Indiana Attorney General sues mobile home parks for mistreating residents
Indiana’s Attorney General is suing several mobile home park owners and operators in Madison, Grant, and Blackford counties. As IPR’s Thomas Ouellette reports, the state cites many things residents have had to live through, including maintenance neglect, standing sewage, and a shutoff of city water services.
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In court documents, the Indiana Attorney General’s office says the owners and operators of the mobile home parks have engaged in an “egregious pattern of conduct” that they say has made the lives residents “nothing short of disastrous.”
The suit specifically details conditions at the Alexandria Mobile Home Park, where it says there was a lack of necessary maintenance. The document also cites a failure of the property owners to pay its utility bills that resulted in a water shut-off lasting more than 60 days. Despite the poor condition of the mobile home park, the owners still continued to bill residents for rent and utilities.
Read More: Alexandria to substantially raise utility rates after council vote
Jackie Beeman was a resident during the water shut-off. He says it felt frustrating to do everything correctly and still lose water for several weeks.
“We paid everything,” said Beeman. “And the water still got cut off just because it was their negligence and it’s part of the lease. That was just ridiculous.”
Read More: Over a hundred tort claims filed in Madison County over poor water quality
Cindy Hisle is the operations manager for the new owners of the Alexandria mobile home park. She says a lot of things had to go wrong for the property to end up in the state it is currently.
“I doubt that there was somebody experienced that had authority operating it,” she said. “And I doubt there was any sort of structure for the tenants.”
The new operators say they are doing major restorative work to the water system and installing long-needed appliances, like new toilets, in several units.
Mobile home parks in Anderson, Fairmount, and Hartford City are also included in some charges in the lawsuit. They are owned or managed by LLCs tied to the owners of the Alexandria Mobile Home Park. The lawsuit says all the companies have expired licenses to operate. The attorney general’s office alleges the companies knowingly continued to run the properties with invalid licenses.
Mobile home parks in Anderson, Fairmount, and Hartford City are also included in some charges in the lawsuit.
Thomas Ouellette is our reporter and producer. Contact him at thomas.ouellette@bsu.edu.
