Owner of A Street Lofts in Marysville appeals vacate notice by the city

The owner of a Marysville apartment building appealed the city's notice to vacate after the city said it found unlivable conditions. 

Earlier this month, the City of Marysville said it found unlivable conditions at the A Street Lofts. The city's vacate notice gave the tenants 14 days to find a new place to live. 

Now, the two weeks are up for the property's owner to vacate and abate the building, but the tenants are still there.

"It's cheap and I'm living here. I'm not out in the cold," said a tenant who didn't want to use his name.

The city says it received multiple complaints from residents about poor living conditions.

"The city's continued position is it's still unsafe for residents to live there," said Jeramy Chapdelaine, the City of Marysville's chief building officer.

But AJ Beck, a rep for the building's owner, says this all began when his company wanted to convert the building to traditional apartments.

"Those conversations were going on for about a year and then from there those conversations ceased when they tried to put a clause in the contract for them to cease the property and when we didn't agree to that, they demanded to do inspections on the property," Beck said.

The city obtained a warrant, and during inspection, found 241 violations, ranging from pests, blocked exits, improper fire alarms, faulty outlets and people living where they weren't supposed to be.

An order was issued to vacate and abate the building, which the building's owner appealed.

"The owner at that point would need to engage in professional designers, engineers, environmental folks to address the issues," said Chapdelaine, "and also at the same time apply for permits."

"We don't believe building permits need to be required for this property because a majority of it is putting a smoke detector in, removing tenant's trash from the walls, cleaning, pest control, a structural engineer report. The report said the building was in good shape," Beck said.

But the city says it needs the permits to be able to address structural problems and heating systems, as it's part of the process of the notice.

The building is home to low-income folks who don't have any other options.

"We're caught in the middle for sure. Because the actions we're taking are on behalf of the tenants. At the same time, there's limited resources for them, so we're doing everything we can," said Chapdelaine.

The city says it's working with community partners like the Sutter Yuba Homeless Consortium to assign case managers to current A Street Loft tenants.

"We fixed every single violation here. There should be no reason for anyone to vacate here at all," Beck said.

The next step is the appeal hearing on March 12.