BY BRADEN CARTWRIGHT
Daily Post Staff Writer
Palo Alto City Council has endorsed a permit program for RV dwellers as a way to cap their numbers and manage their bad behavior.
“If we have a permit system we can say, ‘No, you violated your code of conduct. You’re losing your permit.’ We have much more leverage,” Councilman Keith Reckdahl said tonight (Feb. 23).
Reckdahl is on a committee with council members Julie Lythcott-Haims and Ed Lauing that has been looking at how to deal with RVs — a growing problem that’s angered residents and business owners who don’t like the smell, trash and traffic hazards on their street.
“I drive down Park Boulevard and I smell the urine. I understand it,” Reckdahl said.
On the other side are RV dwellers who say they have nowhere else to go.
“They’re choosing a vehicle over an encampment,” Lythcott-Haims said.
Vice Mayor Greer Stone said the city should have a compassionate response to the policy failures at every level of government that have led to a shortage of affordable housing.
“We’re trying to achieve that balance to make sure that people can live safely and comfortably in the city but also make sure that we’re all playing by the same rules,” Stone said.
So the committee suggested a permit program, starting with a limited number permits in a small area.
The city could offer services like trash and sewage removal to entice RV dwellers to get a permit, City Manager Ed Shikada said.
The committee still needs to figure out how to spread RVs throughout the city and the number of RV dwellers to allow.
Councilman Pat Burt said he wanted to cap the number at the city’s RV count from a few years ago, before neighboring cities cracked down and pushed RV dwellers into Palo Alto’s business areas.
Oversized vehicles are banned on residential streets from 2 to 6 am, pushing them to commercial areas.
Mayor Vicki Veenker said she is against a permit program and wants to work with other cities first. She’s afraid a permit program would have a more severe impact on certain parts of the city.
Council members agreed that banning RVs citywide isn’t an option. Tow yards don’t have enough space, and other cities have been sued and ordered to drop their bans after spending millions on legal bills, Stone and Reckdahl said.
Lythcott-Haims said she wants cities to work together to buy or lease a parking lot for RVs in Santa Clara County, outside of Palo Alto where commercial land costs around $10 million an acre.
Councilman Ed Lauing said the city has tried to find a parking lot for RVs, but churches and private property owners aren’t willing to take them.
The city is in talks with Caltrans about an area bordered by Highway 101, San Antonio Road and Transport Street that’s currently leased to Ciardella’s Garden Supply.
Why was this ever allowed in the first place?
Whether you live in an RV or not, you do not have a right to free city services. If you choose to live somewhere, you should not expect the “housed” residents to support you or pay your share of the city services you use, including the cost of police, fire, sewage disposal and schools. The cost of a permit should reflect this, not that permits are a good idea or solution. Trying to solve everyone’s problems in this world is a fool’s errand.
This is a dumb idea. By formalizing permission, Palo Alto may find itself subject to the onerous state laws governing landlord/tenant relations, including the ability to evict problematic tenants. Ask any landlord about the cost and delays involved. Palo Alto might also find itself subject to the even more difficult laws governing mobile home park tenancies. This all may seem far fetched at first glance, but remember that there are always legions of creative legal aid attorneys ready to jump in on behalf of the homeless, and years of litigation in the appellate courts may result, even if the city ultimately prevails.
In total agreement with DH especially since vanlords profiting from renting the RVs.
There are 62+ members of the OSV (Oversized Vehicle) Ad Hoc committee and City Council is regularly copied on photos of the OSVs. Pictures are supposed to be worth a thousand words but evidently neither the photos nor our words matter to our “leaders” or motivate them to enforce the laws on our books to reduce our RV population.
Instead, PA’s RV population doubles while surrounding communities have taken action sending their RVs to us and PA’s “solution” is to dispersing this growing population throughout all neighborhoods while they seek global answers to societal ills.