Building collapse// concert fire // History repeats, repeats, repeats

[tmurray]

The media always jump on "over zealous" FPOs that are doing their job and in this case, when they aren't, they jump all over them again. I understand that this is just what gets readership/viewership, but it shows a serious lack of intergrity.

 

[cda]

Conarb, hope you have a place to stay,,,



''''''
In October 2015 and again last September, residents complained that the heat didn’t work in their units. Code enforcement staff did not follow up to ensure the heat was fixed or check the heat in other units.'''''''''''


By Andrea Castillo

acastillo@fresnobee.com

Fresno officials red-tagged a central Fresno motel Thursday after deeming it a fire hazard, effectively shutting it down.

City Manager Bruce Rudd said bad wiring has made Hotel California, near Roeding Park at 530 N. Weber Ave., unsafe. The hotel owner must relocate residents by Monday. Otherwise, the city will work with local agencies to find them new shelter and charge the owner for any costs.


It is the latest problem for the hotel’s residents, many of whom have lived without working heat for more than a year.
Kumar Sharma of Los Angeles County and his wife have owned the 49-unit complex since September 2015. A local housing advocate alerted city leaders last month about the lack of heat and other substandard conditions there.

Sharma, who lives most of the time on the property, complied with the city’s demands for heat. Rudd said that as of Wednesday, all but six units have working heaters. But when a building inspector visited the property that day to ensure the work was being done correctly, he noticed the units had the wrong subpanels (breaker boxes), which were installed without a permit before Sharma bought the building.

Rudd said these subpanels don’t provide protection against electricity overloads. Breaker boxes that work correctly shut off power if too much electricity is being used because, for example, someone is blow-drying their hair while watching TV with the lights on and running the heater and refrigerator.


“The panels that were installed don’t have that, so you could literally pull 100 amps (of electricity) through that panel,” he said. “And when you start pulling that kind of amperage, there is the possibility of a fire occurring within the walls.”

Sharma also had to hire a security guard to keep constant watch on the motel in case a fire breaks out. He was directed to unplug all appliances he allowed, including refrigerators, hot plates and air conditioning units.

Paul Salazar, who has lived at the motel for a year and a half, complained about having to unplug his refrigerator, which is stocked with $150 in groceries, now even though he doesn’t have to move out until Monday. “I feel like I’m being burned,” he said.

Sharma said he will ask the previous owner if she can complete the repairs. He said he isn’t sure how much it might cost to repair but estimated around $30,000.


“This is not my mistake,” he said. “I am not doing anything illegal.”
Elaine Robles-McGraw, the city’s community revitalization manager until 2015, said she told city officials a month ago to inspect the building’s electrical and plumbing systems. And residents told code inspectors the system short-circuits when they have too many appliances on at once. But Rudd said building inspectors have different expertise than code enforcement inspectors.

Rudd has a list of 10 other motels, many along Blackstone Avenue or North Parkway Drive, that likely have health and safety violations. He said he doubts Sharma will operate Hotel California strictly as a motel in the future.

“He may be willing to address code issues, but he would need to address the underlying issue that it’s not actually operating as a motel,” he said. “We have to come up with a long-term strategy to address this and all the other substandard housing challenges.”

Sharma said he won’t convert the motel into an apartment complex. Instead, he’ll allow people to stay for no longer than 28 days. On Thursday, one woman said she was recently told to stay at another motel for one night after 28 days at Hotel California. She said Sharma allowed her to come back the next day.

The Hotel California situation is the latest problem with low-income housing stock to come to light in Fresno. The Bee’s series “Living in Misery” showed how many renters live in unsafe housing in the city.
Moving forward
Rudd and other city officials met with low-income housing advocates Wednesday and Thursday, including the Housing Authority, Live Again Fresno, Faith in Community, WestCare Foundation and Fresno Madera Continuum of Care. The city needs help coordinating relocation of the motel residents.

