Keep the Heat on Haster Gardens

Even when fire, flood or earthquake strike, apartment tenants usually get heat and electricity restored within days or weeks. Absent natural disasters, there’s no excuse for depriving renters of those basic utilities for months on end.

But occupants of some of the 148 units at the Haster Gardens apartment complex in Garden Grove charge that those are the conditions in which they live.

The new owners and managers of the complex say some problems are being exaggerated and whatever is wrong is the fault of previous owners and managers.

The city of Garden Grove rightly has filed a civil lawsuit against past and present property owners and managers. That came after the city tried for nearly a year to get problems corrected. Orange County, too, properly is examining the extent of a public health hazard at the complex.

City building inspectors have ruled 28 apartments uninhabitable because of health and safety problems. The city considers the complex the worst slum housing in Garden Grove.

One-bedroom apartments at Haster Gardens can rent for a bit more than $500 to upward of $800 monthly. Most of the tenants are poor; many are immigrants.

A number of residents say they want to move but cannot afford to pay security deposits and one or two months’ rent needed to relocate to another apartment.

Orange County long has been known for its lack of affordable housing, especially for those holding minimum-wage jobs. The Haster Gardens owners say they have spent about $100,000 on repairs in the past few months, repairing roofs, leaky pipes and water heaters.

But tenants said that while they welcomed the change in ownership initially, repairs have taken too long. They point to broken doors and smoke detectors; they complain of roaches and rats. Several have begun withholding rent in an effort to press for speedier repairs.

There’s no need for low-cost housing to be a slum. Garden Grove has succeeded in the past in getting other landlords to improve properties and make them safe for residents. City officials should keep up the pressure until Haster Gardens residents have apartments that don’t threaten their health or safety.