A group of residents in a Robinson mobile home park say they are being forced out of their homes and not given the compensation due to them under the law to be to able to move their manufactured homes.
“You're talking 30-some families made to leave their homes,” said Stacey Stumpf, who has lived in the Twin Circle Mobile Home Park on Steubenville Pike for 17 years. “Most of us here are single parents, or disabled, or on fixed incomes.”
Ms. Stumpf and many of her neighbors have filed complaints with the state attorney general’s office. She said those who have remained in the park have had to contend with utility shutoffs, ongoing demolition and break-ins.
Gary Kalmeyer, an attorney for park owner Bill Chen, said the park’s ownership is working to comply with state law. He said no one was “forced to leave,” though residents and former residents disputed that.
A 2012 state law recognizes the obligation of a mobile home park owner to provide relocation assistance in instances where park is being closed, said Eileen Yacknin, litigation director at Neighborhood Legal Services Association, who is representing one of the residents.
“Clearly, this violates the law, in my opinion,” she said.
Ken “Skip” Benish, who has lived in the park for 17 years, is one of the few holdouts still living there. Mr. Benish said he has plans to move to another mobile home park in Beaver County, but can't afford to go without the assistance he believes the law provides.
“Nobody has been paid,” Mr. Benish said.
He is continuing to pay lot rent and utilities to Twin Circle.
If a mobile home park is being closed and redeveloped, residents are due $4,000 for a single-section trailer or $6,000 for a multi-section trailer to assist in relocating it, said State Rep. Robert Freeman, D-Northampton, the author of the 2012 law. If a resident chooses not to move the mobile home — and many cannot be moved — the resident is due either $2,500 or the home’s appraised value, he said.
The bill, which was signed into law by then-Gov. Tom Corbett, stemmed from an incident in Mr. Freeman’s Lehigh Valley district where residents in a mobile home park were given no financial assistance and only a month’s notice that they would have to relocate due to planned redevelopment.
The purpose of the legislation was to be “a safeguard for the folks in manufactured housing,” Mr. Freeman said.
“It's sad. We were ripped out of our homes, pretty much,” said Melissa Dyer, another long-time resident. Ms. Dyer borrowed money to move out of the park, and her trailer is still there.
“Why should we just give up our trailers? A lot of people there had been there for years and years and years and just had to get up and go. I still hold my title. Give me what I'm owed,” she said, adding that she also had complained to the attorney general’s office.
Raymond Parr, another of the few residents remaining in the park, said he has found space at another mobile home park but doesn't have the money to relocate. He estimates moving the trailer would cost $3,000.
“Every trailer around me pretty much is torn down. I'm just at the point where I don't know what to do,” he said. He too, is continuing to pay the park’s owner for rent and utilities, he said.
“I ain't got the money to move,” he said.
With proper compensation, said Ms. Stumpf, “I would have been able to get an apartment, move my belongings. ...These people would have been able to have had their homes moved.”
A spokesman for Attorney General Kathleen Kane’s office said he could not confirm whether the agency was involved, but urged people who believe they may have a complaint to contact the office’s Bureau of Consumer Protection at 1-800-441-2555.
Mr. Kalmeyer said the park’s owner intends to redevelop the land, though he was uncertain of the exact nature of the redevelopment.
County real estate records show the property was last purchased in 2003 for $1.3 million.
Kate Giammarise: kgiammarise@post-gazette.com or 412-263-3909 or on Twitter @KateGiammarise.
First Published: July 9, 2016, 4:00 a.m.