This isn’t the first time motel residents in Fresno have had to be relocated. In 2014, the city shelled out almost $30,000 to temporarily relocate tenants of the condemned Fresno Inn after owners failed to provide the money. And in 2009, city officials condemned the Storyland Inn. Some tenants were relocated to Hotel California, then called the Sahara Motel.

Rudd said the city won’t do what has been done in the past – move long-term residents from one motel to another. Instead, the city is reaching out to landlords willing to waive deposits and get the residents what they truly need: permanent housing.

“Doing what we’ve done in the past doesn’t make any sense,” he said. “We’re just contributing to the problem.”

City officials don’t have much time to make that happen. Thursday morning, code enforcement officials taped red-and-white signs to each door that read, “Cease occupancy by 9 a.m. on Monday 1-9-17.”
Nearly 20 residents also met with attorneys for Central California Legal Services, who explained their rights as tenants. Attorney Marcos Segura said they are owed one month’s rent plus enough money for a down payment on utilities and a security deposit.

The residents said Sharma had offered to refund that month’s rent if they move out. Segura advised against it.

“If you take that money, whatever he’s trying to give you, he might have an argument saying, ‘Well, I gave them their money back and that’s the relocation they accepted, so I don’t owe them the other amount.’ ”
The Hotel California has had a history of trouble, including drug dealing and two murders since 1990. Records for 26 cases illustrate the motel’s code-enforcement history as far back as 1996. The same issues come up again and again: inoperable heat, water leaks, vermin including bed bugs, and electricity and water services shut off because the owner didn’t pay the bills. In 2005, the city sued the owners because the motel was the site of frequent crimes, such as prostitution and drug violations, and because conditions were substandard.

In October 2015 and again last September, residents complained that the heat didn’t work in their units. Code enforcement staff did not follow up to ensure the heat was fixed or check the heat in other units.

Motel residents say they’d live elsewhere if they could. Some have disabilities.Some have children.Some have lived there for months or several years. Many say they arrived at the motel seeking temporary shelter until they could find an apartment, but fixed incomes, bad credit or a history of evictions keep them from finding better housing.

Andrea Castillo: 559-441-6279, @andreamcastillo

http://www.fresnobee.com/news/special-reports/housing-blight/article124733654.html

 

[CityKin]

Maybe the problem is California law. Our fire department enters every single commercial building in the city every year. True, they do not enter residences, but every warehouse, retail store, office, hospital, school, factory, artist studios, whatever... Rarely does anyone refuse, and if they do, they can get a warrant. Sometimes a place appears vacant and locked, and then it is put on a watch list and the police and the building dept keep an eye on it from the outside.

It does seem that the price of living space in the bay area is a driving force. Here in the midwest, there are tons of cheap houses and that is not really a problem.

It also seems that prioritizing Fire Dept budget to have inspectors is an issue.

 

[conarb]

I think you guys are misinterpreting me, I suppose it's my confrontational legal writing style, but I'm on your side on this.

• I'm familiar with the area and read the local paper, today for the first time in days there were no articles about the Ghost Ship, it's fire or it's dislocated people. The only thing close was an article about a landlord's group filing suit in Richmond, a few miles north, challenging a rent control ordinance that passed November 8th, one of their contentions is that landlords have to bear the costs of code mandated upgrades.
• None of the articles lately have been about the cause fo the fire, I guess it's been determined that it was electrical since the building had no electric meter but was served by a small extension cord run from an adjoining property, all of the articles have been about the fear of 1) landlords evicting them out of fear of liability (already happening) and 2) inspectors condemning their buildings. Oakland's, and surrounding city's, major concerns these days is affordable housing.
• We have a problem, bring the buildings up to code and you will increase the rents displacing people, don't bring the buildings up to code and disasters like this can and will happen. There are problems with a compromise approach, what if the city decides to enforce fire codes only? That may not even be legal to send inspectors in and ignore other code violations, and from a liability standpoint what if an inspector forces a fire code upgrade and then there is a major earthquake causing a structural collapse? If the building is brought up to fire and seismic requirements and a disabled guy rolls in and sues the city for not making handicap upgrades? Surly some of those rock music are environmentalists, what if they sue the city for not enforcing the Green Code? What if somebody spots asbestos on the pipes, or suspects lead in the paint?
  
