This House Is A Hate Crime: Tompkins County Couple Forced to Live in Toxic Conditions
Judith Johnson and Linda Bruno are responsible for the imminent eviction (via condemnation) of a Black couple living in Dryden.
The union is now running a fundraiser for the couple here.
UPDATE 10/28/21: As of 10/27, ALL tenants are to be forced out by Sunday 10/31 at 5 PM due to total condemnation of the building. Seven tenants will be made homeless. Linda Bruno has yet to respond despite direct communication.
UPDATE 10/13/21: Members of ITU, including the tenants themselves, installed the necessary fixtures to prevent the Notice to Vacate on Keionzie and Troy’s apartment.
“Hi, yes. I’m the maintenance personnel for a property in Dryden New York. I’m worried because our so-called property manager is refusing maintenance because the renters won’t pay, but they will if the property manager will allow me to go replace some stuff. Right now [the property manager] won’t.”
-August 20th voicemail left on the Ithaca Tenants Union Hotline
The property this voicemail refers to is 14 W Main St. in Dryden, NY, owned by Linda Bruno, a business teacher at Dryden High School — and managed by Judith Johnson, a former parole officer. Keionzie and Troy Washington started renting an apartment in the building in August of 2020. Keionzie is originally from Kansas and was looking forward to a fresh start in New York, where many renters struggle to find decent available apartments.
Less than a year after moving to Dryden, Keionzie’s car engine sputtered to a stop on the highway. A mechanic later pulled out candy wrappers and other items from her gas tank. Keionzie suspects one of the other tenants was responsible for the property damage, since the car had only been parked behind the house, out of sight. The car was totaled from the damage, making her unable to get to her new job. It should be noted that Keionzie and Troy are the only Black couple in the building, as racism has proven to be relevant in a number of ways in the couple’s struggle for livable housing.
About a month before that, serious water damage had caused fixtures to fall off the walls of the couple’s apartment. This included the bathroom sink. Due to the sabotage that destroyed her car, Keionzie lost her job, and was unable to pay rent. Rent debt was the original reason Judith Johnson had refused the couple critical maintenance, according to the those who reported the disrepair.
However, it should be noted that withholding repairs — regardless of payment status — is illegal in New York State as per Real Property Law L Section 235-B, which states that a landlord not repairing an appliance, heat, water, or addressing safety issues violates a tenant’s “Warranty of Habitability.”
Back on June 16th, Keionzie asked the Village of Dryden Code Enforcement to inspect the unit. Code Enforcement— the department responsible for ensuring buildings meet minimum safety requirements — filed a violation letter, and a copy was reportedly sent to owner Linda Bruno. Shortly after, the unit’s only toilet fell off the water-logged walls. The couples’ cats started entering and leaving the building through a sizable hole the animals had discovered in the foundation. Black mold became visible inside the wet walls. Their door, already ill-fitting, stopped securing entirely. Their stove began leaking gas.
Keionzie and Troy have since been unable to do simple tasks like cooking or using the bathroom. They’ve also rapidly lost weight in the past few months, which the couple suspects is due to both the mold and stress. As still no repairs have been made, Keionzie started intentionally withholding rent in the hopes it would pressure management to address the unlivable state of the unit. There is little recourse for a renter who is suffering from disrepair, even if it results in dangerous and toxic living conditions. Withholding rent is one of the only things tenants can do when faced with unlivable conditions — it’s a decision to stop meeting the tenant‘s side of a lease’s obligations until the landlord meets theirs.
In time, it became clear Judith Johnson’s refusal to allow maintenance into Keionzie’s apartment was about more than the money. In one interaction Keionzie filmed on her phone, she confronts Johnson and asks for maintenance. Johnson repeatedly refuses because Keizonie is “not nice to her” and is “mean.” It is not insignificant that a white property manager has denied a Black couple maintenance due to a perceived lack of respect.
