Section 1808

Citation: Section 1808
Parent Document: McHugh v. Santa Monica Rent Control Board, 777 P.2d 91 (1989)
Jurisdiction: California (state)
Effective Date: 1989-08-17
Original Source: https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/1156663/mchugh-v-santa-monica-rent-cont... ↗

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The majority explain that the Board can avoid the constitutional problem by regularly staying enforcement of its orders for a period of time sufficient to allow an aggrieved party to seek a stay from the superior court. (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 377, fn. 44.) As the facts of the present case demonstrate, such a stay would normally be unnecessary. Since a Board order authorizing withholding of rent authorizes a future act, it may be effective immediately in the sense that the aggrieved party can immediately seek review of the order, but it is not enforceable in the sense that the tenant can immediately do anything unless the order is filed the day the rent is due. Furthermore, even a stay which is sought after the effective date of an order may undo the order and require remedial action pending judicial review. (See Cal. Administrative Mandamus (Cont.Ed.Bar 1966) § 10.8, p. 178.) Thus the status quo ante may be preserved even if the stay is sought and granted after the order became effective. For example, in this very case, once the landlord did request a stay, the court granted one, adding an order to the tenant to pay the withheld rent, retroactive to April 1, into a trust account held by the landlord's attorney, until the matter had been finally adjudicated in court. The landlord then had unimpaired judicial review and no practical obstacle to enforcing a judgment in his favor.

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