Michael “Micky” Mills in interview with NBC7. Screen grab from NBC7 video.
Slumlord Michael “Micky” Mills Has Over 100 Short-term Vacation Rental Licenses in Ocean Beach
In a letter fired off to Mayor Gloria and members of the City Council, the Ocean Beach Planning Board is demanding changes to the short-term rental law that has allowed one person to be granted licenses for over one hundred properties — all in OB.
The Board has determined that one owner, Michael “Micky” Mills has obtained 115 short-term vacation rental licenses through a loophole in the poorly written ordinance passed by the city council last year. That’s only one part of it. Mills is evicting tenants out of his properties in OB in order to convert them to STVRs.
The letter came as a result of Wednesday night’s packed meeting of the Planning Board.
Mills has been a well-known and longtime slumlord in OB. Just recently, the Rag documented Mills’ transition from slumlord to vacation rental king of Ocean Beach.
The “host” loophole targeted by the Planning Board is a requirement that each short-term rental license has a “host” and that person must have the legal right to occupy the unit. A host isn’t allowed to hold more than one license at a time. But a host isn’t the same thing as the property owner.
NBC7 just published an excellent report into the complaints of the OBPB and sat down with Mills who explained how he found hosts to apply for licenses.
“I asked friends in Ocean Beach, family, my staff who live in and around Ocean Beach,” Mills said. “I asked anyone who cared to listen to me if they would contact their friends or relatives with the idea of becoming a host where they wouldn’t be obligated to anything giving them our assurances that my family would manage the properties for them and they wouldn’t be obligated to do anything.”
Mills told us none of these hosts were paid or compensated in any way and are connected to these properties in name only.
“They have no intention of personally managing the property,” Mills told us. “They simply allowed me to qualify for the city’s ordinance restrictions, probably aimed at trying to cut down on the number of short-term rentals in all the beach cities.”
Here is a map published by NBC7 on some of Mills’ properties in OB (each dot represents an address with multiple units) :
The June 8th letter from the OB Board was in the form of “requests” and “suggestions,” but it claims this loophole is contributing to the housing crisis right here in one community, Ocean Beach.
Here is the letter:
{ 14 comments… read them below or add one }
The OB Planning Board is standing up to the short-term rental law. And Kevin Hastings and Tracy Dezenzo of the board are emerging as leaders in pushing this needed change, and we applaud their efforts.
Sorry, but scum. Shameful. The epitome of “just b/c you can, should you?”
Imagine if we passed laws that disincentived housing uses outside of owner occupied primary residences.
This is happening right next door to me on Saratoga. An 8-unit apartment building now has 5 or more STVR licenses. The ordinance needs to be fixed to serve its stated purpose.
Gee. What a shock that the SVTR that Jen et al pushed through during COVID is flawed. Instead of benchmarking against bigger and better run cities (including places that are all too familiar with vacation rentals and enforcement), we came up with a rule that Joe Lacava said was flawed. Instead this bunch of council people kicked the can down the road, saying, oh we’ll fix it later (Sean Eli; Melissa Montgomery, etc). Good luck with seeing a fix soon.
Instead of having a plan, that says “in a year we will follow up”, the rule was thrown into the marketplace, and they let the chips fall where they may.
This total scenario by our city council and their staffs reflects naïveté, incompetence or collusion, take your pick.
So how many similar “hosts” are out there?
A couple of hundred people are now homeless…..thanks Jen et al!
How about the mayor prioritizing that OBapartment building for people getting kicked out by Michael Mills before they become homeless instead of for people who are already homeless. Prevention is the best way, or so we keep hearing
I’m curious at how much it cost Mills to bribe…oh excuse me I meant ‘gave in campaign contributions’ to the politicians that pushed through the STRV rules. I can’t imagine they did it out of the goodness of their black hearts!
sealintheSelkirks
Finally, we have a face for the slumlord-STVR King.
Already more than 50 STR licenses have been pulled from cheaters in Mission Beach, which does not include those who have abused the loophole, which by the way is no longer a loophole. The STR office at the City now says the owner is not in the equation; they don’t matter. The STR records are now so convoluted that it is nearly impossible to follow the legal thread. Nick Dimiglio a year and a half ago evicted 9 young people from a 4-plex that has 4 STR licenses. This is two doors down from our residence on Avalon Court. According to the 2010 and 2020 censuses, the population of Mission Beach has decreased by 23.5 percent. We need all four beach communities to get together and change this.
Wholeheartedly agreed. It’s time we communicate and organize with our fellow communities on a more solid level to demand our neighborhoods be protected from profiteering like this. These are our family, friends, and neighbors lives being destroyed by the few greedy and we all need to demand the balance shift. In a real way. No more lip service.
Not more than a month ago others in La Jolla had an article published about these identical issues. Time to get together.
Hi Gary,
The STRO ordinance does not require the owner to be a natural person. The host is the only person that needs to be a natural person per the definition of a host.
Thank you,
Matt Wood
STRO Administration
City of San Diego
Office of the City Treasurer
T (619) 615-6120
Good morning Gary,
As previously mentioned an STRO license is issued to a host. A host can be the owner or a lessee if the lease allows for subleasing for less than a month. For an LLC, the lease would be between the LLC and the host which would grant the host the right to occupy and the ability to operate STRO. As long as there is a unique person that meets the definition of a host and all the requirements outlined in the STRO ordinance are met, a STRO license will be issued.
Thank you,
Matt Wood
STRO Administration
City of San Diego
Office of the City Treasurer
T (619) 615-6120
Councilmember Campbell and her Chief of Staff always pointed to the STR regulations as the great compromise, but this was no more a compromise than the Crittenden Compromise, which was an unsuccessful proposal in 1860 to permanently enshrine slavery in the United States Constitution. This STR ordinance was and is an attack on our residential neighborhoods by a multi-billion dollar corporation. I just don’t understand why the residents rolled over so easily? When is enough too much?
Hmm. Is this a “loophole” or a “feature”? Knowing this regulation was developed in concert with the SRO industry makes me think it was the latter. I remember seeing this in the proposed ordnance and assuming it was there for the units long-term lesee to go on vacation trips and allow short-term sublease for a few months. Now I know that was a bad assumption. I should have thought more deeply, but also some of the pundits arguing against the proposed proposition could have helped a lot by covering this “feature” in their comments. It would be reasonable for the council to admit they were duped (this admitting they are not too bright) and fix the situation, but they might lose some financial support if they do so.
Venus Molina is the gift from Dr. Jen that just keeps on giving!