Latino mobile home park residents denounce conditions, allege discrimination
Latino residents in Ohio and Colorado have filed lawsuits or complaints as experts warn of the risks, especially financial, of renting or buying manufactured homes in mobile parks.
Mariano Jacobo Piñón, a resident at the Fairgrounds United mobile home park in Lake County, Ohio, said that for months he warned park managers about the lack of maintenance at the grounds, especially regarding a tree near his house, but that they did not listen to him.
“One night a hurricane warning came and I was with my wife and granddaughters at home and we felt a huge blow. It was the tree that fell on the roof and broke the house. Now we can’t live there. We don’t know what to do because the managers and no one has helped us,” said Piñón, an immigrant from Mexico.
At nearby Perry Mobile Home Park, resident Vicente Hernández, 53, a trailer mechanic, said the worst time is the winter, “because they don’t remove the snow and the children have to walk in the mornings to catch the bus to school, and often they slip and fall. There are also problems with the sewage drains. The fumes come back up and make us sick."
Piñón and Hernández are among the Ohio residents who filed a lawsuit in 2022 against the companies that own the two mobile home parks and the company that does the water metering. The lawsuit alleges that the companies violated state law by refusing to provide written lease agreements, unlawfully increasing the costs of living at the parks, failing to maintain the common areas and engaging in harassing and discriminatory conduct.
Hernández and Fairgrounds United resident Ricardo Rodríguez, 40, said that since their mobile home parks changed owners, services that were once included as part of the rent, such as water, are now billed separately at much higher prices.
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