GARDEN GROVE : Center Files Suit to Block Eviction

Lawyers for a center that serves about 50 homeless and mentally ill people filed suit Friday in Superior Court to block eviction by the city.

Mental health officials charged at a press conference that the City Council caved in to the “irrational and unfounded” fears of neighboring residents in January when it refused to grant the center a conditional-use permit to continue to operate.

At the time, city officials gave the mental health officials 90 days to find a new location or to be evicted.

The 90-day period ends Monday, but mental health officials say they have no place to go.

Lawyers charged that city officials are violating the federal Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, as well as state laws, by taking discriminatory action against mentally ill people.

“We believe that it is time that local governments be held accountable for the responsibility they have to all people in their communities, including the disabled,” said John A. Garrett, executive director of the private, nonprofit Mental Health Assn. of Orange County, which has a contract with the county to operate the center. “The MHA of Orange County is not going to settle for this kind of abusive treatment from City Hall.”

Garrett said his organization’s board of directors “is ready to fight City Hall with whatever it takes . . . and we are ready to win.”

He and other mental health officials are scheduled to meet with city officials Wednesday in an attempt to head off eviction or to find a new home.

Garrett said he wants the city to pay the relocation costs and payments remaining on a five-year lease at the center’s location at 10672 Chapman Ave.

The cost could be as high as $200,000 if no new tenant is found to assume lease payments on the building, he said.

City officials, facing a possible $7-million deficit in next year’s budget, say they cannot afford the expense.

Mayor Pro Tem Robert F. Dinsen said Friday that he believes that the Mental Health Assn. is using the lawsuit as a way to get the city to pay for relocation. “It looks like they are trying to take the city,” he said.

Dinsen said he and his colleagues refused to grant a conditional-use permit because the center “was disturbing the neighbors too much.”

Residents in homes that back up to the center’s building had told officials that clients roam their neighborhood and cause them to feel threatened.

Dr. Ike Kempler, a psychiatrist and physician who said he pays weekly visits to the center, asserted that the clients are not prone to violence.

“They are unfortunate members of the family who have a brain disease,” he said. “They are the sons, daughters, mothers and fathers who need help. The city should support and embrace and not push away this kind of facility.”