DA to crack down on illegal housing Vows to assist towns, cities in assault on county-wide problem

      At a press conference in Mineola on Jan. 18, District Attorney Denis Dillon said that he would assist the towns of Hempstead, North Hempstead and Oyster Bay and the cities of Long Beach and Glen Cove in identifying and prosecuting owners of illegal apartments.
      Dillon, joined by the chairman of the county's Board of Assessors, Harvey Levinson, Nassau town supervisors, Long Beach City Manager Charles Theofan and Glen Cove Mayor Ann Holzkamp, said he is not targeting "the little old lady" renting a room in her house. He said the "prosecutorial discretion" of his office would enable him to target the owners of several illegal dwellings. The division of single-family homes into multiple apartments, Dillon said, produces more garbage, more students in the school districts, more strain on police and fire departments and more crime.
      Dillon said he would help execute existing bench warrants for the Town of Hempstead, and track down the most flagrant homeowners. The towns of Oyster Bay and North Hempstead and the cities of Glen Cove and Long Beach will receive assistance in the investigation and prosecution of multiple-family dwelling owners. Dillon did not say how he planned to assist in the investigations.
      "Employing the talents of the district attorney's office in executing bench warrants will let the most egregious offenders know that we are deadly serious about stopping those who would turn single-family homes into boarding houses," Hempstead Supervisor Kate Murray said.
      In addition to "nail and mail" state legislation that allows town building departments to post summonses and mail copies to elusive absentee landlords after failing to serve summonses in person, the Town of Hempstead recently implemented its own deterrent, increasing the fines for owning illegal dwellings tenfold. The fines for owning illegal housing now range from $500 to $1,500 for a first offense, $1,500 to $5,000 for a second offense and $2,500 to $10,000 for a third offense. Under the town's old system, the maximum fine was $500 for a first offense, $1,000 for a second offense and $1,500 for a third offense. The town has also added more building department personnel and established night shifts, and now sends undercover building department workers to open houses for suspected illegal apartments.
      Levinson said that the best way to enact change is by hitting illegal landlords in the wallet. "The lifeblood of illegal housing is the profits generated by the huge rent rolls, often paid in cash," he said, urging officials to take a lesson from the Village of New Hyde Park, which fines landlords of illegal dwellings twice the total rent they collect.
      With the promised crackdown, the tenants, many of whom may not know they are renting illegally, will be left with no place to go. "People will be made homeless as a result of this crackdown. There is no doubt about it," said North Hempstead Supervisor Jon Kaiman.
      "It can't just be law-enforcement level," Dillon said. "We need legislative efforts, too, like more housing for working people who can't afford high rents on Long Island, maybe a flat tax instead of just property tax, and we need to work with Immigration and Naturalization to provide the INS information to deport people committing crimes in our area. We need to work together without pointing fingers at each other."
      According to the National Association of Home Builders, Nassau and Suffolk counties rank 151st out of 162 of the least-affordable housing markets in the nation.

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