my fellow California voters I would like you to know something about proposition 33 and the Costa Hawkins landlord law first of all Costa Hawkins is the major cause of high rents and homelessness in this state and I'll tell you how that works in two parts one that law was written by and for landlords and passed in 1995 the main reason for the law was to stop California cities and counties from enacting any more rent and eviction regulations before 1995 a few cities such as Santa Monica Los Angeles Berkeley San Francisco were successfully holding down rents and protecting tenants from unfair evictions so the richest landlords got together put their money together and had their guys and Sacramento Jim Costa and Phil Hawkins get this law passed one thing the law does is to prohibit any rent regulations by cities on buildings built after 1995 the landlords also used their organizations to pressure other California cities uh to not enact their own regulations As Time passed lots of new apartment buildings were built and none of them could have their rents regulated in cities that already had rent regulations Costa Hawkins said that no new buildings built after the rent Control ordinances were passed could be regulated for example since Santa Monica's rent regulations were first enacted in 1978 no buildings built after 1978 in Santa Monica could have their rents regulated in Los Angeles it was buildings built after 1979 the main effect of this law was to guarantee landlords all over the state that they could raise their rents as high as possible because the law is on their side and that's what the law allows them to do in effect this law was encouragement to go ahead and raise your rents to the max so in effect the law said uh to the landlords don't be afraid to evict tenants who can't pay the new rents there will always be new tenants who have the money you want to demand from them since the law is on the landlord's side there's nothing to stop them even in rent control cities Costa Hawkins says that when an apartment becomes vacant the city cannot regulate the rent on the new vacancies eventually all the apartments that have rent regulations will lose those regul ulations whenever tenants move out the hope is that one day soon there will be no more rent regulations in California in the part two what I just described in part one is how Costa Hawkins causes homelessness it encourages landlords to push rinse to the limits and to get as much money as they can as a result in 1990 the US Census found that California had just over 91,000 homeless people in 1995 Costa Hawkins was passed in 2023 last year the census found the California had over 181,000 homeless people in other words since Costa Hawkins was enacted the population of homeless human beings in California has doubled in fact the homeless population has gone up on average by 4,000 people per year as you can see Costa Hawkins is a homeless making machine it won't stop unless we stop it also there are millions of Californians individuals and families who have a place to rent but who are worried sick that they might be the next ones to have to live on the streets proposition 33 will only only do one thing it will repeal Costa Hawkins so that California cities and counties will be free to regulate rents for their citizens if and only if that is what their citizens want prop 33 does not force anybody to do anything it does not raise or lower any Rents It does not punish any landlords it just brings democracy to local governments so the people can decide what they want to do so please join me and vote Yes on Prop 33 thanks for listening