7 Huntington Beach Landlords Plead Not Guilty to Violations of Health Code

Seven Huntington Beach landlords, accused of neglecting to repair their dilapidated apartment buildings, pleaded not guilty to 14 criminal charges at a Municipal Court arraignment Friday.

The seven, including three middle-class couples, represented the first landlord group to be arraigned on criminal charges as part of a city crackdown on slum housing, said Theodore M. Endres, a deputy city attorney.

City officials took the unusual step after becoming frustrated by past refusals of landlords along Commodore Circle to clean up more than 700 housing and health code violations.

The landlords arraigned Friday are accused of disobeying a March 10 deadline to eradicate mice and roaches and fix plumbing, rotted ceilings and numerous other hazardous conditions.

Arraigned were Robert Cortez, his wife, Gloria, and brother, Arthur Cortez, who own a building at 7662 Commodore Circle, and Robert Muse and his wife, Janet, and Paul and Donna Amelotte, owners of a building at 7652 Commodore Circle.

Each appeared before Judge David H. Brickner and answered “not guilty” to the charges. Each could receive a maximum sentence of seven years in prison and a $3,500 fine.

In an interview after their arraignment, they denied pocketing rental profits instead of paying for renovations.

“We’re not slumlords,” said Robert Cortez, whose building he and his two partners bought recently.

“Hey, we’re not tycoons,” Cortez said. “We don’t have enough money to pay for people to make repairs. We do them ourselves.”

The landlords said they are middle-class families attempting to improve their economic status. In the past, they said, they have owned apartments but nothing of major size or dwellings targeted for building code enforcement. They said they were caught off guard when the city stuck to its deadline.

“We just didn’t know the city was going to (enforce) its order so fast,” Muse said.

Muse, who manages apartments for a living, said that before buying on Commodore Circle he researched the rental market and bought the building despite its rundown condition.

“I knew it was in bad shape, and we had heard the city was trying to clean up the area, but there are landlords who have been there for seven to eight years and they’ve never fixed their buildings,” Muse said.

For Muse and his wife, Friday’s court appearance was especially frustrating. They and the Amellotes have owned the building only since escrow closed Feb. 1, they said.

“We were going to fix it up and the city had given us an indication that it was possible to get a city loan to help pay for repairs. But escrow closed only a month before the March 10 deadline, and it didn’t give us enough time,” Muse said.

Muse said he had hoped that the city would have repaired the rundown streets and alleys around Commodore Circle as its part to help spur cooperation from landlords who would in turn make needed repairs.

Despite dilapidated conditions on Commodore Circle, monthly rents for the predominantly Latino and Vietnamese tenants range from $495 for two-bedroom units to $600 for a three-bedroom apartment.

Angry neighbors of the buildings have complained for years about depreciating property values, but city officials were unsuccessful at cleaning up the blighted apartments until the city launched its aggressive code enforcement program.

More Arraignments Due

In addition to those arraigned Friday, landlords for seven other buildings have been charged with misdemeanor criminal complaints by the city attorney’s office. More arraignments are scheduled next week, a city housing official said.

Huntington Beach housing officials initially ordered repairs on Oct. 18, informing all 20 landlords that they had 30 days to begin work or face criminal prosecution. Landlords received a final notice Feb. 18 after housing inspectors reported that little progress had been made, said Susan Tully, a housing official.

She said that for five months city staff members and a majority of the owners tried to work out a comprehensive cleanup plan for Commodore Circle.

“They all had ample notice that we intended to prosecute,” she said.

The next court appearance for the landlords arraigned Friday is May 9. They have been free on their own recognizance.