Melissa Anderson sits in her apartment at the Seramonte Estates on Mix Avenue. The living room is clean, but well-lived in. Photos of her husband and children and multiple paintings saying, “My family comes first,” decorate the walls.
The decor adds a homey feel, but the space is still not ideal. Against a wall, closet doors lean in the same spot where they broke months ago; maintenance never fixed them. One of the cupboard drawers is missing from the kitchen, despite renovations done to the apartment before Anderson moved in 18 months ago.
In spite of this, Anderson’s toddler, Ella, spins around and sings, while Anderson details all the “hell” she has gone through here at the Seramonte Estates since she moved in 2018..
While Anderson talks about evictions, losing her car, and her husband losing his job, her daughter hums along to the “Apples and Bananas” song playing on the TV. She has no idea what it has taken to get to this mold-free apartment or the movement her mom is a part of with other Seramonte Estates’ tenants.
Anderson is among the 250 other members of the Seramonte Estates’ tenants’ union in Hamden who are fighting back after what they say are years of abuse and mismanagement. This includes moldy apartments, endless car towings and unjustified evictions. They say the problems have worsened since Northpoint Management took over in January 2021.
“Everything was so great and then they took over,” Anderson said.
Since Northpoint took over, Anderson’s husband, Barry Wilson, said he felt like a “prisoner” in his own home.
Greta Blau, co-founder of the tenants’ union, was able to explain it simply.
“It’s been a hellish two years. They (management) try to suck you dry of everything.”
Greta Blau
Blau, her husband Paul Boudreau and their son have lived at Seramonte in Kaye Plaza for seven years, but she said the new property manager, Shannon McMunn, has been “aggressive and predatory.”
“We are just products to them–just widgets that can be bought and sold and thrown away,” Boudreau said.
HQNN called McMunn four times and went to her office on Nov. 3, but she would not comment for this story.
Residents, however, had plenty to say.
They claim mold has festered in the basements of the building for four years now. Anderson said management’s solution to the mold has been to close and lock the basement doors and ignore the issue.
Physically shutting out the problem, she said, has not stopped the issue of the mold from reaching residents through the vents, and some said it has made them sick.
In the case of Anderson, Wilson and Ella, the mold spread throughout their kitchen as well as the basement, leaving her bedroom as one of the only “safe places” for her family, she said.
Beginning in early 2020, Anderson experienced dramatic weight-loss. Between February and November 2020, she lost almost 60 pounds. Her physician could not identify the cause for the weight-loss, but her medical records show that once she moved out of the contaminated apartment, her health improved.
The mold, Anderson said, became a problem before Northpoint Management took over, due to a leaking sink and leaking garbage disposal, which caused Anderson to wash her dishes in her bathtub. Once Northpoint took over in January 2021, Anderson said management promised her a different two-bedroom apartment because of the issues.
Anderson packed up her family’s belongings, but McMunn ended up giving the apartment to another resident after having a disagreement with Anderson. Even though Anderson had already started paying rent for the apartment that was promised to her, she was stuck in her moldy, one-bedroom apartment that was causing her to be constantly nauseous, a condition her doctors could not explain.
“I’m thinking I’m moving soon and getting out of this mold, and next thing you know by March she’s got my place already rented out,” Anderson said. “I don’t mind either apartment. They were both nice–that one was redone, this one was redone–I just wanted to be away from the mold, that’s all.”
Eventually, in May 2021, four months after Anderson had repeatedly complained about unsafe conditions, she moved to her current two-bedroom apartment. Despite her unsuccessful efforts to get the mold in her previous apartment remediated, by June a new tenant had moved into the older unit, which had been renovated and rid of the mold, according to Anderson.
Residents have also faced what they call “predatory towing” done by the tow company and automotive dealership, Myhoopty, which is hired by McMunn, the Seramonte Estates’ property manager.
Boudreau claimed a car could be towed for as little an excuse as a crooked parking job.
