A Mobile Home Crisis

The Catastrophic Threat of Closure

By Lin Marie deVincent

Homeowners living in a mobile/manufactured home park have for decades enjoyed it as a unique place to call home. They own their home the same as any other dwelling, often with mortgage payments – but they also pay rent on the land beneath them. They pay utilities and are responsible for all home maintenance, including landscaping. The relative affordability, supportive neighbors and typically single-level homes make these communities well-suited both for families seeking stable housing and for seniors to age in place with dignity. They can depend on nearby services – such as hospitals, stores, churches, senior centers, libraries, schools – and each other.

Housing security is central to these communities. In 1992, the City of Sonoma adopted its first Rent Stabilization Ordinance (RSO) after the threat of unreasonably high rent increases that would have forced homeowners from their homes. During the next 24 years, the RSO underwent various changes and challenges, until 2016, when the City unanimously approved the current ordinance. These continuing conflicts and resulting agreements gave homeowners the confidence that they would not face sudden rent spikes large enough to drive them out of their homes, while also supporting the park owners’ guaranteed rent increases.

However, in 2024, this unique way of living – and homeowners’ confidence in their housing security – came under threat again when the park owners unveiled a new tactic to seek rent increases beyond what the law allows, by threatening to close the park unless homeowners agreed to pay more. Park owners have used this strategy in Petaluma, Cotati, Santa Rosa and Rohnert Park. The Sonoma park owners have not joined these county-wide attacks – yet.  But homeowners say they need stronger and tailored protections in case new investors buy out the current owners or other unexpected changes occur.    

These threat-closure tactics motivated the homeowners in the three parks in Sonoma to ask the Sonoma City Council to amend Sonoma’s ordinance on mobilehome park closures and conversions. They hired an attorney and provided a draft law, called the Tri-Park Ordinance Proposal.   The requested changes would bring the ordinance up to date and add local modifications that reflect the high value of Sonoma homes, including safeguards against the coercive park-closure threat.

During a meeting earlier this year, City Staff asked homeowners to explain their draft ordinance proposal in lay terms and describe the real-world consequences of the policy choices involved in mobile/manufactured home park closures and conversions.

In response, the Tri–Park Committee created a Homeowners’ Survey, to which 114 households replied. Their answers describe a carefully constructed strategic foundation built over many years. It includes savings and retirement security, family stability, children’s schools, jobs, independence, neighbors, medical care and familiar daily routines. All these things work together to make their lives affordable, stable and sustainable.

In addition, homeowners reminded the city that their homes cannot be moved. The term “mobile” is no longer applicable – these are not RVs. If owners could not afford rent increases, they would have to abandon their homes. Closure could mean losing their savings and accumulated equity. Many have no affordable alternative and fear being forced to leave Sonoma, move in with relatives, face bankruptcy or become homeless. Families would be uprooted from their jobs, schools, friends and support networks, while older homeowners would lose the people and services that allow them to remain independent. These homeowners are not talking about the inconvenience of changing addresses. They are describing the potential loss of homes they own and an entire way of life they could never rebuild.

Survey respondents said the prospect of closure would be catastrophic, devastating and, in some cases, life-threatening.

This is a high-stakes situation. The closure threat puts all these potential losses and fears on the bargaining table.  It turns homeowners’ fear of losing their homes, savings, family stability and community, into leverage for rent increases that the law would not otherwise permit.

This is more than a debate about land use, legal language or competing financial interests. It is a moral question about whether people who worked, saved, raised families, cared for their homes and contributed to this community should be protected from losing everything through no fault of their own.

Sonoma has long valued and protected its mobile/manufactured home park communities.  The current Council prioritizes fairness and affordable housing, and as such, it should adopt the Tri–Park Ordinance Proposal.

We ask the public and the City Council to stand with these families, working households and older homeowners, by strengthening the Closure and Conversion Ordinance now.  If park owners say they have no intention of closing or selling, they shouldn’t object to the proposed Tri–Park Ordinance.

What happens to Sonoma’s mobile/manufactured homes and communities will say something lasting about all of us. Let it say that Sonoma listened to its neighbors and stood strong. Let it say that when families and seniors needed us to join them in appealing to the City Council, this community spoke up. Please email your Councilmembers and express your support for the Tri–Park Ordinance Proposal for the three city parks. And join us at the next Study Session on August 19, 6 p.m., Council Chambers, 1st Street West. Thank you.

Lin Marie DeVincent is the Tri Park Committee Coordinator. For more information go to [email protected].

Mayor Ron Wellander, [email protected]
Council Member John Gurney, [email protected]
Council Member Patricia Farrar-Rivas, [email protected]
Council Member Jack Ding,  [email protected]
(Council Member Sandra Lowe has had to recuse herself from this campaign because she owns property less than 1,000 feet from one of the parks and thus could (under state law) conceivably benefit financially from her vote.

Photo by David Bolling