Two park suits on file

Seniors at Huntington Shorecliffs Mobile Home Park, who have implored the city not to allow the park’s owners to subdivide it between buyers and renters, filed two lawsuits against the owners in recent years over what they considered unfair costs and insufficient care of the grounds.

The suits were brought on by several residents of the park as well as the Golden State Manufactured-Home Owners League Chapter 571, a nonprofit set up to advocate for the residents’ rights. One suit, filed in 2007, alleges that the owners and management of the park allowed residents’ properties to decay and flood, while the other, filed in 2006, accuses them of violating the terms of a 1986 lease and charging residents illegal fees.

Attorney Kent Mariconda said the residents were seeking repairs as well as monetary damages, although he declined to specify the amount. The problems described in the suits, he said, have worsened over the years.

“It continues to fester,” Mariconda said. “There are virtually no serious efforts being made to correct the problem. There may be efforts to put a Band-Aid on it, but the problem itself is not being corrected.”

Robert Coldren, an attorney for the park’s owners, said he believed many of the allegations were false. However, he noted that the suits were filed before the new owners took over the property in 2008.

“To use a nonlegal term, the new owners inherited those lawsuits,” Coldren said.

His office, he said, has filed a cross-complaint against the old owners, seeking to indemnify the new owners if the court orders the old ones to pay damages.

An attorney for the old owners did not return a call Wednesday.

According to the 2007 suit, the park’s owners and management did little or nothing about groundwater problems that caused yards flood and at least one home to grow “black mold and mushrooms.” The suit claims one resident suffered pulmonary and respiratory problems from mold exposure, and Mariconda said the resident has since moved off the premises.

The earlier suit accuses the owners of imposing a new lease in 2006 that violated terms of a previous one signed in 1986, which was supposed to last for 30 years. The suit also claims the owners passed expenses on to residents, including property taxes and trash collection, that they should have paid themselves, and that they allowed themselves to raise rents higher than the 1986 lease permitted.

Mariconda said he believes the owners are trying to sell lots so they could avoid taking care of them.

“They’re, in effect, selling the residents the problems they have in these lawsuits,” he said.