Salvaging Homes From Wreckage

The row of concrete-block buildings known as the Esplanade Street Apartments looked beyond salvation.

Walls at the complex in Orange were filled with termites and bathroom floors were almost entirely rotted out. Bedrooms were blanketed by mold and full of the stench of sewage. A decaying swimming pool filled with slimy water and litter sat in the middle of the beaten-down complex.

Even police were wary of entering the place. When they investigated possible code violations, bottles and rocks were thrown at their patrol cars by some of the residents.

But two years ago, when housing officials tried to buy and clean up the apartments for low-income families, they couldn’t get the owners to sell.

“Why would they?” said Linda Boone, economic development director for the city. “They put all those people in each unit, charge $200 a head and make a bundle of money.”

As many as a dozen people were crammed into each of the 27 apartments. Some were living there in shifts. The place was a gold mine for the landlord, city officials said.

It’s a common problem in rapidly urbanizing suburbs trying to create affordable housing for low-income workers. It’s not a matter of paying for it. The money is often there. It’s about finding sites suitable for rehabilitation in cities where no vacant land is on the market.

A city like Orange would seem to have plenty of good candidates in its many outdated, blighted complexes. The city has been scoping out many of them, block by block. But owners, who could not be reached for comment, rarely return phone calls. The city has had to turn down state housing funds because local officials couldn’t find places to put the money to use.

Such was the case at Esplanade. Until the city took a more aggressive tack.

The effort focused largely on code enforcement. A bicycle patrol was established just to deal with the neighborhood, and code enforcement officers with the Police Department began visiting the complex weekly.

“It was safer on bikes because we could turn around and get out quicker if people started throwing bottles,” said Michelle Fetherolf, a code enforcement officer.

Violation after violation was written; the fines mounted. A thick file of them sits in City Hall.

“We had a tub in an upstairs apartment fall through to the floor below,” Fetherolf said.

With the citations and fines adding up--and after the city took the owners to court a few times--the Orange Housing Development Corp. was able to interest the owners in opening sale negotiations in the spring of 2000. The nonprofit group was formed by the city a decade ago to handle the creation and maintenance of affordable housing.

“The advantage of having us do this over the city is it is all we do,” said Eunice Bobert, CEO of the nonprofit. The city helps fund the projects, then lets Bobert’s group take it from there.

It cost $1.9 million to buy the 27 apartments on Esplanade Street. Grant money the city had secured from Orange County covered the first $500,000. The rest came in the form of a loan from the Orange Redevelopment Agency.

Another city loan of $880,000 was used to rehabilitate the complex into a livable community.

“They had to totally gut and redo every unit without displacing the tenants,” Boone said. The housing development corporation did, however, eventually evict people who were not on the leases, and asked rule-breakers to leave.

Advocates for the poor often oppose such practices. They ask where the families that are kicked out are supposed to go. Those involved with the project, however, say ending the overcrowding was essential to turning the community around.

“These units were in such bad condition that tenants were eager for us to get in there and fix the place up,” Bobert said.

The loans taken out to buy and repair the apartments will be repaid through rents. All the apartments will rent for less than $850 to low-income residents. Rents will stay at that level, adjusted for inflation, for at least 55 years.

By the time Gilma Aguilar, 26, moved in with her two young children six months ago, the apartments were sparkling. The rotted swimming pool has been replaced with a playground and laundry room, and a small lawn and flower garden has replaced a gravel patch.

“People said they couldn’t believe I was moving to this place because it used to be so bad,” Aguilar said. “Then they came and visited me and they were like, ‘Wow, this is really nice.’ ”

Last week, city officials and housing advocates dined at the complex to celebrate its transformation into a model community.