Tuesday, January 27, 2015

Report: Jimmy McMillan facing Feb. 5 eviction from St. Mark's Place apartment


[Photo from February 2013 by James Maher]

To the Daily News:

McMillan, founder of the fringe political party called The Rent Is Too Damn High, has filed suit in Brooklyn Federal Court seeking to stave off the eviction, which is scheduled to be carried out by a city marshal Feb. 5. Acting as his own lawyer, he is also demanding $1.3 million in monetary damages.

The 68-year-old Vietnam War veteran has been embroiled in a legal battle with the landlord, who claimed the one-bedroom flat on St. Marks Place wasn’t McMillan’s primary residence, and that he actually lives in Brooklyn.

McMillan is reportedly paying $872 a month for the apartment on St. Mark's Place. He says the Brooklyn address is for office use.

Find the full Daily News article here.

34 comments:

Anonymous said...

He obviously doesn't live at the St. Mark's Place address, as his car is rarely there.
He's an economic idiot. End rent control and get the government out of our lives sooner rather than later.

Bill the libertarian anarchist and possibly the only EV resident opposed to rent control and other commie measures

Ken from Ken's Kitchen said...

I hope Mcmillan is taking this seriously.

My rent-stabilized downstairs neighbor had to spend thousands of dollars to keep his apt after our landlord claimed that his mother was actually his wife and that his mother's Brooklyn apt was his primary address. They really never stopped harassing the guy and he finally gave up and moved to L.A. They're rehabbing his apartment now.

Not cashing rent checks then putting up eviction notices is another familiar tactic in our building.

Ken from Ken's Kitchen said...

Yeah Bill, NYC will be a free rental market wonderland when all landlords are free to impose $400/month or whatever rent increases and won't need a reason for eviction. It's unthinkable that rents could double or more overnight and that thousands of families will be forced out of the city to who knows where. At a City Council hearing back in 2006, a lawyer for the Public Transit Union testified that city rents had gotten so out of control that there were members commuting to work from Pennsylvania. What's good enough for the MTA should be good enough for you. Have a nice commute.

Anonymous said...

I see him and his car in the neighborhood all the time and seen him unpack from his trunk on st mark's - he lives here at least parttime

Anonymous said...

So typical. Another scammef. And he has the gall to run on ' the rent is too damn high'. Disgraceful. This is way too common. Yet he is somehow a victim. The whole system is a mess and he scammed and abused it. Total BS. Surprising he isn't begging more money online.

Anonymous said...

$872 ??? Well his rent is not too high. And isn't he illegally parked taking a photo op in front of a fire hydrant? Nice to see evidence of his law-abiding nature.

Trixie said...

Just because your car isn't always on parked on the street doesn't mean that you don't live there. I often park for long periods of time at a friend's place in Pennsylvania.

Anonymous said...

January 27, 2015 at 10:47 AM

Bullshit. RS scammers are not typical. With NYC being the real estate goldmine it is these days, landlords like you regularly sic private investigators on tenants, often forcing them into housing court as a kind of tenant harassment a la 2015. Instead of turning off heat and hot water like you guys used to do although that does still happen.

Except for the crushing political power of the real estate industry in NYC and NY state, we'd be talking about extending fair effective rent regulations to practically all NYC renters in NYC (like it mostly used to be) instead of what we have now: older renters covered by regulations while new renters are forced to double and triple up because landlords can charge outrageously high market rate rents and evict them at will.

Anonymous said...

I wish I could afford to have one apartment in the East Village and one apartment in Brooklyn. The change of scenery would be nice from time to time.

Anonymous said...

Ken the Commie,

The MTA is a crony state-run organization, as everyone knows. You need to take econ 101 and learn about economics and the market.

There's nothing wrong with the transportation system that privatizing it and getting rid of the MTA wouldn't fix.

Bill the libertarian anarchist and opponent of economic illiterates (like Ken)

Ken from Ken's Kitchen said...

Bill the etc,

Facepalm. Deregulating banks led to economic collapse, deregulation of NY's energy market led to doubled rates overnight that continue to be the highest in the US except for the island state of Hawaii, and deregulation of NYC's rental housing market has resulted in a housing crisis.

The NYC rental housing market has zip to do with econ 101 (see: cartel). When EV rents got too high for families and the youngs who used to move in, landlords didn't adjust rents down, they just turned buildings into dorms, packing students into apts with living rooms turned into extra bedrooms. Ahh, never mind. You're not for reals.

