Goleta Passes Emergency Law for Senior Mobile Home Parks 

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A mobile home park that for decades has housed senior citizens will remain a predominately ages-55+ community — at least for now. The Goleta City Council passed an emergency ordinance on Tuesday that blocks management company Harmony Communities Inc. from converting University Mobile Home Park in Old Town Goleta  to an “all-ages” community. On Wednesday, the management company said it intends to sue the city over the ordinance.

The ordinance creates a zoning overlay district for senior mobile home parks and establishes a moratorium on converting senior mobile home parks to all-ages parks. It is intended to help preserve affordable housing stock for seniors in Goleta.

“We can do what we can to make sure that at least in one part of our city, there’s one place you could go as a senior and have a reasonable opportunity to be able to live affordably,” said Councilmember James Kyriaco, who represents the district where the mobile home is located.

For decades, University Mobile Home Park has catered to seniors. A staff report on the emergency ordinance states that it is the only mobile home park in Goleta that does so. Today, most seniors in the park own their mobile homes and rent the land beneath their home. 

The park offers affordable housing compared to much of Goleta. Last February, the land beneath a mobile home was generally rented for between $200-$300 per month. 

In October 2025, an entity called University Park Manufactured Housing Community, LLC, bought the park. Soon thereafter, a December staff report said, Harmony came on as the park’s manager. 

On October 30, Harmony mailed a proposed set of new rules for the park, including changing the park to an all-ages community. The management company also sent notifications that rent would increase by about $200 per month to cover increased operating costs. 

Several park residents organized, forming the University Mobile Home Park Association. The association negotiated with Harmony for a staggered rent increase — a total increase of $150 per month spread over five years. 

The residents and Harmony did not reach an agreement on opening the park to all-ages. 

At Tuesday’s city council meeting, Nick Ubalde identified himself as a spokesperson for Harmony. He said the park is legally an all-ages park and that it does not meet the requirements for a senior-only exemption under federal law. 

“No court has ever allowed a city to force a lawful all-ages park to exclude families with children. Management and residents are negotiating right now to bring the park into full federal compliance,” he said. “Only the park owners can make those changes.” 

The park’s owner is University Park Manufactured Housing Community LLC. No owner attended Tuesday’s city council meeting, nor did they offer comment. The LLC shares a mailing address with Harmony’s office in Stockton, California, according to state documents. In a statement to the Independent, Ubaldi said all properties managed by Harmony have the same principal address so that mail flows through the management company. 

Harmony also appears to have a connection to the LLC’s legal dealings; Harmony’s operations manager, Sherry Johnston, is listed as the LLC’s agent for service of process in a state document. An agent for service of process for an LLC is responsible for receiving legal documents for the LLC, including in the case of lawsuits. 
Harmony Communities has a history of converting senior mobile home parks to all-ages communities. In 2022, at Santa Rosa’s Carriage Court mobile home park, Harmony Communities converted the senior park to all-ages to boost revenue, according to the Press Democrat, a local newspaper reporting from Sonoma and Napa counties.

Closer to home in Orcutt, Harmony Communities sued Santa Barbara County after it established its own senior housing overlay in 2024 and put in place a moratorium on converting senior housing: The move protected Del Cielo Mobile Estates, managed by Harmony, from converting to an all-ages park. In January 2026, The Golden State Manufactured Home Owners League said in a press release that Del Cielo tenants were fighting a rent increase tied to the expenses Harmony had incurred as part of the lawsuit. 

Mobile Home owners are both renters and homeowners who may have mortgages. Ann Anderson, the president of the Golden State Manufactured Homeowners League, said at Tuesday’s meeting that mobile homeowners do not have the same freedom of movement as regular tenants. 

“If you don’t like the condition of the park, or the rent raises going up every year, or there’s abusive management, you cannot just go to another mobile home park, because you own your home,” she said, adding that mobile homes can be expensive and challenging to move.

One resident spoke about her limited options for affordable housing in the area. She said she had returned to the South Coast to be near her elderly parents and was looking for a quiet, safe place to live. She took out a mortgage on her mobile home.

“This is my only affordable housing, and I am well over 55,” she said.

Currently, two mobile homes at University Mobile Home Park are available for purchase. On the real estate website Zillow, one mobile home’s space rental is listed for $995 per month. The other is listed for $521 per month — for this space, the Zillow description notes the community is “transitioning toward 55+ occupancy” but that rules may change. 

At the city council meeting, Harmony spokesperson Nick Ubaldi said the emergency ordinance would trigger “strong, expensive litigation that the city would likely lose.” The following day, in an email, Ubaldi told the Independent Harmony plans to immediately pursue litigation. In a closed-session earlier that day, Goleta city councilmembers and the city’s attorney, Isaac Rosen, met to discuss possible litigation from Harmony. 

The emergency ordinance passed 4-1, with Councilmember Stuart Kasdin dissenting. Kasdin pointed out that the current residents will not be automatically displaced by converting the park to all-ages. He said that affordable housing is a struggle for low-income people across the board.

“I don’t see why we would want to have preference for a particular group because they don’t want other people who are different from them,or other people who have different behaviors that they don’t like,” he said. “Why would we say we’ll allow you to exclude them?” 

The ordinance is in effect for 45 days, unless the council votes to extend it.