Hairston apartments: a test case for RUCO

A recent report that Greensboro Mayor Pro Tem Nancy Vaughan wants to explore the possibility of revising the city’s RUCO program — that’s an acronym for Rental Unit Certificate of Occupancy — and go back to a complaint-driven system pricked my curiosity about whether the units at JT Hairston Memorial Apartments have a RUCO certificate and whether reports of bedbug infestation there would constitute a violation.

My fiancée’s teenage cousin, Malcolm Morton, lives at Hairston apartments. He has been bitten by bedbugs numerous times, and earlier this year his arm swelled up in an allergic reaction. This summer, he has been staying most of the time with his aunt Amy to avoid being tormented by bedbugs. LaTonya Stimpson, who lives in a separate block of apartments told me her unit is infested, too. She said that probably half of the units in the complex are infested, but most tenants are too embarrassed to speak come admit it. Stimpson’s 15-year-old son, Quentin Dick, was not promoted to the next grade at the end of the last academic year, partly, his mother said, because bedbugs kept him from getting an adequate amount of sleep. LaTonya said that when Quentin isn’t staying somewhere else he wants to sleep on the kitchen table.

I put the question to Dan Reynolds, inspection manager for the city of Greensboro: Does that sound like a violation of housing code? His answer was, yes.

“When we get that type of complaint, we require an agency to come out to test for bedbugs. If it comes back that there are bedbugs, then [the landlord or property manager has] to tell us what they’re doing to mitigate it.”

Reynolds said that Hairston apartments received a RUCO certificate in 2007. In the parlance of municipal regulation, the apartment complex was “sample certified.” That means 10 percent of the units were inspected. Reynolds said the landlord or property manager selects a 20 percent sample, and the city inspector chooses half of those to inspect. At minimum, the inspector must look at one unit in each building, Reynolds said.

Reynolds said, based on hearing reports about the bedbug infestation, he is sending an inspector out to Hairston apartments.

Meanwhile the RUCO taskforce will be meeting at 8 a.m. on Friday to evaluate whether the program should continue. Where is the location? Wait for it: The Greensboro offices of Triad Real Estate & Building Industries Coalition, or TREBIC, its better known acronym.

UPDATE, 4:33 p.m.: Reynolds called back to tell me an inspector had visited Hairston apartments this afternoon. Apartment management told the inspector that they treated apartments on June 1, June 8 and June 22, and spent more than $12,000 on extermination. Apartment management also reportedly told the inspector that "some of the people in the apartments are not doing everything needed to get the bugs out."

Reynolds added that apartment management told the inspector they were treating the complex unit by unit rather than comprehensively. LaTonya Stimpson and Starlyn Nelson, Malcolm's mother, told me that the bugs come out of the walls, and they fear that once one unit is treated, the bugs will migrate to an adjacent unit and then return once the treatment wears off.