Renters to city: ‘It’s a disgusting mess’

As Gresham considers a new rental maintenance code, fed-up renters rally at a Catholic church, wearing masks to avoid identification by their landlords

By Mara Stine

The Gresham Outlook, Aug 31, 2007, Updated Oct 30, 2009 (22 Reader comments)

Carole Archer / The Outlook

Joanne Summers of Rockwood speaks at a town hall meeting sponsored by the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) Thursday, Aug. 30, at St. Anne’s Catholic Church. Marilyn LeBaron, ACORN Vice President and Treasurer, passes the microphone at the town hall gathering. Renters wore masks to avoid identification by landlords.

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Maria Lara Caro, a mother of four, doesn’t know why her landlord is evicting her family.

Sure, she’s requested repairs that were never made, she said in Spanish through a translator at a Thursday, Aug. 30, housing rally in Rockwood. But whether those complaints sparked her eviction, she doesn’t know, and the landlord isn’t saying.

She does know she must be out of her Troutdale apartment, her home for 10 years, by Sunday, Sept. 30.

“I think we pay rent and are entitled to repairs – nothing fancy, just so things are in working order,” she said.

Gresham city councilors seem to agree.

On Tuesday, Sept. 11, councilors will consider proposals for rental housing interior maintenance codes and an inspection program.

Residents should be able to request repairs without fear of retaliation or retribution in the form of higher rents or eviction, said Gresham Mayor Shane T. Bemis.

“The magnitude of the situation is grave as far as I’m concerned,” Bemis said while recalling a tour of poorly maintained apartments in Gresham last year. “The worst of the worst is in our city.”

At Thursday night’s rally, organized by the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN), Lara Caro told about 50 people, including Gresham City Council President Shirley Craddick and councilors Paul Warr-King and Richard Strathern, about her horrible cabinets, worn carpet, windows that don’t close and bathrooms in need of repair.

When she complained about cockroaches, her landlord – whom she only sees when the rent is due – told her to clean her greasy, dirty kitchen. An insulted Lara Caro maintains that her kitchen has always been clean. She scrubs daily, but it does no good if the entire complex is infested.

As for possible maintenance codes and inspections, Caro is all for them.

“I would like someone to inspect my apartment and see if it’s fit to live in,” she said. “I think it’s a disgusting mess.”

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Gresham city councilors have talked about creating minimum housing maintenance standards for at least 10 years, but since 2003’s creation of a Rockwood urban renewal district, the city has become better acquainted with issues facing Gresham’s poorest neighborhood and elsewhere, Bemis said.

Individual poverty rates in Gresham jumped 48 percent – from 12.5 percent to 18.5 percent – between 2003 and 2005. The percentage of children living in poverty shot up 73.8 percent – from less than a fifth to nearly a third – in the same time period.

Mid and east Multnomah County’s cheaper rents also attract poor residents from North and Northeast Portland, said Jean DeMaster, executive director of Human Solutions, a local organization that offers affordable housing, among other services.

“We hear a lot of stories about horrible conditions in rental housing,” she said, relaying examples of water leaks, mold, exposed electrical wiring and inoperable plumbing.

Language skills also come into play as more Hispanic, Eastern European and African immigrants settle into the area.

“It’s hard to argue for your rights when you don’t speak English as a first language,” DeMaster said.

Gresham wants to create an interior housing code to address such basics as electricity and plumbing, as well as health and safety issues.

“Just overall dignity concerns,” Bemis said. “Nobody should live like that.”

Tough maintenance codes, coupled with an inspection program, would allow city officials to make sure properties are up to livable standards without placing residents in the awkward position of reporting problems. The city could then fine landlords who don’t make timely repairs.

Gresham already collects an annual $25 licensing fee per rental unit, but the $350,000 to $380,000 in yearly proceeds pays for services such as police, fire and parks.

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