Troubled Apartments Anger Neighbors

In a city that proclaims itself the 10th safest in the nation, El Monte residents wonder how long they will have to live next to the crumbling brown nightmare on Gilman Road.

The rat-infested apartment complex, which abuts Twin Lakes Elementary School, lures gang members, drug addicts and parolees with a $299 move-in special. In the morning, broken beer bottles, condoms and hypodermic needles are sometimes left on the school playground next door.

From January through July, police answered 131 calls there. Complaints ranged from domestic violence to terrorist threats to murder. At least one person has been killed since December.

Welcome to 3938 Gilman Road. The property is owned by Sophie C. Wong, a school board member in nearby Alhambra School District and former state Assembly candidate, who along with her husband, Norman J. Wong, own numerous Los Angeles County properties.

She is running for reelection Tuesday.

Under a court order imposed in September 1997, the Wongs no longer manage the building. They pay an outside management firm to do the work, part of a foreclosure proceeding. In July, the city declared the building a public nuisance.

“I have no jurisdiction of the property,” Norman Wong said Thursday. The Wongs, who are still the legal owners, said they defaulted on a bank loan after the city forced them to evict problem tenants.

They said the building had gradually deteriorated despite their best efforts to spend money on improvements. “No matter what we did,” Sophie Wong said, “it didn’t seem to get better.”

Residents in the well-maintained, middle-class neighborhood say they have been repeatedly assaulted and harassed by tenants. Rocks crash through their windows. They hear gunshots at night. Their homes are burglarized.

They have formed a coalition to clean up the building and say police have given little help.

“Up to this moment, we’ve been relying on the police to do something about this,” said resident Reynoldo Negrete, 64. “But their efforts have failed. The problem still exists.”

El Monte Police Capt. Jack Coleman played down the building’s troubles, saying there have been complaints at the address, but “nothing particularly egregious,” mostly parole violations. He said gang activity is not a problem.

But Det. Dan Burlingham wrote in a department memo that in seven months, police have responded to 131 calls, including murder, shots fired, assault with a deadly weapon, kidnapping, robbery, terrorist threats, child abuse and gang activity.

“The neighbors are up in arms about the attitude of the police,” said Mayor Pat Wallach, who shares their concerns. “That bothers me because we should be assisting citizens, not antagonizing them.”

Meanwhile, the superintendent of Mountain View School District, Gary Rapkin, said the 860 students at Twin Lakes are not at risk. He said a 6-foot cinder-block wall the Wongs were ordered to build between the apartments and school has alleviated the problems.

“From our perspective, it’s all been cleared up,” Rapkin said.

He said students are not in danger walking to and from school, and added that he only heard rumors of discarded needles left on the campus but “could never verify them.”

Yet in a memo to the county Department of Health Services on Aug. 7, Rapkin wrote: “Occasionally, we find drug paraphernalia, needles, broken bottles and other refuse that poses a health hazard.”

On Wednesday, numerous broken beer bottles littered the playground along the wall while students played at recess. Next door, a family from Guanajuato, Mexico, ate lunch while hundreds of cockroaches scurried around their recently fumigated apartment. They say they have never lived in such squalor.

A few apartments down, tenant Sara Marquez shrugged while a rat darted along her baseboards. “We pray to God that they clean it here,” she said.

The city’s code enforcement division has a list of repairs, including vermin and cockroach abatement, that the property management company must complete by Nov. 4 to avoid fines.

As for unsavory tenants, Wong said he had screened renters and performed credit checks.

“You think I’d let them in if I knew they were gang members? If I evict all these people, I wouldn’t make payments on my mortgage.”

The neighbors, many who have lived in the area for decades, say they are putting together a lawsuit against the Wongs. Ultimately, they said, they want to demolish the apartments.

“We’ve been living a nightmare for four or five years,” neighbor John Algattos said. “And everyone’s ignoring it.”