Mold. Cockroaches. Broken windows. Faulty plumbing.
These are only among the problems that residents of three apartment buildings on a residential street in East Palo Alto have lived with for years. Complaints, they are saying, have gone unheard for too long.
On Thursday afternoon, about 10 residents gathered on the office of the property's owner, Sand Hill Property Company, to deliver a listing of demands. The dozens of requests included repairs, pest control and improved security.
“Now they've heard it,” said Maggie Bande, considered one of the residents who read the letter on Thursday. “It kind of gives us a little peace.”
The organizing movement began when residents received notice that the buildings they lived in, three buildings along East Okeefe Street, on the marketUnsure of what this notice meant for the long run of their buildings, tenants contacted local social group Youth United for Community Action, which in turn contacted the Bay Area Regional Tenant Organizing Network (TRO).
As the TRO continued to ask questions, it became clear that tenants were living in poor conditions, TRO Director James Huynh said. Last month, about 50 tenants – out of about 60 total units – signed a petition to form a union, Huynh said. The tenants sent a listing of demands to Sand Hill last Tuesday but didn’t receive what they considered to be an adequate response, resulting in an in-person demonstration outside the corporate's swanky Palo Alto office on Thursday.
“We are committed to ensuring that all Woodland Park Apartments are safe and livable at all times,” a spokesperson for Sand Hill Property Company wrote to this news organization. “These buildings are managed by Greystar Property Management, who works hard to track and complete all work orders in a timely manner and has either already completed or is in the process of completing all outstanding maintenance requests.”
Greystar Property Management didn’t immediately reply to a request for comment.
Tenants and organizers crowded into the office lobby as two tenants began reading their demands in English and Spanish. A dozen members of Youth United for Community Action held up a banner that read “E. OKEEFE TENANT ASSOCIATION.” A handful of employees filed into the lobby, where silence fell as residents read a protracted list of their grievances.
“It was a challenge for me to go there,” said considered one of the tenants, Jesús Villalón, in Spanish. “I just wanted to make sure my voice was heard.”
On considered one of the office partitions, a flat-screen TV played a slideshow of Sand Hill Property Company's other properties. Their portfolio includes dozens of Silicon Valley properties that conjure up images of tech utopias. The Innovation Curve, a fancy of futuristic buildings on the sting of Stanford Research Park. A Whole Foods in Cupertino, in addition to the quaint mixed-use mall at the top of the block. Two movie theaters. One property stands out of their portfolio – the 1,800-unit, rent-controlled Woodland Park Apartments, which incorporates the buildings on East Okeefe Street in-built the early Nineteen Sixties.
Freddy Roman, a 38-year-old landscaper, has lived on East Okeefe Street for 13 years. He says there have been unresolved maintenance issues throughout his time living at his apartment.
“The situation is uninhabitable,” Roman said in Spanish. “They don't care about us.”
When he reports a maintenance issue, someone comes over to repair it, Roman says, but the issue isn't permanently solved. And now the stakes are even higher – Roman and his wife predict their first child, a baby girl, in only over every week.
“She must be in good shape,” Roman said.
Despite the issues, the Roman family is reluctant to think about moving. The old constructing is under town's rent stabilization law – the couple pays $1,500 a month in rent for a one-bedroom apartment.
Villalón, who works as a valet, hasn't considered moving either. He has lived on East Okeefe Street since moving to the U.S. from Mexico in fifth grade. He lives together with his aunt in a two-bedroom apartment that costs $2,200 a month and has other members of the family on the road. Villalón says there's no point in moving, regardless that his windows don't close all the way in which, making for cold winters.
“It's a place where I feel at home,” he said. “I don't want to leave.”
Jason Villarreal, COO of Sand Hill Property Company, and Igor Aleksandrov, CFO, were present on the reading on Thursday. They introduced themselves and said they were open to working with the association and resolving residents' concerns.
Huynh said the response from Villarreal and Aleksandrov on Thursday was a superb sign.
“I think everything went as well as it could. I hope they keep their word,” Huynh said.
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