I caught up with the neighbor lady Monday. It was hot, like only the Valley can be, when I walked to the corner and took a look at the house illegally converted into apartments.
There was a guy who didn't look all that healthy trying to get his car started in the driveway and sign in front: For Rent, Westside Rentals. I wrote down the phone number.
As I talked with my neighbor I looked around her house. It was filled with memories and memorabilia of the 50 years she and husband had lived there. A good life, the house they raised their children in and sometimes look after their grandchildren in now. It was home, she said, and I knew what she meant.
I hadn't had a home, a real home, since I was 18 until I moved into Tract 17111 as it's identified in government documents. For my wife and I and our son, our little bungalow was home, too, a happy home. It's what the Valley is all about, middle-class tracts like ours where neighbors know each other and look after each other, where people from all over the world, people of every race and religion live quietly and unpretentiously, in harmony.
And someone was trying to destroy that, infecting a deadly virus, a broken window, into our little piece of paradise. It's a crime these things are happening.
That's certainly how my neighbor feels about this. She was calm but clear as she described her frustration over months to get this attack on our way of life stopped by the city, by Councilman Dennis Zine's office, by somebody. But to the city it was nothing but a minor annoyance, just a routine "unapproved construction" problem -- no an attack on the quality of our lives, our neighborhood.
She and some other neighbors got the runaround from Zine's office and the bureaucrats for weeks as they tried to figure out how to get somebody to do something.
Finally, they drew up a petition that says in part:: "This community and others like it will not exist if investor-buyers succeed in violating zoning laws to create multiple family dwellings in single family dweIling zones and utilize schemes such as deliberate re-sales to associates, friends, and/or family, in order to delay government action."
I was hooked. Foul play was alleged. I loved the idea of playing a journalistic Columbo right in my own backyard but as we talked I learned my neighbor already had the part of Mrs. Columbo down pat.
There was a guy who didn't look all that healthy trying to get his car started in the driveway and sign in front: For Rent, Westside Rentals. I wrote down the phone number.
As I talked with my neighbor I looked around her house. It was filled with memories and memorabilia of the 50 years she and husband had lived there. A good life, the house they raised their children in and sometimes look after their grandchildren in now. It was home, she said, and I knew what she meant.
I hadn't had a home, a real home, since I was 18 until I moved into Tract 17111 as it's identified in government documents. For my wife and I and our son, our little bungalow was home, too, a happy home. It's what the Valley is all about, middle-class tracts like ours where neighbors know each other and look after each other, where people from all over the world, people of every race and religion live quietly and unpretentiously, in harmony.
And someone was trying to destroy that, infecting a deadly virus, a broken window, into our little piece of paradise. It's a crime these things are happening.
That's certainly how my neighbor feels about this. She was calm but clear as she described her frustration over months to get this attack on our way of life stopped by the city, by Councilman Dennis Zine's office, by somebody. But to the city it was nothing but a minor annoyance, just a routine "unapproved construction" problem -- no an attack on the quality of our lives, our neighborhood.
She and some other neighbors got the runaround from Zine's office and the bureaucrats for weeks as they tried to figure out how to get somebody to do something.
Finally, they drew up a petition that says in part:: "This community and others like it will not exist if investor-buyers succeed in violating zoning laws to create multiple family dwellings in single family dweIling zones and utilize schemes such as deliberate re-sales to associates, friends, and/or family, in order to delay government action."
I was hooked. Foul play was alleged. I loved the idea of playing a journalistic Columbo right in my own backyard but as we talked I learned my neighbor already had the part of Mrs. Columbo down pat.
She's been doing a lot of sleuthing for a long time. She told me about
how the original owners bought the house when it was built in 1958 and
become friends and neighbors, how it was sold after the earthquake in
1994,
Property records show Charles R. Lombard and Edith Moslares Lombard bought it in 2001, listing the price at $285,000. They refinanced a couple of times so that by the end of 2003 there was a loan on it for $427,500. It was during that time it became a board-and-care facility, licensed and legal. The cop next door made sure of that.
We lived with it, the price of living in our quiet village in a big city. Then, in 2006, Maria Teresa Teves bought the house for the whopping price of $750,000, partly financed by Charles Lombard, according to the records.
I hear the story of what happened told in a matter of fact way by my neighbor. She says some of the residents slept in tiny cubicles and extra entrance doors with ramps were installed. Concern was growing, she says, and then the banks foreclosed last year. The house was getting rundown and a citation was issued because the pool had become a mosquito-laden swamp. The Fire Department came out to have a look. Complaints were filed with city agencies.
Six months ago the house was acquired for $500,000 by Nady Mahdavi. Workmen began showing up to fix it up, to build partitions. Then, stoves and refrigerators. Neighbors talked to the workmen and looked around. The single family home was becoming apartments, three of them.
By March, neighbors' complaints to the city Building and Safety Department led to a citation for carrying out construction without a permit, something that happens quite often and is minor, fixable simply by pulling the permits. Instead, as first notice became second notice, but before non-compliance becomes a real problem, the house got sold again.
The price: $700,000 -- a paper profit of 40 percent in five months, a profit that comes even as my house down the street is worth 25 percent less than a year ago. The buyer: Claudia Perez.
