After eight months of fighting to keep their mobile home park and even finding a potential new buyer, residents of Forest View Mobile Home Park in Blue Island will move out by the summer, said their attorney, Krisann Kuecher.
Residents said in October they found a buyer for their property who could revitalize the park, but by the end of February the owners of Forest View Mobile Home Park Inc., decided to not move forward with that sale, said Kuecher and the owner’s attorney, Charles Zivin.
The park is managed by Mer-Car Corporation.
“Residents are deeply saddened and feel these profits are being made at their expense,” Kuecher said.
Several residents have said if they worried they would have no place to go if they lost their mobile homes. Residents often own their mobile homes but rent the property it is on.
Kuecher and Zivin both said owners could start forcing residents to leave in July, because that will be 12 months since tenants were notified last summer the park was closing, as required under the Illinois Mobile Home Act.
Kuecher and Zivin said all residents were served evictions for nonpayment of rent. The residents and owners are negotiating a settlement agreement where residents receive compensation for moving off the property by a certain date, the attorneys said.
Zivin said three residents took up the property owners’ initial offer last week, accepting $2,000 to vacate their property by April. Zivin said the residents’ homes were immediately torn down by the owner’s demolition team.
“I put a pretty strict notice requirement in my offer because if a tenant moves out and they don’t tell us and coordinate with us, within 24 hours of them being gone a squatter’s going to be in there,” he said.
That leaves 63 residents still living in the park, Zivin said. The property owners and city initially estimated there were 10 residents, but Zivin said he adjusted that number after resident Joe Cervantes provided evidence of more residents.
Kuecher said the compensation is not enough, and she advocates the residents having more time to move.
“For some of them, it’s just not possible to get them enough compensation,” she said. “These people have higher value and higher investment in their homes and also for those families that have children in schools that might need to relocate before the school year is over, putting considerable strain on the family.”
Kuecher said some residents are behind on rent and were served evictions because they paid rent to a woman named Patty, who posed as a property manager, collected rent payments and even leased out mobile homes.
Zivin confirmed Patty is not and has never been associated with the company. He said that rent payments lost to her do not make up for the nearly $425,000 the owners were not paid.
He said the company faces a cost of $730,000 due to waiving rent, waiving court costs for the evictions and paying for relocation.
“He’s drowning in the cost,” Zivin said of the property owner. “All I know is that my client, as much as everybody is making him out to be a bad guy here, he is getting absolutely killed here.”
Zivin said it is a tough situation and perhaps the city could help with costs.
“They should have just worked with us instead of sending that letter out,” he said. “It’s all obviously an unfortunate situation all around, I mean some of these people have been living there for over 40 years. It’s tough.”
Blue Island City Administrator Thomas Wogan said Tuesday any funds from the city would come from taxpayer dollars and that it is not the taxpayers’ responsibility to intervene in a situation between a private company and its residents.
As for the failed deal for a new buyer to keep the park residential, Zivin said part of the issue was a lack of communication.
Canaan Van Williams, managing partner at Proactive Sustainable Bonds, said in December his investment group finalized an agreement on terms to buy the property, following negotiations with the mobile home property owners.
Kuecher said there was some back and forth regarding other terms and an environmental survey conducted by Van Williams, who wished to proceed with the purchase.
Zivin said there was a gap in communication from Van Williams between November and February.
“The biggest thing though is, you know, the city was breathing down our neck to get everybody out and then there’s like all this delay in whether he’s buying it,” Zivin said.
City officials have said the property is zoned as industrial instead of residential because there is no record the owner, Mer-Car Corporation, ever applied for or received a special-use permit.
Blue Island officials sent a letter to the Forest View property owners demanding the owners to “cease and desist” and evict residents in late July, citing unsafe conditions.
Wogan said Tuesday the property owners are finalizing a permit with the city to continue demolition work for up to 60 trailers.
Kuecher said the residents started a GoFundMe and welcome any help from nonprofits and other resources.
“I just want to say that it has been really heartwarming to work with these residents,” she said. “If the rest of the world showed the same love for their neighbors and concern for those suffering around us, no one would be in situations like this.”
