Mobile-home protection asked

The county Planning Commission is recommending a moratorium on the conversion of mobile-home parks to other uses after more than 120 residents asked commissioners to keep them from being forced from their homes.

The moratorium, which is limited to two years by state law, would include exceptions for health and safety and proof of financial hardship.

The commission on Thursday directed the planning staff to suggest other ways to protect residents, and also encourage creation of more mobile-home parks in San Luis Obispo County. One of the many options the staff will explore is creation of a separate zone for mobile-home parks.

In taking their action, commissioners responded to speakers representing the estimated 6,000 people who live in the county's 39 mobile-home parks. With some using walkers or canes, they filled the chambers and lined the walls Thursday, in one of the greatest outpourings of citizen involvement at the Government Center since it was built last year.

Another hearing on the same subject in August also drew scores of people. Between them, the two hearings took more than six hours.

Only the ranchers and conservationists who came in June to debate a viewshed ordinance raised an equally large crowd.

No place to go

A handful of representatives of mobile-home park owners opposed the moratorium, asking for a task force to study the question or to consider the closures on a case-by-case basis. But the residents overwhelmed them.

Residents seeking the ban on conversions said again and again that because so many are poor, elderly or disabled, they would have no place else to go if their park closes.

In addition, young families and working people are moving into the parks, they said: waitresses, janitors and teachers, for example.

"Mobile" is a misnomer, many pointed out; these are manufactured homes that can't be moved. Even if they could, there would be no place in the county to go.

Hugh Gilson, a Mesa Dunes mobile-home resident and homeowners association board member, said mobile-home parks are one of the last bastions of affordable housing in a county where even the middle class is hard pressed to buy a home.

Many of those who spoke are retired, with their children grown. They made clear that more was at stake for them than the inconvenience of changing residences.

"Look at the gray hair in here," said Larry Boales of the California Mobile Home Residents and Action Association. "Our neighbors have become our family. When you destroy a park, you destroy a neighborhood."

No mobile-home parks are scheduled to close, according to planning staffers, although owners of two have made inquiries. A third is moving toward resident ownership.

Residents forced out

Under mobile-home park conversion, owners of the park sell the land, often for development, forcing residents, who own their mobile homes but not the land those homes sit on, to find other places to live. It is a nationwide trend, according to Planning Commissioner Sarah Christie, who called it a "predatory industry."

Others said Thursday that each mobile-home park owner is different, and many care about their tenants.

"There's every sort of situation with mobile-home parks," said Commissioner Bruce Gibson. He said some are owned by out-of-the-area corporations and others are local "mom and pop" operations whose owners know and care about the tenants.

The dilemma that has faced county planners is how to protect residents without interfering with the property rights of those who own the land, Gibson said.

"It's going to be a challenge," he said. "We have a lot of work to do."

The recommendations will be reviewed in a few weeks by the Planning Commission, then go to the Board of Supervisors, which has the final say.