• The problem appears irresolvable to me, do nothing and potentially let people die, or force code compliance and the city becomes a Detroit with many square miles of abandoned buildings and people sleeping on the streets. The city sees it's number one priority as affordable housing.

 

[CityKin]

Once a building is built and has a certificate of occupancy the building department is done. It should only be the Fire Department doing the annual saftey inspections and they should be looking only to enforce the Fire Code.

True, if they see work obviously done without permit, or a change of use, then all bets are off and the Building Official must decide if he will vacate the structure or issue orders etc.

A change of use triggers full upgrade, there is no way around it.

 

[conarb]

Once a building is built and has a certificate of occupancy the building department is done. It should only be the Fire Department doing the annual saftey inspections and they should be looking only to enforce the Fire Code.

True, if they see work obviously done without permit, or a change of use, then all bets are off and the Building Official must decide if he will vacate the structure or issue orders etc.

A change of use triggers full upgrade, there is no way around it.

There is a firehouse less than a block away, they couldn't miss the coming and goings all hours of the days and nights, plus they had numerous complaints of junk and garbage piling up in an adjacent vacant lot. I don't blame them for locking themselves in the firehouse, there are sounds of shooting going on around there at all hours, the cops won't roll their windows down or get out fo their cars there. Also it's noticeable that there was no toxic foam burning like most rock music venues (think Station House in Rhode Island), the noise of that electronic music blaring with no sound insulation would wake the dead.

There is a small community named Canyon on the back (east) side of the Oakland Hills, Canyon was populated by Hippies in the 60s and many are still there in shacks, I called for a final on a home in Moraga which is the last "civilized" community on the road to Canyon, the inspector was a pretty gal with short pants on that day, after walking the house with me she said: "Tell you what Dick, I'll sign you off but you have to accompany me to my next stop to red tag a house in Canyon", I said: "You don't want me, you want a cop with a gun, those Hippies are growing pot and have guns." She said: "No they won't give me a cop," I said: "Okay get in my truck and when we get there run up and tape your red tag on the shack and get right back into my truck and I'll get you out of there." Dealing with druggies is very dangerous, I wouldn't send Tiger to inspect the Ghost Ship.

 

[SCBO1]

Wow, after reading that tale, cda was right diffidently "Nick Nolte" would be cast to play conarb

 

[sergoodo]

Reminds me of a story except there were no victims. The Three Little Pigs choices determined the fate of their housing choices.

 

[cda]

Reminds me of a story except there were no victims. The Three Little Pigs choices determined the fate of their housing choices.

They did not have seismic or hurricane standards back then

 

[conarb]

Reminds me of a story except there were no victims. The Three Little Pigs choices determined the fate of their housing choices.

Well I can't say that I disagree, those who make bad lifestyle choices deserve their fate. This all comes from the Hippie saying: "Turn on, tune in, drop out." (Take drugs, listen to rock music, don't work). If that's the case why do we make special provisions for disabled people who eat themselves into obesity, or for that matter dumb people who choose to build a poor quality house, or fall for the solar panel scam?

The problem is if the city goes around condemning all these substandard buildings the owners will just abandon them, nobody is going to pay the price of legalizing them, the occupants will live on the streets or squat in the buildings, and the city will end up like Detroit with acres of dilapidated buildings.

 

[tmurray]

The problem is if the city goes around condemning all these substandard buildings the owners will just abandon them, nobody is going to pay the price of legalizing them, the occupants will live on the streets or squat in the buildings, and the city will end up like Detroit with acres of dilapidated buildings.

We do this and have the power to demolish if the owner does not mitigate the hazard to public safety. Typically, the land the building is sitting on is worth more than the building and the land together. Once the building has been demolished, we usually see people want to come develop the lot. The end result is code compliant buildings and a bigger tax base. There is a rigorous appeals process and the costs of the demolition get applied to the property tax. If the tax goes unpaid, it is simply sold at a property tax auction.