On September 9th, tenants gathered outside on the deteriorating back staircase. Wiring can be seen running in and out of the siding, which is slowly chipping away to expose the building’s insulation. All the renters in attendance shared stories about the lights flickering when it rains, improper door installations, broken locks, and the difficulty in getting repairs made. However, other tenants received at least some level of maintenance regardless of their rent status, and only Keionzie and Troy’s unit fell into total disrepair.
Property manager Johnson occasionally hired people to do repairs on 14 W. Main, but those hired were almost always hard-up tenants. Often struggling with disability or addiction, they were paid far too little, if at all. According to a written account by a neighbor, Johnson had him begin bathroom repairs in Keionzie and Troy’s apartment, but the neighbor stopped once it became clear Johnson wouldn’t pay him. In another instance, Johnson gave no notice whatsoever (NYS requires up to a week’s notice for repairs, though the tenants can consent to it being done sooner), surprising the tenants when they were unprepared for a major repair. She later cited this as a maintenance refusal.
Larry Stalton Jr., one of Keionzie’s neighbors, provided several documents outlining inspection failures for his apartment, as well as a claim from management that he too had refused maintenance because of improper notice. He eventually received repairs.
While maintenance is prepared to fix Keionzie and Troy’s apartment, Johnson refuses to pay for the necessary fixtures. “I hate to say this,” said one tenant that wishes to remain anonymous, “but I think there might be a racial aspect to all this.”
“I don’t like being inside the apartment because of the mold,” said Keionize, “but people are always trying to start something out here.”
The housing conditions have contributed to the tension between tenants, police, and the property manager. Tenants often spend time outside due to the condition of their apartments. The property manager and Dryden PD occasionally circle through the parking lots, surveilling the renters. During a visit from an ITU member, a neighbor continually paced back and forth, shouting racial slurs at Keionzie. “We’ve definitely experienced racism here. The cops won’t listen to us, one of them grabbed me. I don’t feel safe here,” says Keionzie.
As of September 29th, the Village of Dryden Code Enforcement visited the apartment after pressure from tenant organizing, hoping to hold the landlord accountable. Code Officer David W. Sprout issued an amended, longer list of violations, and an immediate condemnation date of Thursday, October 7 if significant repairs have not been made.
In the absence of a working toilet, mold remediation, and other issues which the landlord and property owner already have shown to not care about, condemnation is functionally the same as an eviction for Keionzie and Troy. They will be displaced with only one week’s notice because of landlord neglect. Management will have successfully pushed out a Black family by intentionally neglecting to maintain habitable conditions. All other tenants at 14 W. Main have received some level of maintenance, even if that level is still quite poor. Reportedly, the entire building will be condemned soon due to electrical, foundational and mold issues, but the other tenants will have far more time than a mere week to find housing accommodations.
Keionize and Troy began the long, slow process of looking for apartments months ago. Unfortunately, they are running up against the absolute dearth of housing that’s a consistent experience for renters in Tompkins County. The couple now faces imminent homelessness if the repairs aren’t made by October 7th. “I was so excited when I got this place, but now I don’t even know what to do,” said Keionzie.
The Ithaca Tenants Union, working alongside several Tompkins and Cortland county organizers, are currently conducting a phone zap to apply pressure to both Judith Johnson and Linda Bruno to either do the basic repairs that would prevent the Notice to Vacate from being posted late Thursday, or to provide Keionzie and Troy with alternative housing.
So far, Johnson has been quick to describe harassment and repair refusal on Keionzie’s end as her only response, despite evidence to the contrary. Linda Bruno has not responded to any communication attempt, including a recent voicemail from Keionzie and Troy’s Law NY representative. Get the information on the phone zap and participate here. In situations like these, public pressure and collective action goes a long way. After the Tenants Union’s last exposé of a neglectful landlord leaving dangerous housing on the brink of condemnation, public attention succeeded in getting the landlord to finally initiate the baseline repair process required to delay the Notice to Vacate that would’ve left tenants houseless.
The community has raised a small amount of money for the couple’s physical needs, but much more is needed. Donate to their GoFundMe here.
Want to stand with tenants dealing with landlord issues? Join the Ithaca Tenants Union here.
