By:Nick Buglione
The man wrote that the home is divided up among three families, who take up all the parking spaces on the street and flood the sidewalk with garbage.
It-s the type of letter Levinson says he has received hundreds of times, and some have undoubtedly come from East Meadow and Salisbury residents fed up with the same situation in their neighborhoods.
Though Levinson also came to talk about property reassessments and new tax initiatives, it was clear that the gathering of more than 60 residents came to rehash old complaints on illegal rentals and hear the assessor-s ideas on eradicating them.
We get so many complaints on this topic, said Helen Meittinis, president of CASA, who organized the meeting. Meittinis and other civic leaders claim that the high cost of living in Nassau County and the scarcity of affordable housing have resulted in the proliferation of illegal rentals in neighborhoods like East Meadow and Salisbury in recent years.
The problem ranges from homeowners who fix up rooms to rent out for extra income to absentee landlords who buy houses and parcel them out to as many as four families at a time, they say.
While residents and civic leaders complain that illegal renters pose sanitation and parking issues, their main concern is that they sap tax-driven services. While they don't pay taxes, many send children to local schools, for example. Anybody who puts their head on a pillow in the district is the school district-s responsibility, said Charles Goldberg, president of the East Meadow Board of Education. That-s state law. It costs approximately $13,000 a year to educate a child in the East Meadow School District, Goldberg said.
Some who attended the meeting charged that while they have reported a number of illegal rentals to the Town of Hempstead, the municipality that enforces the building code, little action has been taken. I-ve complained to the Town of Hempstead several times, and basically I feel it-s been swept under the carpet, said Jeff Schwartz, a lifelong Salisbury resident.
Town of Hempstead officials argue that they are fighting an uphill battle, and point to recent revisions in the town code that suggest they-re doing the best they can to control illegal rentals. Giving inspectors broader authority to investigate violators and enforce penalties, the town authorized the Building Department to issue notices of violation based on indications of illegal rentals, such as multiple door bells or mailboxes. The town has also stiffened the fines for illegal renting: $500 for a first offense, $1,000 for a second and $1,500 for a third.
Levinson joined the fight earlier this year, after a woman was found stabbed to death in an illegal apartment on Post Street in East Meadow. Since then he has attacked the problem aggressively. I recognized that we have a serious problem, Levinson said.
Targeting absentee landlords, Levinson has begun reclassifying homes being rented to multiple families from Class 1 residential properties to Class 4 commercial properties -- a shift that costs landlords thousands of dollars more in taxes every year. What I-m trying to attack is hopefully the more egregious instances, Levinson said.
He is also pushing Nassau County District Court to require landlords to confirm that their apartments conform to building and zoning codes when they file petitions against tenants regarding back rent or evictions. The assessor is also asking the courts to turn petitions over to his office so he can verify whether the apartments in question are indeed legal. A landlord can be prosecuted for perjury if he or she makes a false claim on the petition, Levinson said. He hopes the fear of criminal prosecution will reduce the number of actions in court and deter landlords from renting homes illegally.
Some meeting attendees pointed out that building affordable housing is the only way to truly eliminate illegal rentals. The problem is the lack of affordable housing, said Alanna Brody, who has lived in Salisbury for 25 years. The same people who are here screaming about illegal rentals are the same people screaming that they don-t want apartments built. You can-t have it both ways.
And in a county short on developable land, finding a place to build affordable housing can be difficult, said Nassau County Legislator Norma Gonsalves (R-East Meadow). We can-t find open space, Gonsalves said, and when space is found, everyone shies away from affordable housing because they think it means low-income housing.
Comments about this story? NBuglione@liherald.com or (516) 569-4000 ext. 236.
