Owner of Frontier Motel 'didn't know' about mice, bed bugs, lack of hot water; Carson City board issues show cause order
Submitted by Kelsey Penrose on Thu, 04/15/2021 - 10:51am
One of the owners of the Frontier Motel appeared Thursday before the Carson City Board of Supervisors while they decided whether or not to order a notice for a show cause hearing, which will determine whether or not the business license for the Frontier Motel should be revoked.
The business license for the Frontier Motel is held under the entity name of Five Star Motel LLC, which lists two managing members, Balwinder Thind and Harbans Handa. Handa appeared before the board to argue that there should not be a show cause hearing, which ultimately failed.
On Wednesday, an emergency order was issued by the Carson City Health and Human Services department immediately shutting down the premises following inspections of the facility on Monday, during which it was determined that the facility was uninhabitable.
City inspectors found that many rooms were infested with mice, rodent fecal matter, bedbugs, structural failures, unpermitted construction, exposed electrical wires, rooms that did not have hot water or toilets that could flush, unsecured doors, broken windows, and general debris and trash within the rooms.
Seven of the 56 rooms on the property were closed immediately upon inspection due to unsafe living conditions, including the potential threat of hantavirus due to infestations.
On Wednesday, notice was given to the rest of the occupants that they would need to vacate the property by Thursday at 7 p.m.
Sheriff Ken Furlong attended the meeting and stated that there have been a series of deaths that occurred at the Frontier which led to Lt. Daniel Gonzales investigating the conditions at the motel and the amount of calls for service that came from the facility in relation to other motels and hotels in the area, which were abnormally high.
“The data revealed that the Frontier Motel has almost twice as many calls for service as other properties and the calls for service are increasing year after year,” said Lt. Gonzales in his report. “Due to the Frontier’s management’s lack of property supervision, the location has become a destination where criminals gather and network. Calls for service range from battery with a deadly weapon, fights, gang activity, drug deals, death investigations related to drug overdoses and drug trafficking. The … inability to control their tenants are straining our response capabilities and reducing our capacity to provide services to the rest of the community.”
Handa stated that they know there are problems and that there are some “bad people” there, but that they need the help of the city to get them out.
“They play loud music, they argue with us,” said Handa. “We’re frustrated with them as well. We need help evicting them. Some are druggies. When they come in, we don’t know whose a druggie and whose not. We cannot get rid of them.”
Handa also said that he never heard that any of the rooms didn’t have hot water or had a problem with bed bugs.
“We have people on site who would fix it right away,” said Handa.
Handa also denied claims that there were rooms without flushing toilets stating that, how would people be able to go to the bathroom without flushing toilets?
“We inspected each room last year because we had a high water bill,” said Handa. “We put in new shower heads and changed some of the toilets to save us money.”
Handa went on to say that they didn’t know about cockroaches, mice or bed bugs because they weren’t told.
“We don’t go to each room and knock on the door and say, ‘do you have a bug? Do you have a bug?’” said Handa.
Handa said that pest control comes monthly; however, he then said he didn’t believe they had been there “this spring” but they come when a resident asks for it.
“We’re trying to do our best but because of COVID we can’t do anything,” said Handa.
Handa also stated he didn’t even know what the problems were because the city had not provided him with a list.
Supervisor Stacey Giomi said, “I appreciate your struggles you and your residents have, but the comment you made saying you don’t even know what’s wrong with the building is telling. You say you want the list of what’s wrong with the building. It’s your responsibility to know what’s wrong, you should have that list.”
Handa asked for a couple of the rooms of long-term residents to be reopened, some of whom are in there 70s and 80s and have lived there for 15 years and have no where else to go. He stated some of them are now living out of their cars.
Handa also said he didn’t know if he’d be able to meet the requirements by the May 20 show clause hearing.
“The contractors are so busy, they said it could be a couple months,” said Handa. “That’s going to be a problem. We would like to fix whatever is the problem but at the same time they’re busy. I want to work with the city and fix the issues.”
The board voted unanimously to issue an order for a show cause hearing to be held on May 20, which will give the owners time to show that they are making changes and to show why they shouldn’t have their business license revoked.
