A San Mateo construction firm has sued East Palo Alto's biggest landlord, alleging it wasn't paid for more than $50,000 in seismic work done at the rental properties.
In January 2008 Palo Alto-based Page Mill Properties hired Johnstone Moyer Inc. to do "certain seismic retrofitting and cosmetic renovations" at some of its 1,800 units in the city, attorneys for Johnstone Moyer said in the complaint filed Sept. 23 in San Mateo County Superior Court.
Page Mill violated the contract, failing to make good on a $52,244 payment, the complaint states.
"Defendants breached the contract by, among other things, refusing and failing to pay plaintiff the full amount of money due," according to the suit.
Page Mill spokesman Adam Alberti and Johnstone Moyer co-owner John Moyer both declined to comment on the lawsuit. It could be the first in a string of similar complaints since Page Mill failed to make a $50 million balloon payment to Wells Fargo Bank in August and later defaulted on the loan.
Last month, a San Mateo County Superior Court judge appointed Pacific Palisades-based receiver Dave Wald to run the properties. Wald has since hired Investors' Property Services, of Foothill Ranch, to manage the properties and booted existing manager Woodland Park Management, a Page Mill subsidiary.
Page Mill and Wells Fargo are still in talks about how to resolve the debt.
Meanwhile, East Palo Alto and Menlo Park Fire Protection District
officials have become alarmed about renovations and construction work allegedly done at the properties without permits, Fire Chief Harold Schapelhouman said Monday.
One contractor who was to repair a fire alarm system at a Page Mill building on Newell Road performed such faulty work that Schapelhouman said he plans to report the man to the contractors' license board.
"There's a reason for the building and fire code," Schapelhouman said. "A lot of people don't think through things like that, but we do, and we see what happens when people cut corners."
Schapelhouman added that his department is talking with Wald about checking all 1,800 Page Mill units for fire safety, a process that could cost more than $50,000 and take about two months.
"Everybody's faith in what has been done and how it's been done has been shaken," Schapelhouman said. "I'm going to feel better if we have the opportunity to walk through all these units."
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