A Los Angeles County 30-day eviction notice requirement long unpopular with landlords was struck down by L.A. Superior Court Judge Mitchell Beckloff in a ruling earlier this month.
Beckloff ordered that the county could no longer enforce the pandemic-era notice requirement for some COVID-19 rental debt relief that was challenged by the Sacramento-headquartered California Apartment Association in its suit against L.A. County.
The case specifically contested a county resolution that was adopted in January 2023 that required landlords to provide a 30-day notice to pay or quit before proceeding with evictions. This county resolution was part of a long line of extensions of the county’s eviction moratorium that had run since Spring 2020, which many landlords said left them unable to collect rent or evict tenants for nonpayment.
CAA argued that the regulation clashed against the state standard three-day notice law. Beckloff ruled that the county will have to comply with the state’s three-day rule.
In November, Beckloff ruled that developer Cedar Street Partners could move forward with a suit against the City of La Cañada Flintridge over a project proposed under the state legal provision called builder’s remedy.
Whitney Prout, CAA’s executive vice president of legal affairs, said “this ruling is important not only for the real-life impact it has on rental housing providers in Los Angeles County, but also for the message it sends to policymakers: They cannot simply disregard the law in the interest of political gain.”
Dan Yukelson, executive director for the advocacy group Apartment Association of Greater Los Angeles, called the decision an overdue victory.
“It’s a great win for housing providers who are constantly being subjected to overzealous regulations. It is about time that a judge removed the county’s knee from the necks of rental property owners,” Yukelson wrote in a text.
A spokesman for CAA did not know if the county would appeal the ruling.
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