Glorieta Gardens residents in decrepit living conditions plead with the feds for relief as owners pull hotel vouchers

By Johania Charles

On January 9, 2024

Miami-Dade County has named a group of property management companies in a lawsuit, citing various sanitation violations at an Opa-locka apartment complex on Alexandria Drive with a long history of poor maintenance practices.

Congressperson Frederica S. Wilson and U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s Jennifer Riley Collins arrived at the Glorieta Gardens Apartments Monday afternoon to see firsthand the poor living conditions that have received widespread media coverage.

The Miami Times first reported this story in September of last year.

Opa-locka’s interim city manager, Darvin Williams, led Wilson, Collins, county leaders, Opa-locka Mayor John Taylor, Opa-locka Commissioner Veronica Williams and others into units with strong sewage odors and mold infestation, and a gutted apartment unit with signs of mold and a peeling ceiling riddled with water stains.

At least 52 families were forced to leave the dilapidated 357-unit complex because of the horrid living conditions. Taylor says the city has paid to have them temporarily stay in local hotels.

Other families who also relocated to nearby hotels, with expenses covered by Glorieta management, say they’ve received notice that the owners will no longer foot the bill, leaving them to either return back to moldy apartments or cover hotel expenses themselves.

“I received a letter that said as of Tuesday, I will be responsible for the cost of the hotel unless I return back to my unit,” said resident Deidre Thomas. “I had mushrooms growing out of my unit. I’m refusing to return. They came into the unit and just painted over the mold.”

“We are fully aware, because we’ve seen it with our own eyes, of the challenges that the residents of Glorieta Gardens have endured and continue to endure,” said Collins. “We acknowledge that these are unacceptable living conditions in several apartments and throughout this complex.

“We acknowledge that work needs to be done, but work needs to be done properly if people are going to live here … It is a HUD priority to ensure that the displaced Glorieta Gardens (residents) return to homes that are at industry standards.”

“HUD sends millions of dollars to Glorieta managers … and instead of them maintaining these apartment buildings, they’re pocketing the money,” said Wilson, calling the owners’ slumlords.

Wilson said she first reached out to Collins last month about visiting the property and holding its managers accountable. At around the same time, the county’s Department of Regulatory and Economic Resources’ Division of Resources Management (DERM) filed the 23-page legal complaint against Glorieta’s owners.

“Raw sewage is seeping into the apartments and bubbling up through the kitchen sink. This is what you’ll see,” Wilson said before the site tour, detailing the experiences of her constituents. “And the stench will knock you dead. So, they put newspapers – this is how the people are living now – on the top of the sink. Can you imagine?”

Because of a national housing shortage, Wilson explained that condemning the complex would displace hundreds of families who would have nowhere to go.

Legal battles ensue

Wilson, who says she plans to file a separate lawsuit, also disclosed that some residents have resorted to defecating in plastic bags to avoid contributing to the sewage backup problem.

DERM’s lawsuit against Glorieta Partners LTD., New Vision Glorieta LLC, NB Holdings Management LLC, Yash Pal Kakkar and Kenneth Weiss calls for injunction relief and seeks more than $50 million in penalties.

Since The Miami Times’ Sept. 6, 2023, report, county inspectors have gone back to inspect the property almost two dozen times, according to the lawsuit. The additional inspections spanned from late September to mid-December, with inspectors visiting the property as often as three to four times each month.

According to county inspectors, property managers consistently violated county policy by not sanitizing, cleaning and disinfecting sewage cleanouts that discharged raw sewage onto the ground, nor did they address strong sewage odors around the property. Glorieta was issued a Field Notice to Correct a Sanitary Nuisance and advised of the sanitation violations.

The sanitary nuisance complaints persist in 2024.

A DERM representative, who also visited the apartments Monday, said he could not comment on the lawsuit.

Collins said the latest visit will inform her department’s next steps.

“The stakeholders, when we get together, now that we’ve all seen the situation … we can talk about what is legally feasible for us to do,” she said, ensuring residents of a forthcoming federal meeting.

Fed up & demanding help

“I need justice. I need help,” Farah Devil, who complained of feeling ill, begged Wilson on Monday. “I can’t no more.”

Devil has lived at Glorieta with her four children for years.

“It’s not even about me,” said Devil, asking the elected leaders to advocate for her children.

“We’re here to help,” Wilson reassured her.

“We’re all experiencing the same things,” said Travis Reese, the father of Devil’s children. “Mushroom, flooding, rat feces. We’re all suffering together. This is impacting me because it’s impacting my kids.”

Residents also pleaded with Collins to have HUD provide them with vouchers to relocate.

“Give us a voucher and let us go,” they shouted.

“I’ve moved from building to building and apartment to apartment, but there’s been the same problem,” said Jasmine Wimes, a 30-year Glorieta resident who grew up in the complex.

The last three decades at the rodent- and mold-infested complex, she said, has been a living nightmare.

At six months old, Wimes said she had to be hospitalized because of water contamination. When an older Wimes moved out of her family’s unit and into her own in 2016, she was faced with a termite problem, along with mold, rats, roaches, flooding and a burst pipe.

“They moved me from the unit last year and into an apartment in the back, where I had sewage coming out of my sink and out of the tub,” said Wimes. “When it rains, water gets inside the unit. And when the people above my unit take a shower the water leaks onto my bathroom from the ceiling.”

“My son is 8 years old, and he’s developed lung disease and has chronic asthma. Sometimes he even has seizures,” said Wimes, who has been sheltering at a nearby hotel since June 2023.

Moving to another location, she said, has been an impossible feat with current rent and housing costs.

“We cannot do this in Opa-locka, in my district,” said Wilson. “Babies are sick [and] people are on breathing machines … some of them have become immune to the smell.”

City manager’s future in question

According to Williams, in addition to the sanitation issues, families are also dealing with building safety and structural problems.

“We’ve had two children fall through here,” said Williams, gesturing at the second-floor railing to the visiting leaders.

Wimes said Williams has been one of the residents’ real advocates, if not the only one.

“The city manager who is present now is the only one who has ever come back here to help us,” she said, explaining how Williams has organized visits to the apartments before. “People only come here election time, then after that never come back again.”

Wilson questioned the timing of a city of Opa-locka Commission agenda item up for discussion today, Jan. 10, calling for the immediate termination of Williams, who has served as interim city manager since April 2022. His appointed term, according to the resolution, was not to exceed nine months.

“This man reaches out, we start to work with HUD (and) make these appointments, (and now) he’s on the agenda to be fired,” said Wilson.

“I feel like they’re targeting him because he’s helping us,” Wimes said. “We’ve been trying to get help for a long time, but nobody has come until now.”

This piece was republished from The Miami Times.