 

[conarb]

We do this and have the power to demolish if the owner does not mitigate the hazard to public safety. Typically, the land the building is sitting on is worth more than the building and the land together. Once the building has been demolished, we usually see people want to come develop the lot. The end result is code compliant buildings and a bigger tax base. There is a rigorous appeals process and the costs of the demolition get applied to the property tax. If the tax goes unpaid, it is simply sold at a property tax auction.

T Murray:

That's undoubtedly true for Canada and better neighborhoods here, but the reality is that in "bad" neighborhoods, like the Fruitvale District in Oakland, the land is still worthless after the building is demolished. It's ironic that residents fight gentrification on the basis that it drives up values displacing the poor that live there, this is a huge issue for Oakland since tech companies like Google and Apple are running daily commute buses into Oakland, these lower level tech workers earn about $125,000 a year and are able to buy up older buildings and fix them up, even willing to move into a high crime area to own property, the current minority population is fighting gentrification because they are no-longer able to afford to live there and there is nowhere else for them to go.

 

[tmurray]

T Murray:

That's undoubtedly true for Canada and better neighborhoods here, but the reality is that in "bad" neighborhoods, like the Fruitvale District in Oakland, the land is still worthless after the building is demolished. It's ironic that residents fight gentrification on the basis that it drives up values displacing the poor that live there, this is a huge issue for Oakland since tech companies like Google and Apple are running daily commute buses into Oakland, these lower level tech workers earn about $125,000 a year and are able to buy up older buildings and fix them up, even willing to move into a high crime area to own property, the current minority population is fighting gentrification because they are no-longer able to afford to live there and there is nowhere else for them to go.

That's interesting. The only thing close to that is we saw a large out-migration of workers to Alberta for jobs in the oil and gas industry. This coupled with some major industry closure left some of our small communities in shambles. Some people were unable to find local employment and had to head out west to find jobs. They would leave their house unlocked and the keys on the kitchen counter for the mortgage company. This was most typical in Newfoundland with the collapse of the cod fishing industry.

 

[Paul Sweet]

T Muray said "We do this and have the power to demolish if the owner does not mitigate the hazard to public safety. "

Unfortunately, asbestos & lead-based paint have to be abated first, and that often costs more than the actual demolition.

 

[conarb]

T Muray said "We do this and have the power to demolish if the owner does not mitigate the hazard to public safety. "

Unfortunately, asbestos & lead-based paint have to be abated first, and that often costs more than the actual demolition.

They're facing this with the United Nations headquarters in New York City now, since its' international they can't force them to abate the lead and asbestos, groups that want them out of this country tried to use that as an excuse but if they condemn the buildings they still have to go through the expensive abatement procedures.

 

[Phil]

Conarb,
What asbestos in the New York UN Headquarters? A $2 billion renovation project completed in 2015 included asbestos abatement. http://www.architecturaldigest.com/story/united-nations-headquarters-renovation

 

[conarb]

Conarb,
What asbestos in the New York UN Headquarters? A $2 billion renovation project completed in 2015 included asbestos abatement. http://www.architecturaldigest.com/story/united-nations-headquarters-renovation

Phil:

Thanks for that, I didn't realize that they had gone ahead and done it, several groups wanted to use asbestos and other problems to get the United Nations out of the Untied States, the most vocal were New Yorkers who were complaining that United Nations employees with diplomatic license plates were taking up all the parking places, shooting red lights, speeding etc. without ever paying fines, there were also anti-war groups that want them out because of their constant wars, and of course those who hate the Rockefellers and their push for one-world-government.

 

[conarb]

Oakland is proposing ways to improve safety while protecting building occupants from eviction and building inspectors.

OAKLAND — Mayor Libby Schaaf on Wednesday issued an executive order aimed at improving safety at unpermitted warehouses while ensuring residents living in the buildings are not displaced.

