Another angle on California's housing crisis: A disproportionate impact on the aging plays out with political drama in Ojai

Alexi Koseff reported yesterday for CalMatters on how a city council member in Ojai, population 7,637, in Ventura County became homeless 18 months ago.  That's when 74-year-old council member Suza Francina was evicted from her long-term rental so the new owner could renovate it.  Since then, Francina has been staying in a tiny apartment above the garage of a friend.  The problem is that the garage apartment is not in the district that Francina represents.  Francina, who emigrated from The Netherlands as a child and has lived in Ojai for 67 years, has been open about her housing situation.  Then, a few months ago, someone filed a complaint against Francina, triggering a grad jury investigation that has concluded Francina is violating residency requirements.  

At an hours-long public forum on June 13 to debate whether Francina should be removed from the city council, Dee Reed, one of Francina's friends commented, 

She’s a living, breathing example of the problem they are in denial about.

Francina made a moral appeal to her colleagues at that meeting, asking them to consider her situation as a matter of justice for a renter who has fallen on hard times.  She is quoted:   

Do you think Rosa Parks felt she was disobeying the law? I mean, look at all the laws that were changed through public protest.  There are absolutely numerous exceptions to upholding wrong laws. And this is a wrong law. It doesn’t work in reality.

Francina has lived in Ojai for 67 years, after she moved from The Netherlands as a child. She taught preschool and yoga.  She wrote and raised a family.

Koseff provides this big picture perspective on what is happening in Ojai, calling it a "a glimpse into a California that is increasingly out of reach, where the lack of affordable housing has distorted every facet of society and where millions of residents who once lived comfortably suddenly find themselves on the margins while those on the margins are pushed onto the streets."

He continues:

Like so many California communities that rely heavily on tourism and that have historically attracted newcomers with the promise of convenience and contentment, Ojai is becoming too expensive even for many of its longtime residents. Housing development never kept up with demand, while guesthouses that once provided a more economical option are being converted into vacation rentals in spite of a local ban. With fewer young families able to settle in the city, the school board recently voted to close three schools due to declining enrollment.

“It’s ironic,” said Francina, who remembers renting her first home for $75 per month. “We worked so hard to preserve it and here’s our reward. We can’t afford it.”

Interestingly, just a few days ago, Anita Chabria wrote for the Los Angeles Times about the disproportionate impact the state's housing crisis is having on those over the age of 50.  The headline is "The truth about our homelessness crisis: As Californians age, they are priced out," and it reports on a recent UCSF study of homelessness in the Golden State.  Chabria quotes Dr. Margot Kushel, who headed the study from UCSF’s Benioff Homelessness and Housing Initiative:  

These are old people losing housing,

Chabria's column continues: 

“They basically were ticking along very poor, and sometime after the age of 50 something happened,” Kushel said. That something — divorce, a loved one dying, an illness, even a cutback in hours on the job — sparked a downward spiral and their lives “just blew up,” as Kushel puts it.

Kushel and her team found that nearly half of single adults living on our streets are over the age of 50. And 7% of all homeless adults, single or in families, are over 65.

And 41% of those older, single Californians had never been homeless — not one day in their lives — before the age of 50.