West Hollywood : Building Owner Cites Progress

The owner of a West Hollywood apartment building where city officials say that a young married couple was living in a laundry room said this week that she is striving to correct numerous code violations.

“I’ve got enough problems. I don’t want them bothering me any more,” said Mollie Shimmel, who owns the four-unit building at 1244-1246 N. Fairfax Ave.

After an inspection in November, city officials said Shimmel used makeshift partitions to add seven “bootlegged” units to the building, including the laundry room.

Shimmel, who called the accusations “exaggerated,” said that tenants in all but two of the units have relocated and that she intends to carry out a “major remodeling” of the property.

Shimmel said she told the couple that they could stay temporarily in a spare bedroom and was “as surprised as the next person” when she returned two weeks later to find them living in what had formerly served as the building’s laundry room.

Nancy Greenstein, a member of a city task force attempting to crack down on housing code violations, said Shimmel had agreed to cooperate with city officials, as well as help some tenants to relocate.