Inspection Program Puts New Face on Azusa Rental Complexes

What Rebecca and Glen Gordon needed when they moved from Utah to Southern California was an inexpensive apartment within commuting distance to downtown Los Angeles, where Glen Gordon was going to start his new job as an accountant. So they moved to Azusa.

What they found was an old building with a lot of problems. During the four years they have been living at the Balboa Apartments on Cerritos Avenue, they have had to contend with walkways and hallways strewn with trash, broken windows, holes in the carport walls and a half-finished exterior paint job.

In January, however, the city stepped in. A tough inspection law that took effect last year led city officials to declare the building a public nuisance. Slowly, repairs have been made, and it has started looking better.

“For a while, it seemed like no one cared about this building,” Rebecca Gordon said recently. “Things are not wonderful now, but there (have) been some improvements.”

It has been 14 months since Azusa began its rental inspection program, the only one of its kind in the San Gabriel Valley. And during this time, rental complexes such as the Balboa Apartments have been and continue to be repaired and renovated throughout the city.

Under the program, all of the city’s 6,500 rental units must pass inspection once a year, as well as every time a new tenant moves into a unit. The only other city in the San Gabriel Valley that has a similar ordinance is Pasadena, which conducts inspections every four years.

During the inspection program’s first year, city officials found that 82% of rental units failed to comply with housing codes. Problems ranged from missing smoke detectors and broken windows to rodent infestation and lack of hot water.

Most complexes lacked proper maintenance, and much of the needed repair work was minor. But among the city’s multiunit complexes--those with more than four units--50 have had or are going through such major renovation as interior remodeling, landscaping and new plumbing installation, city officials say.

Landlord advocates criticize the rental inspection program as costly and unnecessary.

“It is just another layer of bureaucracy with very little benefit,” said Trevor Grimm, an attorney for landlords.

But to city officials, the program’s benefits have been tangible. According to David Rudisel, Azusa’s community improvement manager, city records show that about $1.5 million in improvements have been made in rental properties since the law took effect in June, 1989.

The program grew out of the Azusa City Council’s decision to attack the problem of run-down properties. Council members were concerned that slum conditions are taking root in the city.

Rental units make up more than half of Azusa’s housing stock, so it made sense to target that property through inspection. Another factor was that 90% of complaints to city officials about housing involved apartments, Rudisel said.

“The problem was getting worse and worse every year,” he said. “We had to do something. . . . We had to stop the deterioration and salvage what we had.”

Mayor Eugene Moses added: “There was a time that Azusa was called ‘Junk City.’ But the city is being cleaned up. . . . You can see the changes everywhere.”

The inspection program has not only improved the look of the city, but officials are confident that in the long run, it will also improve the city’s tax base.

“As buildings begin looking better, neighborhoods will start improving, and naturally the resale value will go up,” Rudisel said. “We have had some buildings that have improved their resale value by $100,000.”

Under the program, landlords must immediately fix any life-threatening code violations. For other violations, landlords get at least 30 days to bring their buildings up to code.

In cases where buildings still do not comply with the law after the allocated time, the city can take legal action against the owner, clean it up and bill the owner. In about 50 cases, the city has held utility connections hostage until a landlord repaired code violations.

Before the program was adopted, Rudisel was the city’s sole inspector. He said he had time to visit a property only after many complaints were filled.

“We had no tools to deal with the problem,” Rudisel said. “You had one person and a thousand and one complaints.”

To pay the salaries of the program’s two additional inspectors, fees were set. Apartment owners must pay an annual fee of $60 per complex, plus $4 for each unit within the complex.

Since the program began, other cities have taken notice. Cities as far as Memphis have contacted Azusa for information, Rudisel said.

In Southeast Los Angeles County, Santa Fe Springs recently passed an ordinance modeled after Azusa’s, under which apartment units are inspected every year, or when new tenants move in. To pay for its program, Santa Fe Springs charges an annual fee of $50 per apartment unit, plus $25 per unit for reinspection.

“Not all landlords are bad, but we have found that there are many landlords who are not concerned about the property as long as they get their rent on time,” said Fernando Tarin, director of housing and community preservation for Santa Fe Springs.

Landlord advocates find the inspection program’s fee provision particularly objectionable.

Gary Holme, president of the Los Angeles Board of Realtors, said that slumlords are a minority in the real estate business and that it is unfair to make all landlords pay for their mistakes.

“Running an apartment is not the city’s business,” added Crisostomo Flores, property management director for the Balboa Apartments, which were declared a public nuisance in January and are being renovated. “They should just leave it up to the landlords; they are the experts.”

Flores said all violations cited at the complex would have been fixed anyway had the city not intervened.

However, Rebecca Gordon, the renter from Arizona, is sold on the need for the program: “I just don’t think the owners are in touch with what’s going on here. This is an investment for them. . . . Their most pressing concern is making money.

“Cities need to get involved and push the owners to set higher standards.”