The outside of 361 West 116th Street.
By Joy Bergmann
Landlord John Lasala appeared in Housing Court Thursday morning to discuss how he planned to ameliorate the 165 open violations cited by Housing Preservation and Development at 361 W. 116th, a three-story SRO building.
Seven current SRO tenants have sued Lasala and his corporation, Morningside 116 Associates LLC, seeking repairs and an end to alleged harassment.
While waiting for the matter to be heard, WSR asked Lasala for comment; he has thus far declined.
Several tenants present were not so reticent.
“Everything is rotten in there,” Thomas Tesfagabr, a 62 year-old cab driver, said about his room of 10 years. “But I don’t want to move because the rent is cheap. We just need the repairs. That’s it.”
Leyland Watson, 66, displayed photos from his room, a room featuring a garbage bag where window glass should be. The glass fell out during the summer, he said, after a rotting windowsill finally gave way.
Ahmed Bashir, a 56 year-old Parks Department employee, whipped out his phone and played a video he recorded two months ago of a bat flying around his room. “It’s like a haunted house!”
“The landlord keeps saying work is being done, but it’s not true. Nothing is changing. We’re here to enforce the law,” said Carlota Arias, a tenant organizer with Goddard Riverside.
The ceiling in one tenant’s room.
After three hours, the tenants’ attorneys told their clients to head home. The lawyers, including Lasala, an attorney who works for Citigroup Alternative Investments, would be meeting with HPD to outline a plan.
Thursday afternoon, tenant attorney Tayyaba Khokhar told WSR that Lasala had agreed to make immediate repairs on the 16 Class “C” violations – the most hazardous ones – and to complete them this week. According to the HPD record, these include violations for evident lead paint, rat infestation, lack of hot water, lack of access to building’s heating system in the basement, and broken window sashes and glass.
The tenants also provided dates for Lasala to access their individual units for repairs. Lasala is free to work on common areas during any business hours. “We want to see a good faith effort,” said Khokar. “He’s cooperating right now. But we’ve been here before.”
It seems like this building has been rotting away for years. This is the inevitable result when every apartment in a building is rent regulated.
Starting during WWII it was rent regulation, starting with “Control” that stabilized New York City and the Middle Class
that made it a great and affordable city. It’s the property
owners that neglect their buildings and not the regulations
that cause the dispictable conditions that “working class”
residents have to live in.
At some point these older regulated buildings will become uninhabitable. I wonder what will happen then. This WWII-era rent regulation has been a disastrous public policy and needs to be reformed or phased out completely.
The tenants were in their rent regulated apartments when he bought the building. It this is inevitable he shouldn’t have purchased it.
There you go again…
361 West 116th Street is a SRO/boarding house. It was marketed for sale as an “investment” property in a “distressed” condition.
SRO/boarding house residents were given some protections by the city during the Koch administration. This was largely in reaction to Ed Koch turning a blind eye to wanton and blatant harassment (up to and including threats of physical violence and or sending in goon squads to trash the place) in order to get residents to leave. https://www.nytimes.com/1987/02/05/nyregion/protection-measures-for-sro-tenants-gain.html
Any one of the many previous owners of this building could simply have waited out existing tenants, then sold the building vacant. That or simply waited until the place was empty then file papers with the city to redevelop the property; none of them did.
thought you’d be an Expert Witness for the Defense.
Re: “played a video … of a bat flying around his room. “It’s like a haunted house!”
Good thing he has the video; proves he, as did Quasimodo, DOES have a ‘bat-in-his-belfry’ ?
Speaking of Quasimodo, most do not know this revised and Disney-fied tale of the poor guy:
Having undergone corrective surgery for his severe hunchback, Good Old Quasi is at a cocktail party. But, as he is no longer so deformed, no one seems to recognize him anymore. Frustrated, he engages some Lovely Young Thing in conversation. Which goes:
G.O.Q.: No one at this party seems to know me!
L.Y.T.: What did you say your name was?
G.O.Q.: QUASIMODO !!
L.Y.T.: Why, yes…your name DOES RING A BELL
?
Not for nothing this property has been in trouble for a *VERY* long time. There is a list of outstanding violations going back to 2003 if not before: https://apartable.com/buildings/361-west-116-street-manhattan
Previous owners (now deceased) didn’t pay the property taxes and subsequently the property went though a tax lien sale. They also took out a mortgage and couldn’t pay which lead to default/holder taking the property but then a modification/extension was worked out and owners got the place back.
https://www.taxbills.nyc/1/01943/0011/November%2022,%202013%20-%20Quarterly%20Property%20Tax%20Bill.txt
Mr. Lasala paid 1.22 million for the property and promptly took out a mortgage for $732k on the property. So again please spare me the Pity Me Pines story.
Long story short this is a 115 year old building that looks every bit of it due to lack of maintenance.
Public records online for this property only go back to around 1966. Since then counted about eight or nine owners (including current) all having gone down the same path; purchased the place, took out a mortgage, later sold the place. What they did with the money obtained is anyone’s guess. It obviously was not going into keeping the building up.
It is obvious that current owner purchased the property with the goal of getting rid of current tenants. Afterwards either then fixing up the property and attracting higher rents and or selling it on. You can’t tell me that out of due diligence if nothing else Mr. Lasala did not personally inspect the property and or have various reports prepared noting among other things the violation history.
After submitting this story on Thursday evening, the HPD violation count rose again to 201 open violations including 38 Class C violations.
Joy,
Well done! It is important for these stories to see the light of day. Thanks