“My 5‑Year-Old Grandchild Could Do Better”

Tenants moving back into rebuilt Goffe Street apartments have found much to appreciate — and much not to, as a confrontation Wednesday with management demonstrated.

The complaints from returning tenants of the St. Martin Townhouses at 200 Goffe filled a room a block away at a community meeting held Wednesday night with landlord representatives.

St. Martin’s new owner, New York-based real estate investor Joseph Goldberg, has been temporarily putting tenants in temporary lodgings while the company undergoes a gut-rehab of the aging 63-unit federally subsidized complex, which in the past 19 months has been battered by both flooding and a fire. (Click here to read a previous story about concerns about the relocations.)

In recent months the first relocated tenants have moved back in.

“Overall, y’all did a very good job. Now we’re living way better than we’ve been living, because the way we were living was trash,” one of those tenants, Stasha Johnson said at Wednesday evening’s 90-minute meeting, which took place a block away from the apartment complex, in the community room of the Florence Virtue Homes.

Then she and others unleashed a barrage of complaints to representatives of SPH Management, which runs the complex for Goldberg.

Renovated units lacked consistent hot water, peepholes in doorways, mailboxes, and proper heating, tenants said.

One tenant detailed a scrape her child received from an unfinished railing,. Another declared that the outlets in her unit no longer work, forcing her to pay out of pocket to fix them.

“My 5‑year-old grandchild could’ve done a better paint job,” said Rhonda McIver.

Movers hired by management have broken mirrors and televisions, tenants said.

Tenants also complained about how SPH has handled the temporary relocation of tenants. Felicia Warren (pictured) said that when she moved to a hotel, all her food went bad. She lacked a refrigerator, so she had to buy one. Her promised stipend check was four days late. ​“I went four days without anything to eat” as a result, she recounted. ​“I had to eat the muffins from the downstairs of my hotel because I had no food.” 

Flustered SPH management representatives promised changes. Going forward, residents will be given a form on which to submit any claims against the moving company for reimbursement for broken items. Rent will not be garnished from the provided stipend, and stipend checks will arrive on time.

The representatives also suggested they would repay out-of-pocket costs residents may have incurred in the process of repairing issues broken during renovation. They also apologized to tenants for delays in fixing unresolved issues in their renovated units – delays that in some cases have lasted much longer than the three week post-move-in period within which management promised to address any lingering problems.

“I’ve been in my renovated unit for three months and the door is still not fixed,” declared one tenant.

The management representatives present at the meeting refused to provide their names, any comment, or answer questions from the Independent, including how many tenants remain off site in temporary rooms.

Rochelle Harrison said that her family was moved out on Aug. 29, with a promised return date of Oct. 9. That date has been pushed back three times; more than a month later, the family is still living in a hotel. (SPH Management Attorney Bridget Dornbach previously told the Independent that all residents would be moved back in by mid-September.)

Attorney Amy Marx of New Haven Legal Assistance and Alder Steve Winter were present at the meeting to support the tenants. Both said they have received many calls from residents asking for help resolving issues surrounding the renovation, and are advocating on behalf of the low-income residents of the townhouse complex.

“Management must do more to take care of residents — to make sure they return home to completed apartments, receive displacement checks on time, and have basic necessities like mailboxes, peepholes, and screen doors,” Winter said.