Here it appears ALL felons are treated like sex offenders; we don't want you. Accordingly a "Good Landlord" is one that refuses to help former offenders reenter society. Yes, I said REFUSES!8-16-2010 Utah:
Ogden • Not only was Joseph Sambrano following the rules of his parole, he was doing so well he received a job as a security guard at his apartment building.
The 46-year-old Sambrano would ensure that visitors to Park Avenue Apartments had escorts, told tenants to turn down loud music and helped police when they visited the building. Along the way, Sambrano assumed custody of his 16-year-old nephew and began raising him at Park Avenue.
Despite that, Ogden City wants Sambrano out of Park Avenue. Building management will evict him to save money.
Park Avenue belongs to the Ogden Good Landlord program, which discounts business licenses for landlords who follow its rules, and having tenants on probation or parole is a violation.
Sambrano does not know where he and his nephew will go next.
“I’ve talked to about 30 [landlords],” Sambrano said. “As soon as I tell them I’m a felon, they say, ‘Can’t do it.’ ”
At least three other people on probation or parole have to move from Park Avenue, too.
The phenomenon is not confined to Park Avenue or Ogden.
An investigation » In March, a Salt Lake Tribune investigation found a lack of halfway houses and treatment centers has collided with local housing laws. The result is probationers and parolees — whether they have been convicted of sex crimes, murder, theft or drug offenses — find fewer places in Utah where they can live and congregate in the same neighborhoods or buildings despite rules prohibiting them from associating with one another.
The housing shortage is acute in Ogden, which has a disproportionately high number of felons in part because it has one of only four halfway houses in Utah. The others are in Salt Lake City.
The offenders need to find jobs to stay in the halfway house, and those jobs can keep them in Ogden even after they leave the house.
In 2005, Ogden began its Good Landlord program to reduce crimes and nuisances. It gives participating landlords discounts on business licenses if they conduct credit and criminal-background checks on potential tenants and disqualify anyone on probation or parole for a felony conviction.
As of March, the city said 83 percent of licensed rental units participate, as does Ogden’s public housing authority.
The program and other police efforts aim to reduce the number of probationers and parolees in the city, and in recent years, the rules and policing have reduced crime and calls to police, said Jon Greiner, Ogden’s police chief and its state senator.
“Landlords are paying more attention to who they rent to,” he said.
As for where someone on probation or parole should go, Greiner asks, “Why is that my responsibility?”
Breaking the rules » Park Avenue is a converted Ramada hotel at 24th Street and Adams Avenue near downtown Ogden. It has belonged to the Good Landlord program for about two years, but the manager, Andres Herbon, admitted to ignoring some of the rules.
Earlier this year, Park Avenue had 19 people on probation and parole living among its 150 units.
“I think they deserve a second chance,” Herbon said.
But when word got out, Park Avenue had to repay $18,574 the building had saved under the program.
“It doesn’t matter how they try to spin it. They weren’t in compliance,” said Mark Johnson, who oversees the program as Ogden’s management services director.
Park Avenue is trying to comply. It told the probationers and parolees this winter they had to move. Sambrano and three other people on probation or parole have until Sept. 1 to leave voluntarily or face eviction.
“I really feel sorry for them,” Herbon said, adding that he only charged them half their rent or less in July and has not charged rent in August so the four can save for moving expenses. Herbon also has offered to pay their first month’s rent at the new place.
Sambrano was convicted in state court in Logan of possessing methamphetamine in 2005. He was sentenced to probation, but when he violated the terms in 2007, a judge sent him to prison. He was there about 15 months before being paroled. Sambrano moved into Park Avenue in September 2008. He said his parole officer recommended the place.
Sambrano’s parole officer is 1½ blocks away. Sambrano has no car and walks four blocks to Weber Human Services to undergo addiction therapy and another block to provide samples for drug testing.
He said his parole officer made him quit working security in Park Avenue. Last month, Sambrano took a job as a painter. He rides a bus to work.
It’s the treatment program that most ties Sambrano to Ogden, he said. He has at least 19 more weeks in the program. He hopes to complete his parole in November 2011.
On Thursday, Sambrano had a knock at the door of his first-floor room. In walked Gina Gentil, another Park Avenue resident on probation for drug crimes. Herbon said the city has told him Gentil can stay because she arrived at Park Avenue before he did.
To Gentil, the city’s Good Landlord program discriminates against people with disabilities.
“I have yet to meet an addict who has not been diagnosed with a disability,” Gentil said.
No place to go » The Utah Department of Corrections is aware of some of the housing problems that Sambrano and other probationers and parolees have.
“As different areas adopt these policies, it unfortunately can deter offenders from turning their lives around,” Corrections spokesman Steve Gehrke said in a written statement. “They already have several stressors to overcome upon parole. …
“At the same time, we recognize that the city and its individual apartment complexes have an interest in securing their neighborhoods, and we will continue to support them in the important role of protecting public safety.”
Sambrano’s sister and nephew moved into Park Avenue soon after he did. But in June 2009, his sister died of complications from diabetes. His nephew lives in the unit next door.
“He’s struggling because he’s worried about switching schools, losing friends,” Sambrano said.
Sambrano has been paying $640 a month for the two converted motel rooms with a kitchenette. He also has to pay for his diabetes medication and owes $10,000 in child-support debt.
Even if Sambrano could find an apartment nearby, he said his parole officer has suggested he move out of the 4-square-mile downtown area Ogden police have focused on for crime reduction. While the parole officer, city officials and Herbon have been telling Sambrano where he can’t live, he said no one has suggested a place where he can live.
“Either [the parole officer] is flexible with me moving somewhere close or I’m going to wind up on the street,” Sambrano said. ..Source.. Nate Carlisle, The Salt Lake Tribune
1 comment:
I dont know how they can look at themselves in the mirror in the morning after this.Wait until they are in jail and after looking for a place to live.What goes around comes around.
Post a Comment