888 Grand Concourse Tenants Demand 7A Administrator for Real Repairs

December 28, 2016, BRONX, N.Y.— Many longtime tenants at 888 Grand Concourse recall the years when “the Bronx was burning”—shorthand for high crime and poverty rates, and for landlords setting buildings on fire to collect insurance payments. Now the 888 Grand Concourse tenants face the potential purchase of their building by predatory landlords, and are fighting back by petitioning the court for a 7A administrator to make real repairs in the building.

 Press coverage: New York Daily News, NYDN (Update)

“The lobby courtyard doors don’t close correctly, and there have been rats in the building lobby,” says tenant E.F. Gregory. “The mailboxes in the building are infested with roaches, and when you open your mailbox they scatter all over the walls and your hands. It’s disgusting.”

888 Grand Concourse was built by the renowned architect Emory Roth, who also designed the Beresford and the San Remo, considered to be some of the finest examples of luxury buildings of the 1920s and 1930s in New York City. When the family of Louis and Jonathan Bombart took possession of the building in the late 1980s, the tenants began organizing to pressure the landlord for decent living conditions. The Bombarts have consistently been on the Public Advocate’s list of NYC Worst Landlords while they have kept expensive homes in New York City, Palm Beach, and Connecticut. Meanwhile, tenants have experienced their historic façade crumbling, a chronic lack of heat and hot water, inconsistent elevator service and rats scampering through the hallways. Tenants have fought for many years to combat these abuses.

Actively assisted by Community Action for Safe Apartments (CASA) and Bronx Legal Services, a program of Legal Services NYC, the EmeryGrand888 Tenants Association has written demand letters, filed rent reductions, began a case in Housing Court for repairs, and organized a rent strike in February 2016. Their efforts led to the city placing the building in the Alternative Enforcement Program, which is reserved for the most distressed buildings throughout the five boroughs. The mortgage holder Madison Realty Capital began foreclosure proceedings on the building in 2013. The tenants again insisted that the much needed repairs be addressed and intervened in the foreclosure suit in May 2016, causing the Bronx Supreme Court to appoint a receiver to oversee repairs to the building.

“We continue to advocate for the 888 Grand Concourse Tenants’ Association in obtaining and preserving safe and affordable housing in the community,” states John Montoute, Staff Attorney at Bronx Legal Services.

Yet despite these victories, major building-wide repairs remain undone. The bank’s announcement that the building will be up for auction on January 9th sends a message to the tenants that it is prioritizing profit over their safety and well-being in the building. Tenants are fighting for their building, and are filing the 7A case to ward off predatory landlords as well as to petition the court once again that this building needs repairs that it has not received from any landlord.

“We have taken all the necessary legal steps and actions in an HP action, a rent strike and 7A action to ensure we would never get to this point. We are demanding to live in safe and well maintained apartments and building.” said tenant leader Carmen Vega-Rivera.

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Contact: Sheila Garcia, [email protected], 646-651-0307