Anonymous said...

Damn, I wish my rent for my tiny studio apartment is $872 a month.

Anonymous said...

Sorry. You can say its BS but its not. Nobody scams RS ? Really? Defending a guy who abuses the system? Maybe running for mayor was his mistake. And he is paying for it. And you encourage it. Shameful
Just another entitlement scam. Is he 'disabled' too? A car owner with two apts scamming. Who does he think he is Charlie Rangel?

Anonymous said...

Hwy Bill the libertarian anarchist, what's YOUR service record? Cue in crickets.

Anonymous said...

Ken the commie,

Deregulation didn't cause the financial mess, which was done up by sleazy Easy Al and bin-Bernanke, both Fed heads. NY's energy market is far from free, with taxes, etc. NYC's rental market has not been deregulated either. Where do you get this nonsense?
I met a woman not long ago who rents on E. 9th St. for around $100 a month. Rent regulation is alive in NYC. If you think otherwise you are woefully misinformed.

Bill the anarchist

Ken from Ken's Kitchen said...

2:31 PM Landlords see rent regulation as an entitlement. Renters see them as providing us with rights to remain in our homes without unpredictable rent increases or arbitrary eviction.

Without rent regs, it's pretty impossible for most average income NYers to expect to stay in an apt long-term, making it impossible for us to commit to (ie: stabilize) neighborhoods like the EV, to schools, etc. Instead most of us looking for long term housing would be forced, like the rest of the country, to buy instead of rent.

So good luck to you without rent regs - your tenants will be mostly limited to students and people with no credit rating.

Ken from Ken's Kitchen said...

Bill the etc

NY started phasing out rent control in 1971 - when a rent controlled apt is vacated, it becomes rent stabilized. After passage of vacancy decontrol in 1997, rent stabilized units can be easily taken out of the system by *renovating* them. That's why developers with deep pockets are moving in on the EV and why it's next to impossible to find an actual RS apt on the NYC rental market in 2015. And that's why mostly students and transients are moving here now.

The rest of what you wrote is equally inane. Seriously dude, get a grip on reality.

chris flash said...

How is it that some commenters here have automatically taken the landlord's side?

Why is it hard to understand that a LAWYER (like any other person operating a business) would have an office (for work) AND an apartment (for living)?

Me thinks that McMillan's landlord has targeted the WRONG guy....

Anonymous said...

Only someone who stops at Economics 101 could spout the crap Bill does.

Ken from Ken's Kitchen said...

chris flash

My guess is that landlords and libertarian anarchists get Google Alerts anytime the words "rent stabilized apartment" appear online so they can show up and spout bullshit in the comments.

Anonymous said...

NYC is the land of money. You need it to cross the street, wipe your ass, and for virtually everything in between. I moved to this neighborhood five years ago. I am still in the same studio. Then, the rent was $1400. Now, it is $1700. Not bad for the EV, let alone NYC. Look. if you want to live anywhere decent, especially near the subways, good restaurants, cafes, and so forth, you have to pay. Money is the very bane of our existence. It defines us and reinforces socio economic status. Without it, we are no one and nothing. People need to get off the pot, stop whining like little bitches, man up, and pay your fucking rent like the rest of us. If one can't afford it live in this hood, move to the bowels of Brooklyn or Queens, or if you're really desperate, and refuse to leave this hell hole of a city, move to Staten Island. People must realize not all of us can have our cake and eat it too. This dude, with all respect, doesn't want to let go of a sweet deal, and has refused to stare reality in the face. Wake up. No one owes you, me, us, or anyone anything.

Anonymous said...

$872.00 for a one bedroom apartment in the East Village? That is unheard of. What a fucking sweet deal.

Ken from Ken's Kitchen said...

January 27, 2015 at 6:04 PM

My RS rent is higher than yours so you can piss off with your incredibly stupid and condescending "man up" bullshit. If you had a clue or a family, you'd be asking why you don't have the kind of protections that were extended to most NY renters from WWII until 1997. The answer is that the real estate industry bought off a former governor and continues to buy off upstate Republicans in the State Senate without a renter in their districts to deliver for downstate landlords and screw over downstate renters.

Please get a clue before lecturing people who know way more about things than you do.

john penley said...

