ANAHEIM : Tenants Face Ouster as City Cuts Utilities

About 50 tenants are facing eviction from a low-rent motel where water and electricity were shut off by the city this week after the landlord failed to pay his utility bills.

Power and water to the Razzmatazz Motel, 823 S. Beach Blvd., were cut off about 1:30 p.m. Wednesday, city officials said. Under county health codes, a motel without water service is considered unsanitary and its residents must be moved out.

Officials would not say how much landlord Daud Alani owes the city. Alani was unavailable for comment.

“The landlord had final notices. We try to work with our customers and give them every opportunity to pay their bills,” said Suzie Brown, a spokeswoman for the Anaheim Public Utilities Department, which supplies both water and power to city residents.

On Thursday, the 50 remaining motel tenants, many of whom receive welfare benefits, were upset by the city’s action. Tenants reported being in need of food and water and said they were trying to cope with the outage as best they could.

“They caused the unsanitary conditions, then they came here to kick everyone out,” said tenant Larry McKee, 40, who until April ran a dinner theater next door to the motel. “This is a real disservice to these people. They are caught in the middle.”

McKee said tenants asked the city to restore power until June 1, when many tenants will receive their welfare checks and can afford to move. But city officials said they made their decision based solely on the landlord’s failure to pay and had no choice but to eliminate power and water service.

“It’s an unfortunate situation,” Brown said. “We can’t legally subsidize anyone using other ratepayers’ money. It would be considered a gift of public funds.” Officials had been negotiating with Alani for several months, but were unable to get him to pay, Brown said.

The city’s action marked the second time in 10 days that water and power were cut off at the motel. The city cut off service May 17, but a tenant illegally restored power. The city allowed it to remain on after officials discovered that a woman living there was dependent on an electrically powered oxygen tank.

The 47-year-old woman, a diabetic, was relocated to another Anaheim hotel Tuesday, Brown said.