one way or another to the incessant chant of the "DJ’s" ministrations. Cries of joy switched to tears of despair or grief for some who were overcome by the emotional impact of such a close race. Others rode it out like the wind on a cool moonlit night, ignoring the numbers and enjoying the excitement of the moment leading up to the grand finale of post election signs being torn to shreds and tossed into the air while the music blasted into the night.

Indeed, the election evening results flip flopped back and forth while Just Cause Oakland headquarters was filled with supporters who tried to remain upbeat as the numbers kept shifting around. Measure EE leapt out of the gate ahead of the opposition, and after losing ground to the opposition later that evening, Measure EE pulled ahead one last time during the election evening to keep it’s lead for the next 10 days as the absentee ballots were being counted.

Stakeholders such as realtors, landlords, and tenants alike wondered if the vote counting of the absentee ballots would ever come to an end, while others were entirely oblivious to the vote counting going on by believing that Measure EE had already won back on Tuesday, November 5.

Meant to preserve the diversity of Oakland neighborhoods from the corrupting influence of gentrification and the eviction for profit system, school children and juveniles alike may now grow up to frolic in the morning fog of Oakland on their way to school, thanks to Measure EE. Free from the tyranny of Oaklands notorious landlords, the retired elderly citizens who helped build this town, may now bask in their golden years free from the fear of the dredded 30 Day No Cause eviction notice.

Just Cause or known by the voters as Measure EE restricts the landlords to 11 basic reasons to terminate a tenancy for eviction. The voters of Oakland agreed to some basic rules by passing Measure EE in opposition to the powers to be in Oakland who have fought against "just cause" for many years. Oakland voters agreed to the following conditions to restrict evictions to certain "just cause" circumstances for residential housing units or single family homes:

JUST CAUSE or MEASURE EE

1) failure to pay lawful rent; 2) substantial violation of material terms of rental agreement; 3) willfully causing substantial damage to premises; 4) disorderly conduct; 5) use of unit or common areas for drug or other illegal activity; 6) denying landlord access to unit; 7) landlord will use unit for his or her principal residence where landlord has previously occupied unit and has written rental agreement allowing recovery of unit. 8) landlord will use unit for principal residences or for spouse’s , domestic partner’s, child’s, parent’s or grandparent’s principal residence; 9) landlord withdraws unit from market pursuant to state law (Ellis Act, Government Code section 7060); 10) tenant refuses a rental agreement extension based on terms that are materially the same; 11) landlord must vacate unit for code compliance and repairs cannot be made while occupied.

The above text is written word for word, just as it was in the initiative measure submitted to and passed by the voters of Oakland during the year of 2002. During the year of 2000, over 20,000 signatures were collected in a failed attempt to bring a Just Cause Initiative to the voters, and on 2 occasions that same year former Rent Board Commissioner Andrew Wolff pushed a Just Cause Measure through the Rent Board to the Oakland City Council where it was shot down by corrupt council members who were in the pocket of the Rental Housing Association of Northern Alameda County.

This time, it took nearly 36,000 collected signatures to be able to bring these 11 reasonable conditions onto the ballot for a vote to offer a modicum of protections to Oakland renters from unfair evictions. It then took a hugh effort to get people to the polls for the vote of 44,860 for Measure EE, while the opposition garnered 43,449 votes against the measure. Tenant activist’s and supporters of Measure EE raised nearly $90,000 during the campaign while being outspent by the realtor/landlord lobbies who raised over $500,000 in opposition, for this very tight election result.

The race got down and dirty when the opposition to Measure EE spent a fortune to flood Oakland with mailers portraying the renters of Oakland as drug addicts, sex offenders, and beer swilling bikers who will never face eviction if the "just cause" initiative was passed into law. Some of these obscene mailers were taken very personaly by the renters and activists who worked on the campaign, including Measure EE supporter Councilwoman Nancy Nadel who found her picture on a mailer in opposition to Measure EE.

