San Rafael rent control case could impact thousands

SAN RAFAEL, Calif. (KGO) -- Residents of a San Rafael mobile home park won a major victory Monday in a case that could affect hundreds of thousands of California mobile home residents. The multi-million dollar legal battle pits a company controlled by one of the richest men in America against the city of San Rafael and the Contempo Marin mobile home park.

At first glance, you might think life at Contempo Marin looks idyllic. But former resident Jacqui Garcia says that's an illusion. "I get very angry about what's happened to so many people that have had to walk away," she said.

Garcia lived at Contempo Marin for 30 years, in a home protected by rent control.

Former San Rafael City Councilman Greg Brockbank says mobile home parks are "one of our best examples of affordable housing." "It gives us the diversity we need to have a healthy community," he said. "It provides us with people that work in the community, that retire in the community."

But things at Contempo Marin changed 13 years ago when the park owner Equity LifeStyle Properties (ELS) sued to end rent control. Contempo Marin is like most mobile home communities; residents own their houses but rent the land under them. Despite their name, the homes are actually not very mobile.

About 100 California cities and counties have rent control laws to protect to the homeowners. The San Rafael case could affect them all.

Attorney Michael Von Loewenfeldt is representing the city of San Rafael. "Because (mobile home owners) don't own the land under their homes, they are really subject to abuses or potential abuses by the landowner," he said.

In 2008, ELS tried to raise rents from $700-$800 a month to almost $2,000 a month. A judge stopped that, but the legal battle is still going and it's taken an emotional toll on many residents.

ELS is the biggest mobile home park owner in the country. The chairman of the board is Sam Zell, estimated by Forbes to be worth $4 billion. Last month residents of ELS communities in seven states showed up outside a shareholder meeting in Chicago to accuse the company of excessive rent increases.

"Seniors are actually walking into the manager's office and turning in the key to their house and walking away, losing everything," Carla Burr, a mobile home resident from Virginia, said.

Residents at Contempo Marin say that's happening at their park too. They are caught in legal limbo. Five years ago, a federal judge ruled San Rafael's rent control law was unconstitutional. Then, last April the appeals court reversed that decision.

But the president of the homeowners association, Keith Meloney, says it's too soon to celebrate. He told residents, "While there is a time for our victory dance, it is not yet today."

ELS is fighting the court ruling. For now, if any one moves out of their home, rent control on that space goes away and ELS can raise the rent as high as it wants. That's already happened on more than 60 of about 400 spaces at the park.

In court papers filed last week, residents claim ELS is trying to drive them out.

Gordon Atkinson is the attorney for Contempo Marin residents. He feels so strongly about the case he is doing it for free. Atkinson says the court documents include statements from residents who say they are being harassed. "They say that the park owner is not taking care of the park, that conditions are deteriorating, that they are selectively enforcing rules against some homeowners, but not other homeowners," he said.

Residents who want to sell are struggling. Their houses have lost almost all their value because of the uncertainty over future rent. Andrew Perrins has family and health issues and needs to move. Perrins says he bought his house for $160,000. "Just a few years later, due to the legal actions of the owners of the landowner, my house is now worth less than $5,000," he said.

Jacqui Garcia was so desperate to get out, she's selling her home for just $300. "There was no peace of mind anymore," she said. "You lived in constant fear, what are you going to get hit with next?"

In court documents, ELS calls the residents claims of harassment "erroneous assertions."

No one from Equity LifeStyle Properties would not talk on camera. Instead, they sent the following statement:

We filed a petition for rehearing with the full 9th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals because we believe that the 3-judge panel's opinion was in conflict with U.S. Supreme Court rulings. As discussed in our petition, the trial court found after a full trial that the City's rent control ordinance does not make housing more affordable, a conclusion the 3-judge panel did not dispute. Instead, the ordinance forces new residents to pay more upfront to get into the community than they would have to pay without the ordinance. Our customers are overwhelmingly satisfied with the quality and pricing of the communities and lifestyle we provide. We invest large amounts of money in maintaining and upgrading our communities every year. Last year alone, we invested tens of millions of dollars in property upgrades.

