Hope Shines on a Slum

At night, 11-year-old Armariles Rosales awaits that drowsy moment when her eyelids become heavy and she slumbers into darkness. It is only then that she is blissfully unaware of the cramped, single-room apartment just south of downtown that she shares with eight other family members, scores of cockroaches and a occasional rat. Only then does she fail to hear the random gunfire on the streets below her third-floor home, or the pulsating music from the boom boxes of the neighborhood gang members.

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“I like it when I get real tired and I just fall asleep,” the girl says.

This is life at the Rutland, an apartment building that for years nobody has wanted to own.

But soon, thanks largely to the efforts of a Century City lawyer and a Fairfax-area legal aid agency, the notorious building may finally have an owner who is willing to upgrade it.

The 127-unit building, constructed during World War I, became a symbol of urban neglect in 1985 when the owner, Dr. Milton Avol, was ordered by a judge to live in it. The building had been hit with hundreds of health, fire, building and safety violations. In 1990, the building was sold to Anthony Barris, who died three years later, leaving behind debts and the apartments still a shambles.

With nearly $1 million in repairs needed to bring the Rutland up to code and a $589,000 tax lien against the property, no one wanted the building.

Enter Julio Goldman, who plans to lead a group to buy and bring the Rutland out of the rut it has been in for more than two decades.

Earlier this year, Bet Tzedek Legal Services, a nonprofit organization that provides legal aid to senior citizens and low-income people, teamed up with attorney Cris Armenta in an effort to salvage the building.

Lauren Saunders, a Bet Tzedek attorney, and Armenta, who works for the Century City firm of Alschuler, Grossman & Pines, found a group of investors headed by Goldman, a general contractor who came to America from Israel in 1980.

“I checked him out, and found he had done a good job fixing up some run-down properties in Hollywood,” said Armenta.

Goldman expects to recover his investment by increasing the building’s meager 40% occupancy rate. He pledges that monthly rents, which range from $325 to $400, will not be raised.

“We are doing this because it makes good economic sense to do so,” he said.

The Rutland, which has endured years of neglect, will be getting a complete make-over.

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Once he purchases the building, Goldman first plans to fix the roof. Other major work will be done on the Rutland’s electrical and plumbing systems. Paint problems and vermin infestation are also on the list.

Last week, Goldman, Saunders, and Armenta met with the Los Angles city attorney’s Slum Task Force in an effort to get the rehabilitation ball swinging.

As a result, a team of building and safety inspectors will issue a report on needed improvements.

“The building has been in despair so long, I can’t wait for this to be over,” said Armenta. “The tenants are the only ones that suffer.”

The carpeted staircases reek with the stench of urine. Graffiti stains the peeling walls. Several windows are broken. Gang members loiter outside at night.

“There are roaches all over the place, “ said young Armariles. “I don’t like it, but I have to live here.”