Mobile home park conversion on council agenda
The Newport Beach City Council meeting Tuesday may represent the last round in a fight between mobile home park residents and a company looking to develop the land.
The council is expected to discuss the validity of a report detailing the effects of relocation on Ebb Tide Mobile Home Park residents, who are being asked to leave to make room for a proposed single-family housing development.
Ebb Tide residents were told in July 2014 that they could be forced to move from their 73-space mobile home park on Placentia Avenue, about a mile from the ocean, as early as May.
Ebb Tide LLC plans to build single-family homes ranging from about 1,600 to 2,100 square feet, according to city documents.
The state-mandated impact report, which details the protections afforded to mobile home owners, including options for relocation in the area, must be approved by the City Council before tenants can be required to leave, according to the report.
Paragon Partners, an independent consultant hired to review the document, found it acceptable and recommended that it go before the council for final approval.
“The draft [report] was found to be very well written, in plain and understandable language,” Paragon Partners’ report stated. “It was thorough and exhaustive in addressing the current occupants’ circumstances, the payment options, relocation possibilities and replacement housing resources.”
Ebb Tide LLC has proposed paying residents $9,000 to $15,700 to relocate their homes, depending on the size, according to the impact report.
June Maier, who has lived in the park for about four years, said she hopes the council will consider sending the report back for further inspection. Maier wants a complete appraisal of the homes in the park, so that the residents who wish to sell may receive fair market value from Ebb Tide LLC.
“We want to be fairly compensated,” she said. “No one can buy another mobile home anywhere near here for what they’re offering us.”
She and about nine other residents also plan to request that the council mandate that Ebb Tide LLC provide payment for their homes before the moving date. This, she said, would allow residents to put down payments on other homes.
“These are people without savings,” she said. “How are they going to make a down payment on a place to live if they don’t have any money ahead of time.”
The meeting will begin at 7 p.m. in council chambers, 100 Civic Center Drive.
Dock fees up for discussion
In other business, city staff will present ways in which the council could adjust fee levels for various harbor uses, including residential docks, commercial marinas and moorings, during a 4 p.m. study session before the main meeting.
In 2012, the council voted to raise fees for pier owners on state-owned, city-administered tidelands from a flat $100 annually to 52.5 cents per square foot of usable dock space.
The vote proved controversial, though council members at the time defended the decision, saying increases were necessary to comply with state rules requiring that the city charge fair-market rents for the use of state-owned waters.
The money, council members said, would only be used on harbor infrastructure improvements.
Newly seated council members Scott Peotter, Marshall “Duffy” Duffield, Kevin Muldoon and Mayor Pro Tem Diane Dixon, collectively known as “Team Newport,” criticized the council’s decision during the previous campaign season.