The mayor’s order addresses warehouse and industrial buildings illegally converted to living spaces, such as the Ghost Ship building where 36 people were killed in a fire in December.

“Buildings in Oakland should be safe places to live, work and play,” Schaaf said in a statement. “In the wake of the Ghost Ship tragedy, unpermitted living, assembly and work spaces are under heightened scrutiny.”

Under Schaaf’s order, property owners of buildings that are not zoned for residential use, but in which people are living, can enter into an abatement and compliance plan with the city within 60 days to correct building and code violations. One exception is buildings where hazards are considered life threatening.

Residents must receive a five-day warning before any building, housing or fire inspectors enter the premises, according to the order. It also calls for review of funding available to assist in legalizing buildings, and a review of the city’s Just Cause for Eviction Ordinance and Tenant Protection Ordinance to see if any amendments could be made to better protect residents from displacement.

Jonah Strauss of the Oakland Warehouse Coalition, which formed after the fire, called the mayor’s order “a good start.” The coalition has submitted its own ordinance to city leaders, calling for an eviction moratorium. Strauss, who lost his home in a warehouse fire in 2015, said community collaboration “is probably not going to happen until better tenant protections are codified.”

“I don’t pretend to speak for all warehouses, I just know how people function, and they’re not going to suddenly jump out of the woodwork to collaborate,” Strauss said. “Any effort to force them to do so will not be received well by the underground community.”¹

Notice that he calls these people the "underground community", do we really need to protect those in the "underground community" who have dropped out of life and don't want protection?

¹ http://www.mercurynews.com/2017/01/...der-to-protect-tenants-after-ghost-ship-fire/

 

[tmurray]

I would be okay with leaving people to their fate as long as they know what they are signing up for. That is not the case for a lot of these people. Doing that is kind of like saying the police shouldn't be enforcing speed limits on the road, I mean after all, the only people getting hurt are the ones foolish enough to drive over the speed limit! Except that's not the case. Speeding drivers regularly injure or kill others from their negligence and the same is true here. It may be fine for someone who flouts the building and fire requirements to suffer the consequences, but may times they endanger their family, friends, neighbours, and first responders. As officials, we have a responsibility to provide the public with a certain level of safety. It's not fair to assume members of the public will notice missing life safety elements of a building until they need them most.

Non-compliance can and should be dealt with through varying strategies depending on the offender. Most people just honestly don't know, so we can give them the information to do things right. Some people can't, or choose not to be able to afford to do things right, we can help those people access government programs or financial counseling. The rest are the people who just don't want to. These people sign themselves up for the hard knocks approach, and usually receive it.

Psychology tells us it's a lot easier to have a group make many small changes in lifestyle/behavior than one big change. This is likely just the first of many small changes.

 

[mark handler]

What we need to do is to hold the property owner and the business operator responsible for the deaths.
They need to take responsibility for their actions. They cannot deny knowledge since they knew they were doing wrong. Thats why they denied access to inspectors.

 

[linnrg]

I agree

 

[conarb]

Psychology tells us it's a lot easier to have a group make many small changes in lifestyle/behavior than one big change. This is likely just the first of many small changes.

T Murray:

You make a good point, and therein is the problem, codes are now political, they are driven by commercial and activist interests, note the current discussion about the fire sprinkler mandate and the recent election where George Soros supported Hillary to the tune of one billion dollars to implement his "Open Society", a world without borders and one world government, in Wikileaks she made a speech to a bank in Brazil in which she said her dream was open borders in the hemisphere. At that point you too will be getting the International Codes, even though your codes seem much more reasonable than the I Codes.

In the JLC board there is a discussion of a first step to a residence abutting a sloping sidewalk, this morning a very small remodeling contractor in St. Louis stated:

Now as for "cost is not my problem". I work on mostly older homes, 80 plus years old. Lots of things don't conform to new codes. There is often a struggle between me, the homeowners and the inspectors as to how to solve issues. It seems like a lot of the codes are for new construction not how do you get something done in an old house with nice plaster walls or 3 wye brick walls. I have never really asked before but is there a code book or subset of the existing codes that say section 317.5 is for new homes and 317.6 is for old homes. Truthfully, I am not sure if and when I have actually seen a code book and read thru one.¹

Here is a small guy working near the epicenter of the New Madrid quake who has never seen a code book, but the inspectors apparently work with him, it appears that they have a more reasonable approach than we do.