Monday, the federal appeals court refused to re-hear the case -- a major victory for the mobile home owners. However, Equity Lifestyle Properties has 90 days to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.

There are an estimated 350,000 mobile homes in communities throughout California.

Written and produced by Jennifer Olney

(Copyright ©2013 KGO-TV/DT.

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Court cuts could burden Contra Costa County's poorest

RICHMOND, Calif. (KGO) -- Contra Costa County courts are gearing up for a round of drastic painful cuts. ABC7 News has learned that those who will suffer the most are those who can least afford it.

Contra Costa County Superior Court announced last month it will close six courtrooms. They have to do that because they have lost millions of dollars in recent years in state funding due to California's budget crisis. The court shutdowns are mostly in the east and west of the county and that is where Contra Costa's minorities and the poorest of its residents live.

In Richmond, the juvenile law courtroom will close. Its cases will be moved all the way to the main courthouse in Martinez which is in central part of the county. The same thing will happen in Pittsburg, when its juvenile and family courtrooms go dark.

Lawyer Rhonda Wilson-Rice heads the juvenile law section of the county bar association. She said, "These are folks that tend to have the least amount of income, least access to public transportation and just the least amount of resources than anyone else in the county. And yet, they're being made to take the brunt of these budget cuts."

Lawyer Darren Kessler's office is in Richmond. He believes the cuts violate the law.

"When the changes to the court are done in a manner where people are fundamentally deprived of their ability to have justice in that court, it is taking away their Constitutional right to access," said Kessler.

Shawn Hamilton is an unemployed college student who has a child custody case in Richmond's juvenile court. Like many residents affected by the court cuts, he has no car. Hamilton now lives in Oakland which is a fairly quick 30 minute trip by BART. But when the court closes, Hamilton will have to take BART from Oakland to Del Norte, then a WestCAT bus to Martinez -- a trip that would cost more and could take an hour and a half or two.

"So if I have a 9 o'clock court appointment, then that means I have to leave at 7 or 6:30, or at least get up around 6-6:30," said Shawn Hamilton, a college student.

"Many people walk to court or have to take local transportation, public transportation which is relatively easy in the general area, but to go to Martinez, it is fundamentally impossible for many," said Kessler.

Even police are worried about the court closures and whether the much longer trip to Martinez will affect cases involving troubled teens.

"There might be more missed court dates whereas if the court was still here, they may be more inclined to go to their court dates," said Richmond Police Lt. Bisa French.

The court closures go into effect at the end of the year, except for the family courtroom in Pittsburg, which is scheduled to close its doors at the end of the month. Court officials in Martinez never responded to our request for an interview.

(Copyright ©2012 KGO-TV/DT.

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Mobile phone boom in developing world could boost e-learning

The Wikipedia website accessed on an iPhone. Research suggests mobile technology could benefit education in poor countries. Photograph: Jonathan Hordle/Rex Features

Globalisation, as defined by the rich, is a very nice thing, the former US president Jimmy Carter once reflected. "You're talking about the internet, you're talking about cell phones, you're talking about computers," said Carter. "This doesn't affect two-thirds of the people in the world."

That was in 2001; a lot has changed. In Kenya, mobile phones have become an integral part of cash transfer schemes, enabling poor people in urban areas to buy food. In remote rural areas of Peru, computers provided by the Euro-Solar programme are fuelling an appetite for learning among children. And the senior US political adviser Alec Ross – acknowledging the galvanising influence of social media on the Arab spring – has described the internet as "the Che Guevara of the 21st century".

If the global spread of technology can do all this, what else might it achieve? Quite a lot, according to the authors of a report prepared by the GSMA mobile industry body and published to coincide with last week's eLearning Africa conference in Cotonou, Benin.

Shaping the future – realising the potential of informal learning through mobile (pdf), explores mobile technology's potential to improve access to education for young people in developing countries. The study looks at Ghana, Morocco, Uganda and Maharashtra, in India, identifying young people's aspirations and priorities, exploring the education and employment challenges they face, and scrutinising their mobile phone use.

