No heat, no lights, then no home in St. Petersburg
By Waveney Ann Moore, Times staff writer
In Print: Thursday, December 4, 2008
Janai Frails, 18, left, hugs her mother, Ruby Frails, 37, who is crying after finding out Wednesday that St. Petersburg officials would help her return to Rhode Island. “I’m going home,” she said. The city forced out residents at JMS Hotel.
ST. PETERSBURG — When the electricity in their residential hotel was turned off the morning before Thanksgiving, Mary Mix and her three children scraped together money to buy candles.
During the next few nights — some of the most frigid this winter — they piled under blankets to stay warm.
Then on Monday, city officials shuttered the hotel that Mix and more than a dozen other families, including at least 24 children, had called home.
City officials said the lack of electricity at the JMS Hotel at 4601 34th St. S created a fire hazard. The hotel's water also was about to be shut off.
Officials said the hotel owners owe $90,000 in back utility bills.
A total of 53 people were forced out. They had to be gone by 5 p.m. Wednesday.
Most of the last dozen or so families to leave were single mothers and their kids. Instead of focusing on preparing for the holidays, they were scrambling to find a new place to live.
"I'm trying to get myself situated somewhere where they could lay their heads and call that home," said Mix, whose children are 13, 15 and 17.
City and county social services agencies were trying to help.
On Wednesday afternoon, many gathered in the hotel parking lot and wondered what they would do. When an onsite manager appeared, two residents shouted at her.
City officials said the hotel owners owe $60,000 to Progress Energy and $30,000 to the city of St. Petersburg for water. The property also has been through foreclosure proceedings.
Advocates for the poor say they have seen renters caught in situations like this more often in these tough economic times.
"It's a combination of rental properties being foreclosed and people are losing their jobs," said Cliff Smith, assistant health and human services director for Pinellas County.
"And when the mortgage holder starts foreclosure, the tenants are really the ones who are suffering. They have to move out."
Lisa Brody, managing attorney for Bay Area Legal Services in St. Petersburg, said she also has seen an increase in these situations.
"In many cases, the tenants have continued to pay rent month after month after month, not realizing that the property is in foreclosure," she said.
She said Florida statutes offer fewer protections for people in hotels and motels.
"In these foreclosure situations, it is very difficult because the owner doesn't have the financial means to keep the water on, to keep the electricity on," she said.
That was of little comfort to Taketa Johnson, 30, who had been living and working as a front desk clerk in the rundown hotel for six months.
"They just didn't tell us nothing. We were at work and the lights just came off," she said.
Johnson said she's owed a paycheck. She made $8.50 an hour and paid $250 every two weeks to live in a room with her children, 7 and 11.
"We had just paid our rent," she said Wednesday.
The problems at the hotel began in September, when a routine inspection revealed that fire alarms did not work and guardrails were unsafe, said Lt. Joel Granata of St. Petersburg Fire Rescue.
After the electricity was turned off, the fire department set up a 24-hour watch for the residents' safety, he said.
Darrell Kelley, the motel manager and a former shareholder who lives in Holiday, blames Progress Energy for the problem. He said the hotel received an unusually high electric bill in January and requested an audit.
He said the power company agreed not to collect until the audit was done, but the hotel owners never got the audit results.
Suzanne Grant, a spokeswoman for Progress Energy, said she couldn't discuss individual cases, but added: "I did go back and talked with folks who have access to those records and you're not hearing the entire story."
Rhonda Abbott, St. Petersburg's social services manager, said the city was helping 11 families find new places to live.
Some families will stay at the Mosley Motel, 401 34th Street N, for three nights, she said. Some have qualified for Section 8 housing, and the city will help others to find affordable housing.
Mix and Johnson eventually took their families to the Mosley Motel.
"We're making sure people have a safe place to stay tonight and the next night and the night after," Abbott said. "That's our goal."
Waveney Ann Moore can be reached at wmoore@sptimes.com or (727) 892-2283. Times researcher Caryn Baird contributed to this story.
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