Author: ellensvmhp

Eclipse vs Sunset

So yesterday (9/27/15) Mom and I drove up nearby Via Chaparral to Salvar Rd Bridge for the rare lunar eclipse.  While watching and waiting for the moon to make it up past the fog, we turned around and saw this.

vcm_s_kf_repr_832x624

We finally saw the eclipse, but I was so glad that while we were waiting we didn’t miss the beauty that surrounds us!

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Who Are Our Landowners? What Do They Do? Check Out The Link!

The Daughters of Charity of St. Vincent de Paul own the land here.

In 2015, their nonprofit, St. Vincent’s was named “The Nonprofit of the Year” by the Chamber of the Santa Barbara Region.  Their mission:

“St. Vincent’s is dedicated to strengthening low-income families and seniors through programs rooted in the Social Teachings of the Catholic Church.  Faithful to the charism of the Daughters of Charity of St. Vincent de Paul, we serve our sisters and brothers by providing affordable housing, early childhood education, and family enrichment opportunities.”

You can learn more about this organization and their good works, and how you can help, by clicking on the St. Vincent’s link on the SVMHA homepage.

My Reason #1 for Joining GSMOL: Our eyes, ears – and VOICE – in Sacramento!

“GSMOL lobbies for just and fair protection under the law for manufactured-home owners so they may experience the quiet, peaceful enjoyment of their community.”

Just this month, a GSMOL-supported bill, SB 419,  was passed and signed by the governor.  It improves the process for selling your home by updating and clarifying the rules about realty signs and open houses. It also increases transparency for buyers and sellers regarding park standards for admission of new buyers to live in the park, by requiring clear disclosure of the park’s income and eligibility requirements.

GSMOL has protected California mobilehomeowners’ interests for many years and has saved our  rent control, for example, several times:  GSMOL’s state law legislative record is summarized below – and is very impressive.

Go to gsmol.org to see what else they are doing right now, and please join – it is just $25 for one person, $35 for two.  This is important work they are doing for us.  Being our eyes and ears – and voice! – in Sacramento.  Thank you!

  • 2014 | Sponsored and passed AB 225 (Chau) which modified the rules for the Mobilehome Park Resident Ownership Program to make more money available to help repair and preserve troubled mobilehomes parks, and to facilitate conversion to resident ownership. The bill also makes some of the funds available to provide repairs or upgrades to individual homes in parks converting to resident or nonprofit ownership.
  • 2013 | Passage of SB 510 – condo conversion/subdivision bill enabling jurisdictions to use the results of the Resident Survey as a means to approve, disapprove or modify the application to subdivide a park in a park owner initiated conversion.
  • 2012 | Passed the Homeowner Bill of Rights which must be provided annually to all park residents if the MRL is not distributed.
  • 2011 | Became a party before the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) in a crucial rulemaking proceeding involving transfer of sub-metered gas and electric systems from park owners to serving utilities.
  • 2010 | Formed and lead coalition that overturned Guggenheim vs City of Goleta Federal Court decision, which would have compromised local rent control ordinances statewide. Filed Amicus brief in Contempo Marin San Rafael case to overturn harmful lower Federal Court decision re: rent control.
  • 2009 | Mobilehome Residency Law “Roadshows” started around the state. Blocked AB 761 which would have phased out “vacancy control” resale protection out of local California rent stabilization ordinances on a statewide basis.
  • 2008 | Defeated Proposition 98 which would have abolished rent control and other homeowner protections.
  • 2007 | Prevented management from requiring a manufactured home to be removed from the park unless there has been a required notice provided, specifying the condition that permits the home to be removed.
  • 2006 | Help defeat Proposition 90 which would have eliminated rent control across the state.
  • 2005 | Prevented park management from including in a rental agreement the right of first refusal to purchase a home in the park which is for sale to a third party.
  • 2004 | Required 60 day notice to change park rules or regulations mandated by a change in the law. Numerous bills passed to tighten up residents’ rights to sell their mobilehome. Prevents management from entering home except in an emergency.
  • 2003 | Allowed display of political campaign signs in the window or on the site of a manufactured home.
  • 2002 | Permitted renting out or subletting of home in case of a medical emergency.
  • 2001 | Required that managment permit the CARE program for utilities and the posting of rates in master metered parks. Requires management responsibility for trees for health and safety and maintenance of driveways.
  • 2000 – 1969 | Hundreds of bills become law protecting mobilehome owners and their rights.

Welcome New Neighbors!

The Online Committee wants to welcome all our new neighbors at San Vicente.  We hope you will enjoy it here as much as we do!  This website has a great potential to provide lots of good information – and fun.  If you are comfortable with email and google and want to have yet more fun with your computer, please join us in adding articles, photos, comments, etc., to increase the enjoyment and value of our website.
There are several easy ways to contact us:

  • Via the Comment Page (click here)
  • Call Ellen Duke (listed in book)
  • E-Mail Ellen

Online Committee Minutes Feb 13 2015

Online Committee of SVMHOA  Minutes – February 13, 2015

The committee met at 3:00 pm at the home of John and Anne Wiley. John and Anne Wiley, Tony Spinella, Patty Byrum and Ellen Duke attended. John led the committee in establishing an agenda:

  1. Features of the website
  2. OC rules and guidelines development (consider password area?)
  3. Posting of HOA bylaws, park rules and regulations, etc.
  4. Report recommended changes to HOA board, then implement

FEATURES: After reviewing the website features; theme, menus, pages, format, etc., it was suggested that

  • The theme be changed so the Calendar has wider columns. (John looking into this.)
  • The home page be focused on directing users to areas of interest. It was agreed to move the “latest posts” to their own page, and a new homepage menu was proposed:

   Home     Calendar    Social      Latest      HOA      DPG     Help

Each of these will have drop-down menus which appear when the cursor is over the topic.

  • The search feature is important and will appear in all sections. This enables users to look for posts on a particular category (examples of some possible categories: pets, minutes, classifieds, rules, recipes, stories, events, photos). Comments may be limited to one page.
  • Committee members are considering dropdown menu topics and will circulate suggestions for 10 search categories to committee members for comment before next meeting.
  • There is interest in being able to show summaries of the “latest” posts rather than the whole posts on the “Latest” page; John offered to check this out.

[update: Demo of “Summary” implemented here, using the More feature. Note that it only works on the Latest page, and not when reading the Minutes post directly (where the post is displayed in full and the link itself will not be visible). Also, it must be manually inserted at the point in each post where you’d like the summary to stop with a “Continue…” link. For example on the Latest page, to read the rest of these Minutes click Continue below and you will be taken to a position just below this text on the full post.]

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