Adopt an ordinance entitled "An Ordinance of the Yolo County Board of Supervisors Amending the COVID-19 Eviction Moratorium Urgency Ordinance Adopted on April 21, 2020." (No general fund impact) (Pogledich)

Adopt an ordinance entitled "An Ordinance of the Yolo County Board of Supervisors Amending the COVID-19 Eviction Moratorium Urgency Ordinance Adopted on April 21, 2020."

	Thriving Residents
	Safe Communities

The attached ordinance was introduced for consideration on July 27, 2021. The Board deliberated the ordinance and an alternative version, eventually directing staff to return with the attached version for approval (3-2, Provenza and Sandy voting no and expressing differing views on County regulation of "no fault" evictions). The ordinance modifies the existing moratorium ordinance as follows.

First, as explained on July 27, the attached ordinance includes edits necessary to reflect recent changes in state law and the expiration of executive order protections for commercial tenancies.  These changes consist of:

• Modifying the repayment timeframes for residential tenancies. The ordinance currently allows a protected tenant to make no payments on rental debt until termination of the local state of emergency, and it affords another 180 days thereafter to complete all payments.  State law now preempts local ordinances by requiring repayment to begin (as mentioned above) by May 1, 2022 and be completed within 180 days.
• Recognizing that protections for commercial tenancies have ended, consistent with the expiration of Executive Order 03-21 on June 30, 2021 (which provided authority for such local protections).

The attached ordinance also includes minor clarifying edits, along with a revision that excludes campgrounds and recreational vehicle parks from the definition of “residential real property.”

Second, also as discussed during the July 27 Board meeting, the attached ordinance modifies the "no fault" eviction protections of the existing moratorium ordinance.  While allowing no-fault evictions (which the moratorium ordinance prohibited), it imposes additional requirements that apply to some such evictions.  Specifically, it requires the landlord to move in within 30 days after the tenant vacates and to thereafter occupy the residence for one year or offer the unit back to the tenant with moving expense reimbursement.  The ordinance also limits other no fault evictions undertaken to withdraw a unit from the rental market, limiting evictions to situations where an owner is in contract to sell the unit to a buyer intending to occupy it as their primary residence.  All no-fault evictions must be undertaken in good faith and, to bolster this requirement, the alternative ordinance requires the landlord to “allege and prove compliance” in any unlawful detainer action.  The ordinance does not propose relocation assistance.

Legal Services of Northern California was consulted in the intial stages of developing the ordinance.