“If it snows and there’s snow on the windshield, they’ll tow you because they can’t see the sticker.”
Paul Boudreau
Reached by phone, someone at Myhoopty who said he is the manager but would not give his name claimed their company tow only “unauthorized vehicles that are found on the premises.” The Myhoopty manager would not disclose how many cars they had towed during 2021, simply stating it was the “number of vehicles that violate the Seramonte estates parking policy.” The same person would not say how often they were on the premises, just that they have an “alternating rotation, 24 hours seven days a week.”
When the towing started in 2021, Boudreau estimated there was a period when 30 to 40 cars were towed every day in a complex that has 450 units.
Boudreau found himself getting up four to five times a night to see if his car was still there. His car has yet to be towed, but that was not the case for everyone.
Anderson drove her husband to work every day at a restaurant in Milford. After getting into a car accident in September 2021, Anderson finally could afford another car, a Dodge Neon, by mid November.
Anderson had the paperwork showing the sale and an appointment set up for Dec. 16 at the Department of Motor Vehicles to get a new title. She showed all of this to McMunn as part of the process Seramonte residents are required to complete to get a parking pass.
McMunn acknowledged that she was in the process of getting a title and Anderson was given a temporary parking pass that would expire in two weeks. Two days before her DMV appointment and the exact day that her parking pass expired on Dec. 14, 2021, Anderson drove home and ran up to her apartment to pick up her husband for work. When she came back down with him not long after, her parking spot was empty.
Not only did Myhoopty tow her car without a notice, they also sold her car days later when she was trying to scrounge up the money to pay the towing fees. Myhoopty did not release the report from this time but claimed that Anderson’s paperwork had been “fraudulent” and that they have the right to sell cars after they are left “unclaimed” for 15 days.
Although Anderson said it had been less than 15 days, she could not provide evidence of this. Anderson did provide valid documentation to HQNN verifying the sale of her car.
Anderson only found out through a family friend who was a private detective that her car had been sold, leaving the family without transportation. Without a car, Brian Wilson said he had trouble getting to his job in Milford on time and was eventually let go.
Seeing tenants lose their cars was the final straw for the Boudreaus, who started the tenants’ union in March 2021.
After forming the union, tenants worked with legislative council member Sarah Gallagher and leaders of the Connecticut Tenants Union to better understand their rights and how to get justice. Thanks to this collaboration, Hamden had its first Fair Rent Commission meeting in four years in mid-September.
The meetings have addressed the unfair, stark rise in the cost of the rent. The commission heard Yamil Crevecoeur’s case in which her rent had been raised to $2,700 from $1,900 when Crevecoeur only makes $2,500 in monthly income before taxes.
At this time there have now been five meetings of the Fair Rent Commission and the tenants’ union has only gained traction. The Fair Rent Commission denied the rent increases for Crevecoeur and two others and continues to “side with humanity,” according to Boudreau.
Victories like this can be hard to come by at Seramonte Estates, especially since the union has now grown to over 250 members.
The more outspoken Blau and Boudreau get, the more the management tries to evict them. They recently received their third eviction notice for being a “major nuisance,” which they have challenged.
With Blau as a former paralegal and Boudreau as a self-described research junkie, their work toward justice only forges on. Boudreau still works full-time as a mechanic, but he also puts in up to 30 hours of work fighting for his fellow tenants. He often makes calls related to Seramonte during his commute to work or on his lunch break.
Blau is currently unemployed and puts all her free time into this union, yet “there is still not enough time to deal with all the complaints.”
Despite everything, both of them are adamant they are not leaving Seramonte.
“This is our community, our friends. We are so much stronger together. A lot of us were victimized at once, but we found each other. We should have peace in our homes, and that should be a right.”
Paul Boudreau
For Anderson, the journey to a safe and healthy home has been long, but through her efforts and those of her community, she has gotten to a better place.
“I do have a really good support system with the tenants union,” she said. “I just want to be comfortable where I live and live in peace.”