Mobile home mediation continues Mobile home mediation continues (February 27, 2004)

Residents' committees detail grievances with park management

By Grace Rauh

Mountain View Mayor Matt Pear wants to finally close the book on years of grievances and complaints made by Sahara Village and Santiago Villa Mobile Home Parks' residents, and he thinks it just may happen.

Last week, residents' committees from both parks appeared before the Council Neighborhoods Committee, armed with detailed reports chronicling their problems with park management and efforts to find solutions.

"There has been two years of this," Pear said. "The whole idea was to bring this to some type of closure. ... I'm very hopeful we will be able to come to some type of solution."

Pear plans to meet with parks manager GeorgeWhitteker for several hours on March 19 to discuss the issues remaining at both parks. He expressed confidence that the meeting can resolve the residents' complaints.

Residents from Santiago Villa have been meeting with Whitteker to discuss specific problems they have with the park, and they "continue to be cautiously optimistic in our dealings with park management," residents' committee president Shawn Jipp wrote in the report.

The report included a list of issues residents want management to address, among them overgrown palm trees, a faulty laundry room ceiling, the treatment of dogs in the park and a children's play area.

The report from Sahara Village highlighted infrastructure failures in the park. There is a limited water supply, sewage backups and random loss of electric power at specific residences, the report stated.

"I was surprised concerning the infrastructure," Pear said. "Out of all the items that I saw, that was major."

Residents at both mobile parks also said they want their rents lowered.

Council members urged the Sahara Village residents' committee to begin meeting with Whitteker to find lasting solutions to their complaints. The Sahara committee has never met with park management and recently refused mediation with Whitteker, saying it will only speak with park owner John Vidovich. According to Sahara committee chair Sandy Sandlin, previous meetings between management and individuals on the committee have become confrontational.

"But at council's urging, we are going to" meet with Whitteker, she said.

The Neighborhoods Committee offered mobile park residents assistance from the city attorney's office in preparation for mediation.

The committee will recommend that the City Council fund a workshop called "Mobilehome Owners Rights and Responsibilities" which would be led by Project Sentinel, the same group tapped to oversee the mediation. The workshop would cost Mountain View $600.

Sandlin plans to attend it. "We'll definitely go to see if they can in any way offer us more information than all the information we have so far gathered," she said.

E-mail Grace Rauh at grauh@mv-voice.com>$>

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