Tenants Protest Ditmas Park Super Who Wears Body Camera & Allegedly Harasses Tenants
Last Saturday, tenants and organizers held a protest outside 60 Turner Place between Coney Island Avenue and Stratford Road, demanding the swift firing of a super who has allegedly been harassing tenants.
The super, Herchin Ablai, was the subject of an in-depth article by Gothamist last year that reported cases of harassment and discrimination in the building, including Ablai yelling at people talking in the lobby, using racial slurs, and targeting black tenants.
In addition, Ablai spat in a tenant’s face and grabbed another’s arm, tenant organizer Hazel Duke told DPC yesterday. “He’s incompetent and unresponsive. When we need things done, we have to call management to send an outside person or the fire department,” said Duke.
In addition to the harassment from the super, tenants believe that the landlord is trying to evict rent-stabilized people from the building. Duke said she has been working with neighbors at the 130-unit building for two years.
On October 29, tenants and organizers from the Brooklyn Anti-Gentrification Network chanted and held signs calling Herbert Donner of ADI Management a “gentrification goblin.” ADI Management is the management company for 60 Turner Place, according to Progress Queens.
“We are here to tell the landlord and the city that we will not tolerate this harassment and discrimination,” said Duke. ” We will fight back. Each day in court to defend yourself that you’ve paid rent, or to try again and again to get repairs, is a day of stress and a day without pay,” she said.
This isn’t the first time that the Ditmas Park building, 60 Turner Place, has been under scrutiny for mismanagement. Gothamist reported that Double A Properties and ADI Management bought the building in 1979 at a foreclosure auction. Then, the building was managed by the “Dracula landlord,” Leonard Spodek, in the 80s and 90s, who eventually served two jail stints and was fined more than $1.4 million for violations in his Brooklyn buildings. The current super, Herchin Ablai, started managing the building about 10 years ago.
In addition, ADI Management was sued by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for New York’s eastern district in 2002 for housing discrimination that violated the Fair Housing Act, reports Progress Queens. The case was successfully won by the tenant.
We reached out to ADI Management but didn’t hear back in time for publication.
Correction: An earlier version of this article spelled Ablai as Alabai.
