What Do Tenants In Our Neighborhood Face? Collapsed Ceilings, Harassment, Black Mold & More

Lloyd Smith glanced down at his piece of paper and, in his ever quiet and steadfast voice, looked at state Sen. Kevin Parker and said, “Will you be our advocate, senator?”

It was a version of a question he asked during much of the Flatbush Tenant Coalition’s trip to Albany on Tuesday, and, no matter how much political speak was thrown his way, he continued to say it until he got an answer. And, when he did get a response, Smith, who lives in an apartment on E. 18th Street between Albemarle and Beverley, would press further.

How, exactly, would the lawmakers who are about to vote on the state’s rent regulation laws support tenants who are facing illegal eviction and harassment from landlords and unsafe living conditions and unfair fines tacked onto their rent? How would they address landlords not cashing checks from tenants they want out of their buildings and then taking them to housing court over it? How would they ensure that people will not be illegally pushed from their homes in order for landlords to rent their apartments at a far higher price?

“The weak rent laws create displacement and harassment,” Smith told such legislators as Parker and Assemblyman William Colton.

And Smith isn’t saying that based on hearsay – he knows all too well about the lack of tenant rights and the harassment of residents in our neighborhood.

“In our building, the owner, he’s trying to get MCIs (major capital improvements) from us,” even though the projects that the landlord, David Walke, claims to have done have not actually occurred – or haven’t been done for the lavish price tag that he claims, Smith said. Walke could not be reached for comment.

“We’re fighting him with all the might we have,” the neighbor continued. “You’ll send your rent check, and he’ll hold onto it and not cash it. You have to get certificate of mailing because of this – I advise everyone to do that.”

Stories like Smith’s come fast and furious throughout the day, with tenants speaking about everything from collapsed ceilings to landlords dragging them to the notoriously problem-plagued housing court for years.

Jean Folkes, who has lived on E. 18th Street near Cortelyou Road since 1977, said her landlord how now begun “packing people in like sardines,” placing an illegal number of tenants into small apartments.

“He cut a studio into three rooms,” Folkes said of the landlord, Ivan Leist. “A two bedroom apartment they made into rooms, and it’s now a transient hotel.”

“When it rains, the ceiling leaks,” she continued. “We don’t have any ventilation… This man, our landlord now, he bought the building in 2003. You cannot talk to him – he won’t talk to you about anything. People are scared. I’ve seen mold on people’s walls. We have many problems.”

Leist could not be reached for comment.

Hilary Gibbs, who has lived in the Homewood Gardens housing complex in Prospect-Lefferts Gardens for 40 years, has, since 2009, been in and out of court with her landlord, Yeshaya Wasserman – who recently was ordered, following a state investigation, to pay $60,000 in restitution to tenants after being accused of longtime harassment. The Flatbush Tenant Coalition aided the state during their investigation of Wasserman, who neighbors said continues, despite the investigation, to harass longtime tenants in an effort to push them from their rent regulated homes to make way for higher paying clientele.

“Wasserman bought our building in 2009 and immediately took us to court – immediately,” Gibbs said. “… All the older people, who were there before me, he told them, “Get out of my f-ing building,’ and they were scared, so they left.”

Among the litany of problems Gibbs has faced under Wasserman’s tenure as landlord include her ceiling collapsing on April 28, 2010.

“The living room ceiling collapsed at 2:30 in the morning,” said Gibbs, who works as a traveling nurse. “All this dust came and covered me. I had just come home from work – normally I sit in the living room, but I didn’t that night. It could’ve collapsed on me.”

Like Smith’s landlord, Wasserman, who too could not be reached for comment, is holding onto tenants’ rent checks and then claiming they never paid, Gibbs said.

“Everyone’s doing that – and they’re getting away with it,” she said.

“He’s stopped doing repairs,” she continued. “They’ve been supposed to do repairs in my kitchen since 2009.”

Gibbs also stressed that, for many tenants, pursuing court action because of landlord harassment is a time-consuming, and sometimes expensive, pursuit that many just cannot afford to do.

“Thank goodness I’m a travel nurse – if I was a regular nurse, I would’ve been fired because I had to be in court every fricking month. Most people can’t do that.”