A group of Sunset Park tenants can finally return home two years after a fire forced them out and their landlords dramatically reshaped their rent-stabilized apartments, according to a judge and the city’s buildings department.
But there’s still a big problem: Their homes lack heat or gas.
The utility shut-off is the latest setback for five families who first sued to get back into their rent-stabilized apartments on 43rd Street in December 2021, about two months after a first-floor fire forced them to leave the four-story walkup, Gothamist reported last year. Since then, court records show the landlords have repeatedly ignored judge’s rulings, completely reconstructed their apartments and even started renting units out to new occupants in spite of a vacate order and the existing tenants’ leases.
The tenants and their lawyers say the episode reveals the glacial pace of restoration for renters made homeless by fire or other disasters — and a lack of enforcement against landlords who may try to exploit those situations to revamp rent-stabilized units and displace tenants.
“They’re just making it harder and harder and harder for us to get back,” said Leonel Gomez, a limo driver who first moved into his fourth-floor apartment 35 years ago. “This is home, and as small as it might be, this is what I know, this is what I like, and this is where we belong.”
Property owners rarely face criminal penalties, or even hefty fines, for failing to address unsafe conditions or flouting court orders. So far, the people affiliated with the limited liability company that owns the Sunset Park apartment have avoided accountability for locking tenants out of the building in spite of judges’ directives, but that could change this month.
A Brooklyn judge ruled in November that the landlords now face penalties for contempt unless they cover the cost of the renters’ legal fees. People affiliated with the landlord, a limited liability company tied to a family with multiple…
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