The flurry of thousands of pieces of legislation flying around the State Capitol this time of year (hold on to your wallets and purses!) continues to allow the FlashReport to bring our readers into the building to take a closer look at individual pieces of legislation.
Today we’re taking a moment to look at Senate Bill 1000, introduced by Republican State Senator Tom Harman of Orange County.
PROPERTY RIGHTS
Before I delve into the specifics of this legislation, let’s have a short little primer on property rights. This has been a big issue lately, especially since the United States Supreme Court in their (terrible) Kelo v. New London decision cleared the way for government to come in and take someone’s private property through eminent domain if the government deems that a different use for that property would further ‘economic development’ in the area. This has lead to a national trend of local measures to protect property rights.
SB 1000 LESSONS PROPERTY RIGHTS
It is with this heightened sensitivity to property rights that I take a look at Senator Harman’s SB 1000. I came across this bill after our own FR Correspondent Adam Probolsky kept profiling bills (see here and here) by Harman that seemed like poor public policy. I went online to see what else Harman had introduced. He’s a busy guy. He has close to 40 bills! Many of them look like good policy — such as bills that go after illegal immigrants, get tough on sexual predators, and provide tax credits to employers for providing healthcare to employees.
It was SB 1000, though, that caused me to be concerned. It is an assault on private property rights. To understand SB 1000, and what it does, we need to introduce FR readers to a program called 
Sober Living by the Sea (SLS). SLS is a company that was started to help those who are in recovery from addictions to alcohol or drugs, and it is located in the neighborhood of Newport Beach that is right along the Pacific Ocean. It is what is referred to as a residential treatment facility. By that, it means that people who sign up for the SLS program (a minimum of 90 days) are placed into an individual home in this neighborhood, along with no more than six others, where under watchful supervision they are helped to get past their addiction. A key to the program is being able to live in a ‘normal’ neighborhood environment, and learn to live a normal life, free from the addiction which is destroying their life. (You can read more detail about the program here).
Suffice it to say that SLS has numerous homes that they either own or rent in this particular part of Newport Beach, and they have, since 1986, helped countless thousands of addicted persons to get a fresh start on life. It is also important to note that these homes are just that – homes. The clientele all go to their classes, and the other aspects of their program at a building that is not a house.
Of course, this same area of Newport Beach is home to one of the largest populations of transient visitors in all of Orange County — because along the ocean’s front, it seems like virtually every other house (or more) is a vacation rental – often times packed as full as possible with carousing college students! During the summer months, they are weekly rentals, and they tend to go monthly the rest of the year.
With all of these rentals, the SLS clientele coming in and out on a quarterly basis (or longer), it would seem, would not be particularly notable, or so one would think… Unless the notable part is that the SLS folks have a 10 p.m. curfew — and if, like me, you’ve ever walked around the Newport Peninsula late at night in the summer. I guarantee you the weekly rental folks party it up into the wee hours!
NIMBY ("NOT IN MY BACK YARD!") DISCRIMINATION?
I am sure that there are some residents in this community who don’t like the fact that SLS has been so successful, and has branched out into so many homes. I suspect these same people are also unhappy that there are so many weekly vacation rentals in the neighborhood as well. Why the objections to SLS homes? If they are objecting because they feel that residents of these homes are bad neighbors, creating noise, or otherwise infringing on their rights to enjoy their own property, I have yet to see any objective proof…
But some research on the internet has opened my eyes to the fact that recovering addicts in these kinds of homes suffer from unfortunate discrimination — there are people that object to the whole ‘idea’ that someone recovering from an addiction would do so in their neighborhood, let alone in the house next door.
I would imagine that some of these annoyed/unhappy residents are well-heeled typed. 
Heck, just owning a home in this area literally makes you a millionaire — sometimes many times over. So it is no surprise that they have apparently leaned on folks with the City of Newport Beach to ‘do something’ about this problem (whatever that problem happens to be). How grand — using government to go after your neighbor!