The endgame is to establish how the mobile industry and international development community can pool their expertise to create m-learning services that improve teaching and learning, and therefore promote long-term development.

"It's a big step in the right direction in terms of putting the possibilities in front of the GSMA's members and raising awareness of the commercial and business opportunities education represents in the developing world," says John Traxler, professor of m-learning at the University of Wolverhampton in the UK. "Clearly it's a small sample, covering only four countries, so it's indicative rather than representative. But if the networks get the message, it's a valuable piece of work. Networks don't need to hear it's virtuous, they need to hear it's profitable – just enough to encourage them to get out there and do something."

Mobile phones are increasingly ubiquitous in poor countries, which now account for four in every five connections worldwide (pdf). As Elsie Kanza, of the World Economic Forum, recently said: "Regardless of social class, almost everyone [in Africa] has a mobile phone, or two or three. Even in remote villages, mobile phones have replaced the bicycle or radio as prized assets."

An obvious caveat is that voice-calls far outstrip data use in poor countries, which remain an emerging market for smartphones and other data-enabled devices. One reason is cost. A quarter of the young people surveyed – and almost half of those from Ghana – said a shortage of money was the biggest obstacle to accessing educational resources. Even so, the rapid spread of mobile technology offers clear possibilities for learning. Of the young people participating in the study who had accessed the internet, half had done so on a mobile device.

One female student from rural India told the GSMA researchers: "In class, I sometimes record the lectures on my phone so I can listen to them later in case I forget or don't understand. I can use the calculator to help me with my maths. My favourite subjects are maths, science, history and economics. If you could get these on your mobile it would be good."

Enthusiasm for learning was a common thread in the feedback. Only family and health were felt to be of greater importance by the study's participants, 30% of whom said having a good career ranked higher among their priorities than marriage or home ownership.

Despite this aspirational outlook, however, only a quarter said the classroom was their principal source of information and education. Friends and family were identified as more important by 41%, while 43% gleaned most of their knowledge from TV programmes.

So can m-learning help? Yes, say the report's authors, who suggest that, by using the study's findings to tap into common interests among young mobile users, the reach and impact of educational material can be increased. Many of those surveyed used their devices to access music and sports content (49% and 24% respectively across the four areas studied); by bundling learning material with, say, football updates, the GSMA researchers believe technology can make a significant difference.

Others, however, are sceptical. Some experts say there is little demonstrable evidence of m-learning's impact, suggesting it threatens to undermine traditional teaching methods and – by leaving those without access to devices at a disadvantage – reinforce inequality.

Traxler believes such arguments are misguided. "You don't have to pay for mobile technology, and it reaches the people you want to reach," he argues. "Computers, books, television sets and college buildings may be infinitely more respected, but people already have mobile phones – they buy them, pay for them, and carry them. So let's look at how the technology is representative of our society, and how we can use it, rather than worrying about the niceties of education."

The report preaches a message Traxler has long championed, one he hopes will now trickle down not only to mobile networks and their commercial departments, but also to governments. "That's where the action needs to happen," he says. "We've had 10 years of relatively small-scale, short-term projects, and by their very nature I'm not sure how much they would really have told us, or how rigorous they were.

"The case that needs to be made is about sustainability, scale, return on investment and impacting on government policies. If the GSMA can do a better job than the rest of us have done in the past 10 years, then good luck to them – and I think they probably will."

View the original article here

Mobile phone boom in developing world could boost e-learning

The Wikipedia website accessed on an iPhone. Research suggests mobile technology could benefit education in poor countries. Photograph: Jonathan Hordle/Rex Features

Globalisation, as defined by the rich, is a very nice thing, the former US president Jimmy Carter once reflected. "You're talking about the internet, you're talking about cell phones, you're talking about computers," said Carter. "This doesn't affect two-thirds of the people in the world."

That was in 2001; a lot has changed. In Kenya, mobile phones have become an integral part of cash transfer schemes, enabling poor people in urban areas to buy food. In remote rural areas of Peru, computers provided by the Euro-Solar programme are fuelling an appetite for learning among children. And the senior US political adviser Alec Ross – acknowledging the galvanising influence of social media on the Arab spring – has described the internet as "the Che Guevara of the 21st century".

