The rat problem at Brooks Park apartments
Last term I got the opportunity to attend a City Life/Vida Urbana rally as folks were protesting a potential mass eviction from their apartment complex on Brooks Park Apartments, off Main Street. That campaign ultimately ended well: the tenants managed to hammer out a rent control deal with Charlesgate, the property management company, and prevent mass evictions. An early-career municipal employee living there told me that their rent was under $2000 a month and a longtime resident told me his was around $1500. That’s really good for this area.
The bad news is that the building was built in 1932 and continues to suffer from other problems — most notably, since at least March 2024, a rat infestation. The apartment complex sits in front of a park, where plenty of rats nest, and with winter looming they’re always looking for ways to get shelter. The building is old so has plenty of nooks and crannies through which rats can enter. This is exacerbated by Brooks Park’s weekly trash pickup schedule and inadequate room to store trash for the whole complex: they rely on three small dumpsters, which often suffer from overflow, while a fourth dumpster on the premises is sealed shut for some reason. This provides the rats with a ready food source.
A former member of CLVU is in the process of organizing the tenants’ union to demand that a few of these issues be fixed. I attended two of these meetings, which were held were in a basement laundry room. The basement smelled of rat urine, and at the end of the second meeting, one of the tenants showed me around some of the areas in the basement where rats were able to sneak inside, which was where I took a few of the above photos. At the meetings, the residents, in their back-and-forth chats, also revealed a few other details, like the fact that their maintenance man was no longer being paid and the heat systems weren’t working, forcing a ground-floor resident to rent a hotel room during a few nights of the winter (the second and third floor residents had received window renovations but the ground floor had not). They also mentioned, during the first meeting, that rats lived in the dumpsters, which they were able to access because the dumpster doors were often open due to the trash overflow.
The Medford Board of Health inspected the area in between the two meetings I attended and apparently indicated that it was some of the worst conditions they’d ever seen. They later mentioned to me that the building owner only had a permit for one dumpster.
I don’t like the complain about intractable problems with no immediate solutions. The city has plenty of those. But this is a case where a real solution is pretty obvious: get bigger dumpsters or more frequent trash pickup or both, pay the maintenance man, and hire an exterminator. The maintenance company and landlord are simply not doing it. None of this costs a lot of money, either. The tenants union recently sent a letter to Charlesgate and told them as much:
To Representatives of Charlesgate and DAH Medford LLC:
While we, the members of the Brooks Park Tenant Association, greatly appreciate working with you previously to find a solution that would keep us housed without unreasonable rent increases, we feel compelled to bring up the intolerable rat infestation in our apartment complex, as well as some very straightforward and implementable solutions.
Specifically:
· Residents frequently see rats during almost any walk behind the building in the parking lot
· Residents have heard rats living in the dumpster when throwing away trash
· When going up the fire escape in the rear, residents have found it necessary to scare rats away with a flashlight. You will hear or see rats in walks around the building.
· There are rat holes along the wall in front of the building. Neighbors see rats too.
· Rats are seen and heard in the basement/laundry room.
· There is a serious infestation in the city park across the street from our building
The rat problem is not a recent occurrence. It existed when we first formed our tenant association in March of 2024. There is no way that residents of Brooks Park, the members of our tenant association, can get “quiet enjoyment” under the law while this problem persists.
Much of this problem is due to the inadequate trash facilities in the apartment complex. The entire apartment complex relies on three small dumpsters that are frequently overfilled. Enclosed in this letter, you will find a picture one resident took of the dumpster when it was overfilled with trash. This attracts rats and leaves openings for them to retrieve food waste. Furthermore, one dumpster in the complex is permanently closed and never used by the residents. Therefore, we request the following steps be taken to address the rat problem:
· Replace the inadequate and unused dumpsters with a new ones that close tightly, preventing access by the rats. This will require a locked lid and a side door to throw trash/garbage in.
· Removing the dumpsters that are never used
· If the size of the new dumpsters is inadequate to handle residents’ trash, more frequent trash collection.
· Professional exterminator services to get ahead of the problem
· Plugging rat holes in the front of the building.
· Collaboration with the City in eradicating rats in the park, including obtaining all necessary permits for more dumpsters.
We are aware that these improvements will cost money. We are aware that the problem traces not only to our building but also to the city park. But the current situation is intolerable.
Sincerely,
Members of the Tenant Association
from the Dec. 4 meeting.
cc. City Councilor Matt Leming, State Sen. Patricia Jehlen, Jacob Grossman (DAH Medford LLC)
Anyway, my hope is that a little public pressure will encourage them to address a few of these issues, since it’s been going on for over a year and likely won’t improve with winter.
