RUSS REPORT - The Community Care Facility Ordinance (CCFO) was heard before the City’s Planning and Land Use Management Commission (PLUM) on April 24 and the Commission submitted its report to the LA City Council without recommendation.
Phyllis Winger, Chief Planning & Land Use Deputy for Councilmember Mitchell Englander- CD 12, confirmed that the ordinance was transmitted exactly as it was drafted and released by the City Attorney in September, 2011. Winger said no date has been set for this item in City Council.
The vote will require a simple majority of the City Council.
According to the CCFO, “The proposed ordinance would add definitions to Los Angeles Municipal Code (LAMC) to bring it into conformance with the California Community Care Facilities Act.
“As mandated by state law, the ordinance permits these State licensed facilities with six or fewer residents in nay zone that permits single-family homes. It will permit seven or more residents as public benefits, requiring performance standards.
“The proposed ordinance also amends the definitions of ‘Boarding or Rooming House’ and ‘Family’ to provide clear guidelines for the appropriate enforcement of boarding homes with transient characteristics and prohibits Boarding or Rooming Houses in one- family dwellings zoned RD.
“Lastly, it adds a definition for Correctional or Penal Institution to ensure that group homes for parolees are classified as conditional uses.”
But forefront critic, Paul Dumont, disagrees. Dumont, the Vice President of the North Hills West Neighborhood Council (NHWNC), owns a Sober Living Facility that could be required be licensed to operate under a conditional use permit or be closed down.
One of Dumont’s homes in North Hills had been shut down once and later reopened in 2008. The home was closed again in 2011. There were a total of 30-47 tenants residing in the home, according to LAPD. The rent listed on a website advertised by the owner was $900.00 per month, per tenant. He purportedly owns another home in North Hollywood.
Dumont’s abrasive demeanor at the March 20 meeting disrupted the meeting and angered attendees.
Dumont was visibly angry when he said, “I hear a lot of talk about discrimination against the disabled population in our city. The characteristics of the people who are supporting this ordinance are wealthy white people from Granada Hills and Pacific Palisades. They want to send the people of color and the people that are poor that often find themselves in need of drug and alcoholism treatment and addiction services and sober living, they want to get them out of their white neighborhood and send them back to the hood where they belong. They want us to live in the ghetto instead of in Mitch’s (Councilmember Englander) pretty white neighborhood. We belong in every neighborhood in this city. We will be living in every neighborhood in this city regardless of what law you pass. You are discriminating against a protected class and you’re discriminating against minorities and poor people. It’s not going to be tolerated.”
This isn’t the first time Dumont has been angrily vocal in his opposition to the proposed ordinance. A multitude of individuals who support the proposed ordinance have reported threats, harassment and intimidation by Dumont.
One woman said, “He (Paul Dumont) has threatened me previously, and also phoned the City to complain of misdoings at my parents’ home (thinking it was mine), which were totally concocted by him. My father is an 89-year-old Veteran of WWII, and my mother is 87; he claimed they were running an illicit business out of their garage!”
One single mother testified that she became very afraid after she received a threatening email from Dumont telling her that he was knew where she lived, how many children she had, and other personal information.
Another, fearful of Dumont, said, “In an attempt to rally opposition to the proposed Community Care Facility Ordinance, supporters of this ordinance are vilified in such a vicious manner that I along with others fear that we will be targets of future retribution and reprisals. The insidious nature of these threats is not to be taken lightly. I am aware of the criminal backgrounds of those who run SLN and many of the residents of these houses … Because of this and other intimidating incidences that I have experienced, I will be notifying the LAPD and other safety officials of potential threats to my personal safety.”
Dumont created another firestorm when he attended the Foothills Forum on February 23, 2011 and saw fit to provide a link to the speaker cards maintained by the City on another public Community Forum to chastise those in a derogatory manner because they advocated regulation for SLF’s. Several people who read his statements were fearful and filed complaints with LAPD.
Others were angry that Dumont would exploit their personal information and potentially put their families in harms way. “This small special interest group of spiteful people who think they can push all of us out of our homes with their connections, donations and political support of our City Council. They don't care where we go; they just want us out of "their" neighborhood. They believe we do not matter, even though it is our neighborhood too. This ordinance is NIMBY (Not in My Back Yard) conceived and NIMBY driven,” penned Dumont.
Residents say that with the early release of prisoners and parolees into communities and potentially into unregulated and, often, unsupervised SLF’s, the City needs regulation to enable LAPD to keep tabs on those individuals. They site Dumont’s former SLF in Northridge as an example. Residents say there were three calls to Los Angeles Dept of Building and Safety (LADBS) for code violations in the four years it operated, over 80 calls to LAPD over a 2 year period for fights, loud music, etc, and at any given time, Dumont housed 15-19 parolees. For several years, the ongoing nuisance abatement proceedings were inadequate.
Rebecca Lobl, President LA Coalition for Neighborhoods, said in her April 19th letter to PLUM, “There simply are no facilities similar to that of community care facilities that are given this broad based freedom to locate in any zone in the city without first obtaining a conditional use permit. Public benefit status is more typically reserved for libraries, museums, fire stations, parks and playgrounds (LAMC Section 1400 (A). With the pending influx of parolees and probationers from the state prison system, it is critical that the Los Angeles City Council address this immediately.”
Lobl said that 38 other Neighborhood Organizations and scores of stakeholders support an ordinance that would regulate these businesses.
A year ago, Dumont said, “There is NO EVIDENCE that multi lease homes are a problem. There is NO EVIDENCE of a CITYWIDE problem.”
The communities of Granada Hills, North Hills, Pacific Palisades, Melody Acres, Reseda, Westwood, Mar Vista, Van Nuys, Sunland Tujunga, Northridge, Chatsworth, Encino, Woodland Hills, Tarzana, San Pedro and Sylmar have seen a proliferation of Sober Living Facilities (SLF) in several neighborhoods and might disagree with Dumont.
No matter where one comes down on this controversial issue, almost all would agree the issue is not going away soon.
Those wishing to attend the City Council meeting when it votes on this matter should contact their Councilmember for details.
(Katharine Russ is an investigative reporter. She is a regular contributor to CityWatch and to the North Valley Reporter. Katharine Russ can be reached at: [email protected] ) –cw
Tags: Katharine Russ, Russ Report, Sober Living Homes, Ordinance
CityWatch
Vol 10 Issue 35
Pub: May 1, 2012