Apparently a combination of existing federal and state laws make it very difficult for a local government to regulate a facility such as SLS out of business. So Newport Beach has teamed up with their local legislator, moderate Republican Tom Harman, to change state law — but the change they seek, through Harman’s SB 1000 isn’t really about local control, its about changing state law to close down SLS.
NEW REGULATIONS
This bill introduces several new regulations on SLS and similar businesses — but the most draconian of them by far is the introduction of a new law that would require that there be at least a football field’s length (100 yards) between each of these homes. You may be shocked to hear that if this requirement is imposed on Sober Living by the Sea they will be in a world of hurt. This ‘taking’ (as I see it) would specifically prohibit the owner (by title or lease) of these properties from using them as they are currently doing — an ’eminent domain’ of sorts by the government.
It would also permanently deprive others who might want to make a similar use of their property from doing so in the future, it their property just happens to be too close to someone else doing the same thing on theirs! Remember, these are a few people (no more than six) living in a home, under strict rules — we are not talking about large facilities (which are already regulated for density).
While I ‘profile’ one effected business in this column simply because it makes it easier to make the point, it is worthy of note that, there are a lot of these types of addiction recovery outfits around California. This bill, with a broad stroke, would decimate many of them.
WARRANT-LESS SEARCH??
In addition to this oppressive component, SB 1000 would also submit these homes to having to jump through all kinds of state regulatory hurdles, and then would give power to local governments to warrant-less searches (surprise inspections)! Remember, this is where people are living. Would you want inspectors to be able to come into your home — even your summer rental home — without probable cause? I think not. Imagine how the City of Newport Beach, which does not want these sober living facilities to exist, could use the power to enter these properties to harrass the people living there. This may be the most egregious part of the legislation.
I spoke with Senator Harman (pictured to the right) at length last week, and he makes the counter argument, among others, that intense density of these homes changes the character of a neighborhood, and infringes on the property rights of other property owners who live next door or near by one or more of these facilities. He also told me that there are issues to do with traffic flow as delivery trucks provide food and/or laundry services to these homes. (By the way, there is no traffic-flow increase from SLS residents, who are issued bicycles for transportation.)
I am sympathetic to these arguments, but am so cynical about the use of government to regulate the rights of private property owners to do what they will on their own property, that I need proof — objective proof — before I will lessen my opposition to this kind of use of the state government to, in essence, shut down a private business, let alone stop potential future businesses from starting up. Neither Senator Harman nor his staff were able to give me any of my required documentation, referring me to the City of Newport Beach to track that down.
SB 1000 GOES TOO FAR – AND SHOULD BE VOTED DOWN
In closing, SB 1000 goes too far. Way too far. It represents a pretty straight-forward attempt to create a state law that would effectively shut down Sober Living by the Sea.
Concerned property rights advocates in the Legislature should ask — no, demand — to see specific proof of the negative impact of these SLS homes on neighborhoods. And this proof needs to clearly show that trucks and service people that "block traffic" are for SLS homes and not for the hundreds of weekly rental properties that are vastly more numerous in the area. Proof must also be provided for allegations of negative impact on local property values.
I believe that Senator Harman’s intentions are pure in the introduction of this bill. I do not believe that he wants to discriminate against recovering addicts. I believe that, as a legislator, he is being responsive to a request from a large city in his district. However, I believe that their problem is actually a political one — between affluent coastal cities like Newport Beach, Dana Point, and San Clemente and a handful of well-heeled residents who don’t like a transient population in their very nice neighborhood by the ocean.
That said, it is my hope that this perspective will cause the Senator, and hopefully those other legislators who might be inclined to vote for this bill, to pause. Property rights are an intrinsic part of America and California. This legislation would take away property rights from SLS and countless other similar facilities around the State. Think carefully about how you would vote. Based on what I know, I would comfortably vote against SB 1000.
P.S. In case you are wondering why the City of Newport Beach hasn’t asked Senator Harman to carry legislation to ban all of those weekly vacation rentals along the beach… Perhaps it has to do with the fact that the city taxes those rentals for 10% of their revenues, as opposed to sober-living homes which do not provide them with more cash for the kitty…
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