What we need to do is to hold the property owner and the business operator responsible for the deaths.
They need to take responsibility for their actions. They cannot deny knowledge since they knew they were doing wrong. Thats why they denied access to inspectors.

We already do, it's called the civil law, relatives of the deceased have already lawyered up, the problem is do the culprits have any assets or insurance? The owner is an elderly Chinese woman, the man who leased the building from her and sublet the spaces does not appear to have any assets, we will soon know. For all we know the elderly woman may be a slum landlord with many properties, but the question remains as to whether any of them are worth anything in light of the current situation when old abandoned properties cannot be used without the investment of substantial sums of money that can never be recouped in rents. I guess it would be legal for a city to require liability insurance prior to renting a property, of course the amount of the insurance would have to be commensurate with the risk, and insurance companies may be reluctant to write such policies and if they did it would again drive up rents even further to cover the costs.

The tenants in these buildings have no money, they refer to themselves as the "underground community", they cannot afford to pay the costs of living in code compliant buildings, if they are kicked out on the street Oakland becomes Detroit.




¹ http://forums.jlconline.com/forums/...ng-science/1066882-step-onto-sloping-sidewalk

 

[conarb]

Today's front page article about the fire:

OAKLAND — In December 2015, after two years working for the Oakland Fire Department fire inspection bureau, Mark Grissom walked out for lunch and never went back.

Overwhelmed by the dysfunction and ineptitude of what the wildfire veteran called a “broken” inspection system, he’d had enough. For two fire seasons he complained about fabricated inspections to his boss, the mayor and the city administrator. He even drove the city auditor up to the Oakland hills for half a day to point out evidence that firefighters had fudged their reports, but little changed.

“People were there to collect a check. It seemed to me a lot of (inspectors) just didn’t get fire inspection,” he said. “The (bureau’s) culture was tremendously broken.”

Grissom admitted he was an “intense” inspector, unafraid to anger people if that’s what it took to make their property safe. A few complained, he said.

Grissom isn’t the only one making correlations between the Ghost Ship fire and a larger dysfunction in the department’s fire-inspection services. After the deadly warehouse fire, the North Hills Community Association wrote a letter to city leaders complaining about the quality of fire inspections of hills properties. It was almost identical to one they had written a year earlier.¹

An "intense inspector", sounds like our Tiger. The truth of the incompetence of the Oakland Fire Department is that the city has long used it as a vehicle for minority employment, the color of the skin and the gender of the employees means more to them than the quality or the employees.

The "North Hills Community Association" is a group formed after the Oakland Hills fire in 1991 that formed a special assessment district voting to pay more taxes for better fire protection, only to have those funds used to pay the absurd pensions of retired firemen.


¹ http://www.mercurynews.com/2017/01/...two-years-complaining-about-fire-inspections/

 

[tmurray]

Today's front page article about the fire:



An "intense inspector", sounds like our Tiger. The truth of the incompetence of the Oakland Fire Department is that the city has long used it as a vehicle for minority employment, the color of the skin and the gender of the employees means more to them than the quality or the employees.

The "North Hills Community Association" is a group formed after the Oakland Hills fire in 1991 that formed a special assessment district voting to pay more taxes for better fire protection, only to have those funds used to pay the absurd pensions of retired firemen.


¹ http://www.mercurynews.com/2017/01/...two-years-complaining-about-fire-inspections/

In Canada, I can be held accountable if I am negligent in my inspection. I the same true for the US? It's not super common up here right now, but it helps in that it's not just the municipality I represent that is held accountable for the job I do. It is usually reserved for cases where negligence was completely obvious, where the inspector has shown an obvious disregard for the safety o the public, not just honest mistakes.