According to Holly Finck a long time supporter and organizer with Just Cause Oakland; the hardest part of the campaign was to watch the gobs of money from the opposition spending half a million dollars on hideous campaign mailings, tv commercials, and bill boards against Measure EE, said Finck. In contrast, Finck went on to say that Just Cause sent out 3 mailers in support of Measure EE targeting the absentee voters, apartments in the flatlands, and some of the areas where the hill people reside. Tumis a non-profit of East Oakland did the mailers, and we had a principled campaign supported by many unions and non-profits such as BOSS, ACCORN, and APEN, said Finck. The easiest part of the campaign to round up volunteers was due in part to the momentum of the first campaign which won the hearts and minds of the people, leaving the realtors and big landlords isolated in their opposition to Measure EE, said Finck.

Alaskan born attorney Hunter Pyle, who is a chair person for the field operations of Just Cause, believed that the hardest part of the campaign was to watch an unscrupulous adversary with money to burn flood the city of Oakland with negative mailings against the renters of Oakland and Measure EE. The mailers were nothing but a bunch of lies, said Pyle. Pyle credits Just Cause for not having any direct leaders with egos that may have misdirected the campaign for personal reasons, and believes the success was due to the many volunteers who were willing to take on different roles as needed while the campaign unfolded day to day. This was a huge step forward for Oakland tenants leading to long term goals for the betterment of the community, said Pyle.

The negative aspects of the campaign in opposition to Measure EE took a strange twist when recent news articles of the Montclarion reported on an inkind donation of $15,000 which flowed from the coffers of Measure DD to the opposition of Measure EE during the campaign. More sparks flew when a mailer sent out across Oakland supporting Measure DD opposed Measure EE at the same time. Oaklanders had to ask themselves why Councilman Danny Wan or Councilwoman Jane Brunner would feign support for Measure EE while participating at the same time in a campaign that donated such a large sum of money in opposition to Measure EE. Even more intriguing was the fact that, Councilwoman Brunner and her staffer Justin Horner had the nerve to appear at the Just Cause Headquarters during the November 5 election evening as the votes were being counted. Brunner and Wan were hugh backers/sponsors of Measure DD, and no one believed that Measure DD campaign manager Larry Tramutola was the one to decide to attack Measure EE without consent of his superiors. During 2001, while working for Mayor Jerry Brown, it was the same staffer Justin Horner who was exposed on the Just Cause Bulletin Boards using the made up name of Jim Smarler while urging renters to move rather than to fight evictions in Oakland.

Former Rent Board Commissioner Andrew Wolff moved to Oakland from Chicago around 1991 or 1992, and was also on the drafting committee of Just Cause to assist in writing the ordinance. With help from Anne Omura, Laura Lane, Debbie Rocher and Randy Shaw of San Francisco, a critical aspect of re-writing the ordinance in such a way as to create the least amount of resistance, was to remain moderate so as to gain it's passage by the voters, said Wolff.

Using the old ordinance as a first draft, they studied 4 or 5 cities with existing rent control and "just cause", then spent some time with Paul Wortal and Randy Shaw who helped as a review committee so that they could figure out what would or would not work in gaining voter support. This way they could do in one fell swoop what may have taken years to accomplish in other cities. In some ways it's less stringent than Berkeley, and taking out rent registration was the key to success, said Wolff.

COVERAGE BY JUST CAUSE or MEASURE EE AS WORDED

The measure applies to all residential units except: 1) hotels, motels and other places for transient occupancy; 2) hospitals,skilled nursing facilities, health facilities or asylums; 3) nonprofit facilities providing temporary structured living environment for homeless persons; 4) nonprofit facilities for substance abuse treatment; 5) units newly constructed and first offered for rent after the effective date of Oakland's rent arbitration law; 6) buildings containing 3 units or less if one of the units is owner-occupied; 7) units held in trust for developmentally disabled individuals; 8) property where the owner occupies and shares use of kitchen or bath with tenants.

OAKLAND MEETING TO EXPLAIN MEASURE EE

The Campaign for Renters Rights have reserved the Meeting Hall at Local SEIU 250 for an evening of guest speakers including Andrew Wolff to explain to the interested public regarding how Just Cause or Measure EE was envisioned to protect the renters of Oakland from unfair evictions, with a question and answer period afterwards.

When: December 9, 2002, from 7pm until 9pm.
Where: SEIU Local 250-Downtown Oakland at 560 20th Street.

For more info contact the Campaign for Renters Rights; 510/ 595-5545