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DESERT SUN (Palm Springs, California) August 3, 2008 Actions
being taken to make Duroville safer Progress is being made toward turning a dilapidated Thermal mobile-home park that the U.S. government sought to shut down over health and safety violations into a safer, more habitable living space, a spokesman for the facility says. The Desert Mobile Home Park — better known as “Duroville” for its owner, Harvey Duro — will be the subject of a status hearing in U.S. District Court on Monday in Riverside, and representatives of the facility will have good things to report, said Tom Flynn of the L.A.-based Housing Renaissance Fund, now managing Duroville. “We've had to make up for years of stuff not happening out there,” Flynn said. “It wasn't run on a scale that was commensurate with what was going on. We're facilitating the outside world reaching into Duroville and contributing in tangible ways.” In April, U.S. District Judge Stephen G. Larson decided against a U.S. Attorney's office request to close the park, citing a need to keep the facility open for the 3,000 to 5,000 migrant workers who seasonally occupy the roughly 250 trailers on the 40-acre property. Duroville is part of the Torres-Martinez Desert Cahuilla Indian Reservation, and the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs filed a lawsuit last year seeking to halt operations at the facility over substandard living conditions. The suit highlighted the park's permanent state of disrepair, and said that despite years of warnings, Duro had failed to deal with a broken sewage system, faulty electrical wiring and other environmental hazards, including the fire danger associated with so many trailers stacked in tight proximity. The Riverside County Fire Department complained about access to the park, where numerous trailer fires have occurred in the last few years. Based on a study by a three-person panel appointed by Larson, the judge ruled the park was salvageable and laid out terms and conditions that Duro would have to meet — or face the prospect of closing the facility. Larson, who also toured the park in December, established a strict timetable ordering Duro to, by June, hire a professional property management team, set up formal lease agreements with businesses at the park, obtain insurance quotes, perform an engineering study and secure a loan to pay for the modifications. “Come Monday, we'll be turning in signed agreements with contractors to build a fire suppression system (at the park) and the actual cost of rehabilitation plans for bringing into compliance the electrical and sewage infrastructure,” said Flynn. He said the judge will also be notified about the status of a multimillion-dollar loan application that the newly founded Duroville Renaissance Corp. — a nonprofit entity overseeing financial matters at the park — filed with Clearinghouse Community Development Financial Institution. The Orange County-based lender, composed of a consortium of “blue chip” banks that pool funds to underwrite low-income neighborhood projects under the federal Community Reinvestment Act, has indicated it will provide as much as $3 million for Duroville rehabilitation plans. The loan would have to be repaid over a 13-year term at modest interest rates, according to Clearinghouse Community Development Financial Institution spokeswoman Kristy Ollendorff. “One of the problems I have is cost,” said Flynn. “Believe me, there's not much money out there (at the park). There's a real cash-flow issue.” According to Flynn, repair projects at the facility have been under way for the past month, and the money to pay Duroville's nine-person staff and rent equipment to make modifications is coming mainly from rents charged to trailer park tenants, who pay approximately $350 a month to live there. One of the conditions stipulated by Judge Larson was arranging formal lease agreements with the commercial businesses operating at the park, including several used car dealerships, a welding shop and tire outlet. Flynn said eviction notices have been served on all the auto-related businesses because their operations are “incompatible with land-use regulations.” The business owners have apparently retained an attorney and intend to sue, Flynn said. “We will renegotiate leases with businesses that are needed for the local community — a grocery store, laundromat, clothing store,” Flynn said. He said Lloyd's of London has agreed to insure the mobile-home park, providing liability coverage amounting to several million dollars. Flynn said the Housing Renaissance Fund, an organization that works with banks to rehab distressed properties, has never managed a property the size of Duroville, but help is coming from outside sources. “The Diocese of San Bernardino and Sister Gabriella Williams have been just unreal, taking a lot of personal interest (in Duroville),” Flynn said. The diocese, through its Office of Social Concerns, has agreed to provide portable buildings for a centrally located community center in the park, according to Flynn. During the summer, the park population is at its lowest, around 2,700 residents, Flynn said. More will return in the fall, after the grape-harvesting season in Northern California passes. After Larson reviews the Duroville progress report Monday, Duro will have another two months before a second progress report is due, showing that funding commitments are in place to pay for all the necessary work, and that new commercial agreements have been signed and an educational program is under development to instruct tenants on their rights and responsibilities.
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