As part of the mayor’s crack down on overcrowded housing in Red Bank and the landlords who promote it, he announced that he and the borough attorney are drafting a measure to curb the trend.
Mayor Pasquale Menna again spoke to the issue at the Jan. 14 Borough Council meeting, discussing new initiatives that he will be introducing this month to deal with the growing problem of overcrowded rental housing in the borough.
“I’ve asked the borough attorney [Thomas Hall] to try to come up with a proposal that would I think be somewhat revolutionary in terms of how we address recidivist landlords who keep on bucking the system and putting cash in their pockets,” said Menna.
He added, “Because of the sensitive nature of what we are going to be announcing we would rather not tip our hand, but I think if legally we can do what we’ve been talking about, it will go a long way to demonstrate to mostly out-of town-landlords that we do mean business in terms of what they’ve done to some of our neighborhoods and they’re going to have to pay…whether they like it or not in terms of aggressively having a no tolerance policy.”
One initiative Menna has championed in the past is publishing the names of those landlords who have pleaded guilty to multiple overcrowding offenses.
“As early as the next council meeting we’re going to have a list of recidivist offenders that have already pleaded guilty [and] fines that they have paid.We’re going to be making that public, that’s the first step. The second step is I can tell there’s been a lot of increased enforcement.We can always do better. We can always get more information,” said Menna.
Residents also addressed the issue of overcrowding and its effect on neighborhoods in the borough at the council meeting.
“I’m here to address the old issue … of overcrowding and quality-of-life issues pertaining to that,” said Krishna Tyler of Leighton Avenue. “We need to adopt a zero tolerance [policy] against noise, disorderly conduct, public urination.”
She added, “The penalty for landlords is not big enough in Red Bank. We ask that you look into an ordinance, which will justify a zero-tolerance policy in enforcing the lawtomake landlords abide. Ifwe don’t, you are going to have to pay for it.”
Borough resident and landlord Sandra Fuentes, Elm Place, said the overcrowding problemin the borough is not just about the landlords.
“I’m one of the landlords. We own two houses here in Red Bank. One of the houses was overcrowded and we got tickets and it happened all over again. We asked the city for help. It took us threemonths to get these people out of the house.
“Sometimes it’s not about a landlord problem. It’s something that happens overnight.We don’t rent rooms, we rent the houses to families, and then all of a sudden there’s like 15 people there. I don’t knowhow we can help if you guys don’t help us also.”
CouncilmanArthurMurphy said that 90 percent of the houses checked by code enforcement officials are called in by residents. He said the residentswere the officials’ eyes and ears for these overcrowding situations, and that if a resident reports a case of overcrowding, the proper officials will come and check it out.
According to the chairwoman of the council’s code enforcement committee,Councilwoman Mary-Grace Cangemi, enforcement of overcrowding cases has been a borough-wide effort.
“We have landlordswho are being penalized tens of thousands of dollars. We have been bringing not just our inspectors but also our subcode officials, our construction guys into these overcrowding cases specifically, along with police and fire.We respond to every overcrowding report we get,” said Cangemi.
Red Bank Police Chief Mark Fitzgerald also shared concerns that he has with some of the landlords in the borough and the ongoing overcrowding issues at the Jan. 9 Westside Community Group meeting.
He said since the lastmeeting inDecember, there had been more than 150 summonses issued to about seven residences for overcrowding and tenancy issues.
“One of the landlords really gotme upset because they own two of the houses. It’s a couple that lives in Connecticut and there was no way of getting a hold of them at all. It took them three days.”
He said in one of the residences, there was no electricity, running water and heat, and there were 10 people living there, including a pregnant woman.