Willow Woods Residents Vent; Board Spikes Increased Rent

The issue of a rent increase of about $20 per month at Willow Woods took a back seat at West Deptford's rent control board Tuesday night, as residents spent more than an hour building a laundry list of complaints, describing everything from flooding to sewage in sinks.

The evening turned into a referendum on the mobile home park's management, from their response to those problems and the day-to-day operations, as residents and board members alike took the park's representatives to task.

And when it was over, the California-based Carlyle Group, which owns the park, walked away defeated, after the board voted 4-0 to reject their application for a rent increase.

“We need you to wake up,” board member Tyler Levine told the company's representatives, after he and other board members noted that the same kind of complaints seem to crop up, year after year.

Those complaints were plenty this time, as nearly half of the two dozen residents who turned out for the meeting came up to speak about one issue or another.

John Miller held up photos from the recent floods and a petition as he spoke against the increase.

“I've only been there since October, and I'm scared to death,” he said.

Miller criticized management's attempts to mitigate the floods with an earthen berm, which he said doesn't do anything to protect residents.

“The water just rushes right through,” he said. “It's all messed up.”

Brenda Borneo said local park management was rude and unhelpful when she told them of a problem with her sewer lines after the April flood.

“I have sewage in my sink,” she said, and repeated it for effect.

The two floods in August didn't help the Carlyle Group, either. Though township inspectors didn't find any code violations in an inspection Monday, Hurricane Irene flooded the same part of the park that had already been hit hard twice this year, though there was less damage this go-round.

Donald Thorn, who lost his car to the flood in April, called the conditions at the park “primitive.”

“We shouldn't have to live this way,” he said.

For their part, the Carlyle Group's representatives tried to respond to residents' concerns as the meeting went along, assuring residents that their concerns were heard loud and clear.

Joe Weber, the company's chief operating officer, said the company is doing its best to help Willow Woods residents where they can, like compensating individual renters for flood damage from April or bringing in extra pumps to try to get ahead of the predicted floods from Hurricane Irene.

“We're not unfeeling people,” he said.

The company's attorney, Christopher Hanlon, shared similar sentiments with the board, and noted that they had made attempts before, using capital expense projects to try to alleviate some of the problems residents had raised in years past.

The company wasn't aiming to hike the rent to pay for other capital costs, Hanlon said, but was instead seeking an increase to cover higher tax and water and sewer bills, along with a cost-of-living increase of 2.5 percent, which would've amounted to anywhere between about $17 to $22 extra per month per home.

The increased costs from water and sewer and property taxes were simply the increase the park saw from the township, Hanlon said.

“We don't benefit one nickel from those components,” he said. “We've already spent it.”

Some residents saw it differently, though.

Joan Miller accused the company of putting dollar signs before people.

“To me, it's my home—to you, it's just a paycheck,” she said.

And while the board's rejection of the increase was met with applause and support from the residents, it wasn't a be-all, end-all for some.

Borneo said it was more important to get the park's problems out in public, and have them addressed by management above the local level–something that's been difficult in the months since the first major flood in April.

“The rental increase didn't really upset me that much,” she said.