I can't believe how many scumbags live in the neighborhood now and also how many of them are complete cowards who post their crap anonymously here all the time. ChickenS--T MFers. On another note related to this Rent Control laws expire soon and with the state legislature in turmoil because of Sheldon Silver's greed people with rent controlled apartments better be paying attention to what happens in Albany.

Anonymous said...

Tale of two cities. RS and non RS. Love how the RS crowd see themselves as both victims and entitled. Amazing. And what's with asking someone about their service record? I thought the anti bro anti chain EV was anti military. Did that change too? But let's continue keeping apts permanently off the market. You complain about a system you have worked masterfully for decades. Pick a side. Stop riding the fence. The whole system is a disaster. Ever wonder why almost every US city is cheaper? Why are nice citues cheaper than the Bronx? But you got over and complain one of your ilk got caught? Ridiculous.

Anonymous said...

How many apts are kept off the market due to these scams? Sad. Artificially limit the number of available apts and wonder why its a mess? Interesting to see what happens I'm Albany. And no NYC democrats don't run everything. NY is a big state. People live north of Westchester! Maybe they don't care about RS. You sure don't care about them. Maybe upstate needs the help and attention Not freeloading anti American big city libs who never met a tax they didnt like- as long as someone else pays it.

Anonymous said...

He has an eviction slated to be carried out by City Marshals? So this means that a Housing Court judge ruled against him and sided with the landlord. So as Housing Court judges are historically in favor of tenants, the landlord proved that in fact he was not residing there and his filing in Federal Court is a last ditch effort to stop the due process of the judgement from being enacted. Of course anybody would want to hang on tooth nail and claw to $872 for a nice decent sized apt. built only a few decades ago. Anybody knows how many rooms or square feet? I wonder how the other tenants feel about paying higher rents so his rent is subsidized by them. If the city/state/federal gov't feels so strongly why don't they subsize Rent Stabilization rather than private citizens who are forced to do so via a regulatory scheme in the interest of the public good?

Ken from Ken's Kitchen said...

7:58 PM, 8:55 PM, and 9:44 PM.

You are all the same person. And you are a landlord.

1. You know RS is not a subsidy. No one's taxed to keep rents down, no one's forced to build or rent a RS apt, no money's transferred from one party to another.

2. RS does not keep apts off the market, it provides an incentive for people to settle down long term in (ie: to stabilize) NYC neighborhoods like the EV by removing the threat of arbitrary eviction and unpredictable rent increases. Without that most people looking to settle down would go elsewhere and find a place they can afford to buy with a fixed mortgage. Without RS, NYC will become a city for the very well off, students, and transients.

3. I don't know if that $872/month is factually accurate, but if it is, you know that it's an anomaly after 12 years worth of big Bloomberg admin RGB rent increases (9.5% for a 2 year lease) and since the state allowed MCIs to be added permanently to the base rent in the 1980s. It's possible that at his age the guy's on SCRIE.

4. The RS system was not a disaster. Loopholes were added and it was intentionally complicated at the behest of the RE industry. As you well know, it has been in phase-out mode since the introduction of vacancy decontrol in 1997. The big developers moving in and sucking up huge swaths of EV real estate aren't happy with the pace of its demise and want it over now and screw the people and families who committed to this neighborhood years ago. Well screw you.

Anonymous said...

Pretty sure he lives there, anytime I am looking for a parking spot on St. Marks Pl. he is already there idling waiting for a spot.

What can one say to one who will not hear? said...

Money is the very bane of our existence. It defines us and reinforces socio economic status. Without it, we are no one and nothing.

No, Anonymous January 27, 2015 at 6:04 PM, money is very important to allow people in this society to live a decent life, but we are far from "no one and nothing" if we aren't flush with cash.

You have not only my disdain but sincerely, also my pity.

Anonymous said...

His son used to live in the apartment (he did not), but I do not know if that situation continued.

Anonymous said...

According to the Post he lost today and is out Feb 5. This has been going on since 2011. Guess he's moving to Brooklyn.

Anonymous said...

i live directly across the treet. he's been there the past few years almost every day, around the time it came out publically about the son living there instead. before that, i've never seen him on the block nor have 2 of my friends that live in the same building.

les native said...

Go fuck yourself punk republican yuppie, fuck off back to nebraska. Ayn Rand was an unhappy cunt!