If the global spread of technology can do all this, what else might it achieve? Quite a lot, according to the authors of a report prepared by the GSMA mobile industry body and published to coincide with last week's eLearning Africa conference in Cotonou, Benin.

Shaping the future – realising the potential of informal learning through mobile (pdf), explores mobile technology's potential to improve access to education for young people in developing countries. The study looks at Ghana, Morocco, Uganda and Maharashtra, in India, identifying young people's aspirations and priorities, exploring the education and employment challenges they face, and scrutinising their mobile phone use.

The endgame is to establish how the mobile industry and international development community can pool their expertise to create m-learning services that improve teaching and learning, and therefore promote long-term development.

"It's a big step in the right direction in terms of putting the possibilities in front of the GSMA's members and raising awareness of the commercial and business opportunities education represents in the developing world," says John Traxler, professor of m-learning at the University of Wolverhampton in the UK. "Clearly it's a small sample, covering only four countries, so it's indicative rather than representative. But if the networks get the message, it's a valuable piece of work. Networks don't need to hear it's virtuous, they need to hear it's profitable – just enough to encourage them to get out there and do something."

Mobile phones are increasingly ubiquitous in poor countries, which now account for four in every five connections worldwide (pdf). As Elsie Kanza, of the World Economic Forum, recently said: "Regardless of social class, almost everyone [in Africa] has a mobile phone, or two or three. Even in remote villages, mobile phones have replaced the bicycle or radio as prized assets."

An obvious caveat is that voice-calls far outstrip data use in poor countries, which remain an emerging market for smartphones and other data-enabled devices. One reason is cost. A quarter of the young people surveyed – and almost half of those from Ghana – said a shortage of money was the biggest obstacle to accessing educational resources. Even so, the rapid spread of mobile technology offers clear possibilities for learning. Of the young people participating in the study who had accessed the internet, half had done so on a mobile device.

One female student from rural India told the GSMA researchers: "In class, I sometimes record the lectures on my phone so I can listen to them later in case I forget or don't understand. I can use the calculator to help me with my maths. My favourite subjects are maths, science, history and economics. If you could get these on your mobile it would be good."

Enthusiasm for learning was a common thread in the feedback. Only family and health were felt to be of greater importance by the study's participants, 30% of whom said having a good career ranked higher among their priorities than marriage or home ownership.

Despite this aspirational outlook, however, only a quarter said the classroom was their principal source of information and education. Friends and family were identified as more important by 41%, while 43% gleaned most of their knowledge from TV programmes.

So can m-learning help? Yes, say the report's authors, who suggest that, by using the study's findings to tap into common interests among young mobile users, the reach and impact of educational material can be increased. Many of those surveyed used their devices to access music and sports content (49% and 24% respectively across the four areas studied); by bundling learning material with, say, football updates, the GSMA researchers believe technology can make a significant difference.

Others, however, are sceptical. Some experts say there is little demonstrable evidence of m-learning's impact, suggesting it threatens to undermine traditional teaching methods and – by leaving those without access to devices at a disadvantage – reinforce inequality.

Traxler believes such arguments are misguided. "You don't have to pay for mobile technology, and it reaches the people you want to reach," he argues. "Computers, books, television sets and college buildings may be infinitely more respected, but people already have mobile phones – they buy them, pay for them, and carry them. So let's look at how the technology is representative of our society, and how we can use it, rather than worrying about the niceties of education."

The report preaches a message Traxler has long championed, one he hopes will now trickle down not only to mobile networks and their commercial departments, but also to governments. "That's where the action needs to happen," he says. "We've had 10 years of relatively small-scale, short-term projects, and by their very nature I'm not sure how much they would really have told us, or how rigorous they were.

"The case that needs to be made is about sustainability, scale, return on investment and impacting on government policies. If the GSMA can do a better job than the rest of us have done in the past 10 years, then good luck to them – and I think they probably will."

View the original article here