[thereisnospork]

> “Our officers will respond to investigate the nature of the call,” OPD said in a statement. “If our officers determine this is a landlord-tenant issue, the case will be referred to the Alameda County Sheriff’s Office for further investigation.”

People unlawfully squat and the official position of the Police is shrug.

Small wonder people are unhappy with the system and there's a market popping up for extra-judicial evictions.

[gottorf]

> People unlawfully squat

My understanding of CA tenancy law is that it's so tilted in favor of the tenant, that if someone just claims to be one, the police have to shrug.

> Small wonder people are unhappy with the system and there's a market popping up for extra-judicial evictions

Well-intentioned laws, upon contact with the real world, often end up with undesirable secondary and tertiary consequences such as this.

[thereisnospork]

Broadly agree.

Would probably be much cleaner all around if in such cases the law dictated possession back to the property owner with ~ treble damages/attorney's fees/statutory damages/reversion of possession in the cases where the alleged squatter was lawfully occupying. Basically enough to entice a lawyer to take the case on contingency and make it unequivocally in the favor of a hypothetically wronged tenant, while not allowing squatters to abuse the existing legal process.

[viraptor]

That sounds like a mostly reasonable approach from the police though. Do you want want a police raid just because you did something the landlord doesn't like? Do you want the issue decided on the spot with little actual knowledge? Unless the place is being actually damaged, it's likely better to take the time - there's too much possibility for harassment otherwise.

[like_any_other]

> Do you want the issue decided on the spot with little actual knowledge?

Oh so after a ~week long prompt investigation, the police, now well informed, act decisively? Strange then how the landlord in the story would rather pay $12,500 to this swordsman than wait one or two weeks.

[Ekaros]

Should really be some sort of government process and speedy trial in court. Say inside a week. Show a lease or get year in free accommodation by the state. Both sides win. Property owner frees the property and squatter gets free government paid housing for longer period.

[IncreasePosts]

Police are not in the business of reading contracts and determining who is in the right or wrong.

They'll remove trespassers but these squatters will usually claim that they have a rental agreement, or that they've lived there long enough that there is a de facto agreement.

[OgsyedIE]

Honestly I think there are too few evictions.

The working homeless are worse at contributing to natalism than the working housed and there are too many Americans for the global aquifer budget to support. A mass fertility reduction can only really happen through a decline in prosperity. Ideally, the American housing policy framework should be exported globally as much as possible, too.

https://www.footprintnetwork.org/

[ares623]

> A mass fertility reduction can only really happen through a decline in prosperity.

Uhh I think you got it backwards.

The poorer a country is, the higher its fertility rates.