Wrighting homes

Mayor Wright Homes — its collection of institutional gray and tan structures a Palama landmark for nearly 60 years — has been one of the poster children of bad public housing stewardship. Its deterioration has accelerated further in the last decade or two.

Apartments that are broken down, infested with pests, inaccessible to the disabled … the symptoms are familiar to residents of another poster-child project, a mile or so away. That’s the Kuhio Park Terrace (KPT) and Kuhio Homes complex, which more recently has been getting the overhaul that it so desperately needed.

Some housing advocates — including the attorney behind the class-action federal and state lawsuits that helped to prompt action at KPT — hope that this reversal of fortunes can spread to Mayor Wright. Litigation is being employed again as a tool to compel overall improvements in the project’s physical condition and security: Class-action federal and state complaints were filed in April, naming Mayor Wright residents.

"The purpose of the lawsuits is to gain the attention of government, and tell them they cannot operate systems like these that are in violation of state and federal law," said the attorney leading the charge in court, Victor Geminiani of the Hawaii Appleseed Center for Law and Economic Justice, formerly known as Lawyers for Equal Justice.

That said, Geminiani sees hope for change, partly because the new state administration is already taking notice. Funding for long-awaited repairs to the degraded water-heating system was pushed through the Legislature and the repairs made. And at the grassroots level, there’s reason for optimism because conversations between tenants and the complex managers have ramped up recently.

The genesis of those communications was grim: the latest murder on Sept. 10 at the complex, notorious for violence and the incursion of gang activity. Takson Krstoth, 21, has been indicted on a second-degree murder charge for allegedly stabbing a man in the back near a garbage bin at the project.

Neither Krstoth nor the victim — TJ "Tipuk" Mori, a 24-year-old father of three — were legal residents of Mayor Wright. But that is part of what has worried residents, who fear security doesn’t regulate the comings and goings of people who aren’t part of the community.

"If you’re not a rent payer in Mayor Wright, there’s no reason to be on property," said Fetu Kolio, president of the Mayor Wright Homes Tenants Association. "It’s OK to visit, but the people … they can move freely with no concerns whatsoever. They roam the property like they’re tenants."

Kolio, who is also one of the plaintiffs in the legal action, said the community has had meetings with the state’s managers, and all have agreed to tighten enforcement of security rules. There was some discussion of imposing a curfew, a temporary constraint placed on residents that was adopted at Kalihi Valley Homes last year. At KVH, that move proved largely successful, cementing closer bonds among residents who still maintain vigilance over the neighborhood, said Denise Wise.

"I have had tenants at KVH who told me, ‘It was the first time in 25 years I was able to sleep through the night,’" she said.

Wise is the executive director of the Hawaii Public Housing Authority, the state agency that oversees KVH, Mayor Wright and other public-housing projects statewide. After discussions at Mayor Wright, however, the ultimate agreement was not to set a curfew but to start by setting a 10 p.m. "quiet time" when everyone, residents and visitors, would be barred from congregating outdoors. Access to the property would be restricted to residents, and patrols around the perimeter would increase to keep trespassers out, Wise said.

Residents have been warned that their guests’ behavior is their responsibility and that flouting the rules could eventually get families evicted, she added.

"I’ve told them, ‘If you don’t want to cooperate with that, if you let people on the property that disrupt the community, I don’t want you here — don’t even cry to me about it,’" she said.

On the issue of structural repairs, Wise said the agency is encouraged by the privatization model employed at the Kuhio complex. Michaels Development Co., based in New Jersey, is the lead partner in the site redevelopment and renovations that began in May.

However, she said, replicating that at Mayor Wright is not a simple proposition. The authority is instead beginning a master-planning process that evaluates the condition of the entire public housing inventory — more than 6,000 units statewide.

HPHA is under considerable pressure to do this. In addition to the lawsuits, the agency was hit in June with a scathing management audit by state Auditor Marion Higa. The 54-page report noted the authority was lagging severely in its plan to convert to a more efficient, more localized scheme of management. This, according to the audit, would better meet the state’s obligations to maintain facilities, keep units rented to paying tenants and offer them reasonable security.

Higa acknowledged a "concerted effort" by the new administration to rectify things, but underscored just how far there is to go.

"Oversight for rent collection, federal reporting, and issues affecting tenants’ daily lives — such as building conditions, property upkeep, and timely addressing of repair and maintenance problems — was erratic," she wrote.

Wise, in the job for a little more than a year, declined comment on the specifics of the lawsuit.

The complaint in U.S. District Court alleges that the state has violated the federal Americans with Disabilities Act by failing to provide reasonable modifications to make enough units accessible and safe for tenants with disabilities, effectively excluding them from the housing program.

The case before state Circuit Court charges the state and the HPHA with a breach of lease agreements because of "squalid, unsafe, unsanitary and unlawful conditions" at Mayor Wright Homes. For example, the complaint cites a 2008 assessment that reported widespread water damage, corroded and inoperable windows and mold on water heater tanks.

Infestations by rats and roaches are common throughout the premises, according to the complaint, with extermination treatments used infrequently and incompletely.

Security guards are too few and spread too thin, leading to problems ranging from vandalism to violent crime, the suit alleges.

State Rep. Karl Rhoads, the legislator who represents Mayor Wright interests at the Capitol, agreed with that charge. Rhoads has knocked on doors there frequently since first being elected in 2006, with very little interference from the unarmed guards.

"I’ve spent many, many hours at Mayor Wright, and I was challenged by security one time," he said. "The problem is there are other people coming in there whose motives aren’t legal and they don’t challenge anybody. The guards are more afraid of the gangs than the gangs are of the guards."

Geminiani said the current contract, with Alii Security, is up in July. The housing authority needs to ensure that the next award goes to a company that hires qualified personnel who are trained and given protocols on how to handle situations and on when to call police, he said.

Rhoads agreed that security is the worst of Mayor Wright’s shortcomings, though he applauded Gov. Neil Abercrombie for pressing forward with the most critical building repairs this year, at a decidedly faster pace than that of his predecessor, Linda Lingle.

"There is some reason for hope," he said. "Neil has actually made it a priority, and that was not the case in the previous administration — they don’t like the government being in housing at all, and it showed in their attitude at Mayor Wright.

"I’m hoping that the trajectory is the same on the security side," he added. "It’s not good right now."