March 24, 2026
To: The Mayor, Vice-Mayor, and City Council Members of the City of Camarillo
On Wednesday, March 25, 2026, you will be voting on a Rent Stabilization Ordinance for mobile home parks in Camarillo. I strongly urge you to vote yes on this ordinance.
To emphasize that mobile home park rent stabilization is the morally just option, let me tell you a personal story.
My mother lived in a mobile home park in Oxnard for 50 years with rent control starting in 1982 and formalized in 1998.
My father retired early due to health reasons and subsequently passed away much earlier than he or anyone anticipated. My mother was too young for social security and was forced to go back to work, but only part-time. With her part-time earnings and minimal dividend earnings she was able to continue to live in her mobile home solely because of rent control. Rents did not skyrocket out of control, and she could anticipate the increase for each year and plan accordingly. She always had enough left over each month to play her beloved bingo games.
She retired, remarried, and became a widow for a second time all the while living in the same mobile home. Although due to her second marriage her financial situation was better but had space rents increased exorbitantly each and every year, she still would not have had enough income to maintain her simple life in a mobile home park. She would have had to move in with me, which was fine with me, but not with her. She cherished her independence and the mobile home community in which she resided. Many of the residents socialized, checked in on each other as they aged, and helped each other in many ways.
My mother lived in the same park, the same space, and in the same mobile home from 1966 to 2013 when she passed away. She lived happily and independently in her “little house” as she called it. She loved her life, and this was made possible entirely by rent control. When I sold her mobile home, her space rent was the lowest in the entire park due to her stability and was in fact a selling point with the rent for the new owner increasing by only a small, allowed amount.
The City of Camarillo is woefully behind on the issue of mobile home rent control/stabilization. Rents or land leases as they are often called now have already spiraled out of control in Camarillo, making residency there untenable for many people. In Camarillo, living in a mobile home park does not seem to be “affordable housing” any longer.
I urge you to act now to help people while that is still possible and pass the Mobile Home Park Rent Stabilization Ordinance that is before you.
Regards,
Patricia A. Griffin
Camarillo Resident