According to the petition circulating in Tract 17111, Westside Rentals listed the single family home as an apartment house. It's 2,047 square feet and the listing is for two three-bedroom units, one with one bath, the other with two, and a studio apartment.
A lot of leads, a lot of mystery. Who are these buyers and sellers? How come the city isn't all over this case? What the hell is going on here? Who is killing my neighborhood?
To be continued, click Whodunit for previous chapter
Property records show Charles R. Lombard and Edith Moslares Lombard bought it in 2001, listing the price at $285,000. They refinanced a couple of times so that by the end of 2003 there was a loan on it for $427,500. It was during that time it became a board-and-care facility, licensed and legal. The cop next door made sure of that.
We lived with it, the price of living in our quiet village in a big city. Then, in 2006, Maria Teresa Teves bought the house for the whopping price of $750,000, partly financed by Charles Lombard, according to the records.
I hear the story of what happened told in a matter of fact way by my neighbor. She says some of the residents slept in tiny cubicles and extra entrance doors with ramps were installed. Concern was growing, she says, and then the banks foreclosed last year. The house was getting rundown and a citation was issued because the pool had become a mosquito-laden swamp. The Fire Department came out to have a look. Complaints were filed with city agencies.
Six months ago the house was acquired for $500,000 by Nady Mahdavi. Workmen began showing up to fix it up, to build partitions. Then, stoves and refrigerators. Neighbors talked to the workmen and looked around. The single family home was becoming apartments, three of them.
By March, neighbors' complaints to the city Building and Safety Department led to a citation for carrying out construction without a permit, something that happens quite often and is minor, fixable simply by pulling the permits. Instead, as first notice became second notice, but before non-compliance becomes a real problem, the house got sold again.
The price: $700,000 -- a paper profit of 40 percent in five months, a profit that comes even as my house down the street is worth 25 percent less than a year ago. The buyer: Claudia Perez.
According to the petition circulating in Tract 17111, Westside Rentals listed the single family home as an apartment house. It's 2,047 square feet and the listing is for two three-bedroom units, one with one bath, the other with two, and a studio apartment.
A lot of leads, a lot of mystery. Who are these buyers and sellers? How come the city isn't all over this case? What the hell is going on here? Who is killing my neighborhood?
To be continued, click Whodunit for previous chapter
Ron Kaye is the former editor of the Los Angeles Daily News where he spent 23 years helping to make the newspaper the voice of the San Fernando Valley and fighting for a city government that serves the people and not special interests.
Twice in recent years, Los Angeles Magazine listed Kaye among the city’s most influential people, specifically in the area of politics. Kaye has been variously described in the media as the “accidental anarchist,” “the Patrick Henry of the San Fernando Valley” and a “passionate populist.” He is now committed to
carrying on his crusade for a greater Los Angeles as an ordinary citizen. Previously, Ron worked at the Los Angeles Herald Examiner,
Associated Press, Cleveland Plain Dealer and The Australian as well as papers
in Fairbanks, Alaska and Yakima, Wash. He also wrote for Newsweek magazine, The Guardian in London and the Naitonal Enquirer.
This is happening all over town.
It's one reason housing prices are so high: when you try to buy a house for your family, you're essentially competing against three families willing to cram into the building -- and able to do so because Villaraigosa refuses to enforce the building code, and supports density.
If you want to preserve YOUR quality of life, you must TAKE ACTION.
Start by visiting my website and, if you like what you see, supporting my campaign to become L.A.'s next Mayor.
And some of you out there should run for City Council in the same election. It's on March 3, 2009. Be brave. Run for office. Take action to fix this City.
Walter Moore
Candidate for Mayor of Los Angeles
http://WalterMooreForMayor.com
This is happening all over town.
It's one reason housing prices are so high: when you try to buy a house for your family, you're essentially competing against three families willing to cram into the building -- and able to do so because Villaraigosa refuses to enforce the building code, and supports density.
If you want to preserve YOUR quality of life, you must TAKE ACTION.
Start by visiting my website and, if you like what you see, supporting my campaign to become L.A.'s next Mayor.
And some of you out there should run for City Council in the same election. It's on March 3, 2009. Be brave. Run for office. Take action to fix this City.
Walter Moore
Candidate for Mayor of Los Angeles
http://WalterMooreForMayor.com
Better to be curious in the Valley than angry in the Valley.
Ron, please let us/me in on Mrs. Kaye's secret. What magical gem did she use to tame Bruno enough so she could rescue him?
A two-pound (oops. sorry. didn't mean to mention that word.) free-range filet mignon from Whole Foods?
Where did you say his hiding-in shrubbery is?
I love this story. It rings so true. For years, I've heard, witnessed and personally experienced just how ineffective the city is when it comes to enforcing its own laws. Here's my recommendation to your neighborhood, Ron. Hire an attorney. One that knows just how to manuever behind the scenes. I would suspect that when you tell your neighbors that their property values are being futher impacted, they just might cough up the money. It's a vital investment. Otherwise, a dangerous precedent could be established - if one guy does it, what's to stop the next one?