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Residents urge Anaheim to enforce tenant-protection law and release rental-inspection data after Walnut Street eviction reversals
Summary
Speakers at public comment described recent eviction filings on Walnut Street that were overturned in court and urged the council to adopt enforcement for California’s Tenant Protection Act and publish the city's rental-inspection database and housing element materials.
Several community speakers at Tuesday’s Anaheim City Council meeting urged the city to enforce California’s Tenant Protection Act and release rental-inspection and housing-element documents after recent eviction disputes on Walnut Street.
“Half a dozen of those tenants fought their evictions in court and had them overturned last week,” Vern Nelson, of the Anaheim Dembs Club and Tenants United Anaheim, told the council. Nelson said the tenants — primarily Spanish-speaking residents represented by attorneys Stephanie Germani and Lorena Tejeda — prevailed because they had not been properly notified and because the landlord’s substantial-remodel claims appeared weak.
Nelson asked what action the city planned to take to enforce state tenant-protection rules. “That’s why we've been trying to get you, the council, to vote for Anaheim to enforce the state law and protect its tenants,” he said, asking staff to return with an ordinance to implement local enforcement.
Mark Herbert, who runs anaheimgrease.com, asked the city to share a two‑year rental‑inspection database that he said tracks ordinance violations and to improve public notice for workshops and advisory‑board meetings, including a planning commission housing-element workshop and hearing notices. “It would be good to share with the public,” Herbert said of the inspection database.
Speakers noted that California’s Tenant Protection Act does not include a dedicated local enforcement mechanism and urged Anaheim to fill that gap through municipal regulation. Nelson said tenants who cannot access lawyers frequently lose eviction fights even when they have defenses.
Council members did not take formal action on the requests during the meeting but Council Member Meeks previously asked staff for a rental-inspection program update; city staff indicated they will continue work on housing-element outreach and noted upcoming planning commission meetings on the housing element.
No ordinance or staff directive enforcing the state law was adopted at the meeting.
