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DOWDALL LAW OFFICES A PROFESSIONAL CORPORATION ATTO R N EYS AT LAW City Council of the City of Santa Ana City of Santa Ana September 16, 2021 Page 13 3. ENVIRONMENTAL CONSEQUENCES STUDIED? NO. Decline in building maintenance is unavoidable. While it appears the city has declined to review the environmental consequences of stringent rent controls in any form of robust analysis, other cities have undertaken the responsibility to understand and evaluate what rent control does on existing populations and on property maintenance. This is one reason why, indeed, the city of Los Angeles which neighbors Santa Ana (as recognized by the Ordinance) did undertake an environmental impact report to check on the significant effects upon the environment caused by rent control. Since the environment is of foremost concern to many, that direct and immediate impact caused by the ordinance cannot be simply disregarded. Increasing the frequency of rent increase hearings while at the same time encouraging the diminution in quality of life and housing services by reducing maintenance as a natural consequence of reducing cash flow, will affect the environment. It has been shown that rent controls also increase commute time because tenants will not move closer to their work if the rent is maintained at artificially low levels. The increase commute time for those in the working population is significant. The city has recognize that a significant portion of the residents that live in mobilehome parks in the city of Santa Ana are in food service. Restarting employment with restaurants that have not been shut down and going out of business will require travel. It is natural to live near one's work. Rent control will stop that from happening. The effect on the types of automobiles driven, the mileage, the length of time on crowded freeways, and the impact on air quality have not been studied by the city. This proposal is clearly a project which requires an environmental impact report. Again, the City of Los Angeles ordered preparation of an environmental impact report for the original RSO in the 1970s. City attorney Claudia McGee stated that the city had a legitimate concern regarding the environmental impact created by the rent control law (at a well -attended seminar for attorneys regarding rent controls in the early 1980s). This threat to the environment is even greater when the city is precipitating an onslaught of rent increase applications. This was not formally the case, when the environmental impact report was commissioned. The case for an EIR is more compelling now. An EIR Is Required in Order to Address the Significant Effects of the Proposal Proximately Resulting in Reduction of Housing Maintenance and Services. The proposal for this form of old-fashioned rent control immediately hits maintenance of housing services, buildings, cleaning, and labor. History is clear that the forced reduction of revenue takes away revenue needed to maintain property. Coupled with increased travel to the city for administrative hearings by thousands of landlords and their experts, attorneys, accountants, managers, and tenants, even the travel patterns are within the city will be detrimentally affected in a significant way by reason of the spiking frequency of administrative hearings trying to obtain rent adjustments to maintain the status quo of economic returns. -13-