WeHo Can't Agree On What To Do About All Its Old Apartments

Here's one thing West Hollywood City Councilmembers agree on: city funds should not be used to update the city's aging and privately-owned apartment buildings. But a solution? Not so much--they didn't even agree that no one suggested the city should pay for the upgrades in the first place. The discussion came in response to a report that they commissioned last year, which found that 89 percent of the city's 24,000 rental units were built before 1980, and nearly half before 1960 (which puts the current apartmentification boom into a little perspective). Councilmember John D'Amico estimates that there are 1,600 of those units are in dire need of repair, reports WEHOville. Landlords, meanwhile, blame the lack of repairs on rent control laws--all units built before 1980 are subject to rent control and cannot be returned to market rates until they've been vacated (60 percent of units have been since 1994). Amid the impasse, city staff were told to come back with a funding proposal in six months.
· WeHo Council Grapples With How to Address Aging Housing [WEHOville]