RESIDENTS MUST STAY INDOORS
More draconian measures and intimidation from management


Management's orders: Stay inside your apartment

In addition to the highly criticized towing policy, the management at Abbey Court is now enforcing a heavy-handed “no loitering” rule which requires residents to remain inside their apartments at all times except when entering or leaving the premises.

During a confrontation with residents who were sitting out on a lawn on the evening of August 29, manager Dee Gill, accompanied by a security guard, stated that the complex’s common areas may be used for no purpose except ingress or egress (coming or going). This means that residents may not stand or sit on the lawns, sidewalks, stairwells, entryways, or parking lots. When they are on Abbey Court property, they must stay inside their apartments.

Gill threatened that residents who violate this rule may be charged with trespassing. Gill, in fact, called police during her confrontation with the residents sitting on the lawn, but the police left the scene without taking action.

A heavy-handed policy

The Abbey Court management maintain that they are simply enforcing long-neglected rules written into residents’ leases. Certainly the law is on management’s side in this case. And certainly the resident community benefits from a crackdown on loiterers who make noise or consume alcohol.

But management’s approach in this case, as in the case of the parking policy, goes beyond a reasonable effort to improve quality of life for residents. The “ingress and egress only” policy is heavy-handed, draconian, and adversarial toward people who are paying to live here. Some residents have complained that management has told them not to allow their children to play outside. Is that part of how management intends to enforce this policy? After catering for years to Latino immigrants and other low-income renters, management now seems to want to reverse course, transforming Abbey Court into a window-dressed complex of “condominiums,” where the low-income renters already present will at least do management the favor of staying out of sight.

Intimidating residents

Furthermore, it’s not clear that the “no loitering” policy is being equitably enforced. Some of the residents whom Dee Gill brought security to confront on August 29 have been prominent critics of the towing policy. After the police had come and gone, this author (who is also an Abbey Court resident) approached the group to find out what had happened. As we chatted in the parking lot, Gill, who was watching from a distance, sent two security guards to tell me that I was violating the rules and needed to “leave now.”

That’s not about security for residents or improving our quality of life. That’s intimidation, pure and simple. Unfortunately, it’s becoming increasingly clear that this is how the current management intends to operate.