Redwood City mobile home residents can't afford required maintenance
REDWOOD CITY -- A tiny trailer at the Sequoia Mobile Home Park in Redwood City is where Mary Whitney, her daughter and grandsons live. The space rental is $1,200 per month.
Residents at the park say they are suddenly getting health and safety violations from park management. Residents at Sequoia, often one paycheck away from catastrophe are worried about what to do.
Whitney and others say code enforcement violations began piling up in March, following a fire at Sequoia.
"The cost of living in Redwood City is ridiculous. We can't afford to live anywhere else. We're not being provided the resources. We have the county constantly knocking on our door for us to fix these violations," Whitney said.
"They're saying that there's violations in our propane tanks, there are violations in our sewer leaks, we have electrical issues, we have cracks in windows, we have um, just a variety of issues."
San Mateo County has told them to apply for financial assistance with the repairs.
"A lot of the residents here are elderly and they don't have the resources, smart phones, Wi-Fi, they didn't have the technology to apply for these programs so I've been helping them. To this date, we've turned in our applications and we've yet to hear from this program."
Thursday night at a town hall-style meeting, residents aired numerous frustrations and problems while county executives tried to assuage fear that this is a ploy to evict them.
"We do very much care. We are not trying to hit them. We are trying to support them where we can to ensure they have a safe place to live. To the degree management is not cooperating and collaborating so we can make these repairs that allows them to stay here and stay safe, we will do everything we can," said Steve Monowitz from the San Mateo County planning and building department.
"I'm very scared. I'm very nervous about speaking out and the reason why I'm doing this is because enough is enough. We have elderly people, we have pregnant women, we have elderly people knocking on my door saying "Mary, are we gonna get kicked out?"," Whitney said.
San Mateo County executives say they are also working with property management to repair ongoing sewage and electrical issues. Management has until Friday to respond.
