Apartments may be shut down

Jen Lawson and Dan Kulin

Thursday, July 7, 2005 | 11:13 a.m.

A downtown Las Vegas apartment complex that Metro Police and city officials say has become a haven for crime and squalor is headed toward a courtroom battle that could result in the city shutting down the Monterey Villas Apartments.

The City Council on Wednesday voted 7-0 to authorize the city attorney to go to court to in an attempt to close down the complex on the basis that it has been operating without a license for about a year and has been deemed a chronic nuisance and an imminent hazard.

"It should send a message to the rest of the slum lords," said Sgt. Eric Fricker of Metro's downtown area command. "You just feel that a fire is imminent down there. You can feel something bad is going to happen."

City Attorney Brad Jerbic said he expects to begin legal proceedings by Friday.

The city will find other homes for the residents of the 80-unit complex near the Stratosphere to live if the complex is shut down, a spokesman said. About half of the apartments are unoccupied.

There is a chance that the city could change its course of action if conditions began to improve, Jerbic said.

But representatives for the owners, Monterey Villas LLC based out of Los Angeles, said they are being unfairly targeted and that conditions at the complex have gotten better.

However, police continue to arrest people for trespassing, drug offenses and prostitution.

Further, a Sun reporter who visited the complex Wednesday afternoon discovered that the amount of trash and debris littering the courtyards and landscaping outside the complex had grown substantially in the past month.

"I have my mind made up," resident Joseph Peterman said from his second-floor apartment that overlooks the courtyard, where broken glass, empty 40-ounce beer bottles in paper bags, food wrappers, plastic drink containers, paper plates and grocery store circulars were strewn.

Peterman said he's moving to a different complex soon -- he is fed up with the police activity, the garbage and the fact that the property manager is never around. He had to repair his front door himself, he said.

Twenty-four of the apartments were sealed June 2 after officials found conditions that made them unfit for habitation: raw sewage, no electricity or working plumbing systems, for example.

The closed apartments were supposed to be vacant but had been occupied by squatters whom police said were drug users and prostitutes. Some squatters changed the locks and tapped into the complex's power box for electricity.

One of the people living there illegally was the property manager who had been brought in to clean up the complex after the violations sweep. Fricker said he had been stealing electricity from the complex.

Attorney Robert Nersesian appeared before City Council as a representative of the owner, Monterey Villas LLC, but refused to divulge the names of the actual people behind the corporation.

"We really don't know what to do," Fricker said. "We have police officers who are trying to reduce crime and are also acting as private security guards so people don't get hurt. We don't know who to hold accountable."

Nersesian disputed the city's claim that the complex is a chronic nuisance said they've improved conditions the apartments and are willing to work with the city.

"This is not an eyesore," Nersesian said. "This company wants to be a good citizen."

Nersesian also complained that when company staff went to the complex to do some repairs in recent months, they were arrested for doing business without a license.

Councilman Gary Reese said the Monterey apartments have "really been a heartburn for me for many, many years."

He added that just because the residents can't afford an expensive apartment, doesn't mean the Monterey residents have to live in squalor.

"They haven't improved one iota," Reese said of the apartments. "The place should have been shut down a long time ago."

Councilwoman Lois Tarkanian, whose ward includes the apartment complex, said she visited the apartments recently.

"The smell, the squalor," she said. "It's time to take action now."

Jimmy Savani, another representative of the owner, said he thinks the city's actions are outrageous.

"Whatever they ask we have been doing," he said. "We want to comply fully."

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