The banner sign that hung diagonally above Silvia Estulillo captured her fellow tenants’ story: “Rent Strike; No Mas MCIs,” referring to Major Capital Improvements that took effect shortly after the landlord’s $1.9 million, top-down renovation of the six-story building on Gates Place in Norwood.

It wasn’t easy for Estulillo—who’s joined in the MCI strike—to share her story, bursting into tears after speaking openly on the ongoing strife she and a handful of tenants, fueled by gumption, have had to endure. Last year, the tenants decided not to pay for the MCI fees they say are too costly.

“We’re working. We’re not doing anything else. Not robbing; just trying to work to pay this extra rent,” said Estulillo, speaking at a Dec. 16 rally at the doorstep to the apartment building at 3425 Gates Pl. she’s called home for the last ten years. “I hope [the landlord is] conscious of what [they’re] doing. We’ve suffered a great deal.”

Other tenants followed suit, sharing their rage against their multimillion-dollar landlord, the Morgan Group, whose vast portfolio of properties stretches across the northwest Bronx. The owners—Scott, Ryan, and Brooke Morgan—were approved by the state for an MCI renovation on apartment kitchens and bathrooms in 2017.

The rally is the latest in a series of actions by tenants condemning the Morgan Group, which have included demonstrations in front of Housing Court. The tenants’ plight has also signaled a lack of support for MCIs, even in the face of reforms that were weakened following the passage of the state’s rent reform laws. The new MCI regulations don’t apply to Gates Place since the MCI work was approved prior to when the current rent laws took effect.

Tenants have long blasted the project they insist had disrupted their day-to-day living in the building. Dozens of tenants on the building’s H line were forced to share a bathroom on the fourth floor for three and a half months, taking shifts to ensure they had time to shower. The stoves on the same line, meantime, were off limits, forcing tenants to shell out monies for buying hot food. Renovations also included upgrades to the intercom system.

“Instead of fixing them, they did more damage,” said Evodio Rosas, a 20-year tenant in the building, who pointed to the work in his bathroom where its window space was effectively reduced.

Yarisme Guilamo, 30, a lifelong tenant in the building, said the work was “not up to par,” pointing to the intercom system she said does not work properly.

At the end, tenants were shocked over the sticker price imposed on them in September 2018: an MCI fee of $81.33 per room.

That’s an extra $325 for Flor Morales Rojas, a fourth-floor tenant caring for her disabled husband, would have to pay. “The only one who’s working is my son,” said Rojas, adding that he’s been helping the family get by.

Estulillo was hit with an extra $243 a month, equivalent to what would be a month’s grocery bills.

The Morgan Group has responded to tenants, even meeting with them, to the lack of tenants’ satisfaction. Even after Linden Miller, the tenants’ lawyer, demanded the MCI fees be waived at a meeting on May 22, the attorney for the Morgan Group, Luise Barrack, said they couldn’t. In a statement, Barrack said that the landlord had responded to additional requests for work performed in the apartments.

“As some tenants have elected to stop paying their rent entirely, these tenants and their families are living in and enjoying their apartments rent free which is entirely unjustified. These tenants are not leaving the owner, which is required to and is maintaining all of the building’s services and is paying real estate taxes etc. for the building, any choice but to pursue their legal remedies to collect the unpaid rent,” said Barrack in an email to the Norwood News.

For a building home to low-income tenants, Guilamo alleged the MCI could simply be a ploy to systematically remove the tenants from the property. “We’re not renters. We’re here to for the long haul. And the problem is this corporation wants to get us poor people out of here. They want to gentrify because we’re right here by Montefiore, we’re right by the 4 train, and they want to get the poor people out of here so they could get renters and rent it for triple what it’s worth,” said Guilamo.

The playing field wasn’t exactly level, claimed Guilamo, who pointed to the initial notifications of the Morgan Group’s MCI application, where comment by tenants was sought. The notifications by the state Department of Housing & Community Renewal and the Morgan Group, Guilamo said, were sent out in English to a building that’s predominantly Spanish-speaking.

“They didn’t send it in English or in Spanish; they just sent it in English,” said Guilamo.

The Northwest Bronx Community & Clergy Coalition (NWBCCC), which specializes in tenant organizing, has since stepped in, empowering tenants to take on the Morgan Group, ranked as the seventh worst evictor by housing advocacy groups that include NWBCCC.

The group is now planning a trip to Albany for Jan. 9, when the State Legislature begins its session, to discuss a further weakening of the MCI. It’s unclear whether state lawmakers will prioritize a revisiting of the MCI laws, but they have at least an ally in City Councilman Andrew Cohen, whose district covers the building.

“It’s very hard to get people to stand up, so you’re being very brave,” said Cohen. “I’m going to stand by you all the way through this.”

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Welcome to the Norwood News, a bi-weekly community newspaper that primarily serves the northwest Bronx communities of Norwood, Bedford Park, Fordham and University Heights. Through our Breaking Bronx blog, we focus on news and information for those neighborhoods, but aim to cover as much Bronx-related news as possible. Founded in 1988 by Mosholu Preservation Corporation, a not-for-profit affiliate of Montefiore Medical Center, the Norwood News began as a monthly and grew to a bi-weekly in 1994. In September 2003 the paper expanded to cover University Heights and now covers all the neighborhoods of Community District 7. The Norwood News exists to foster communication among citizens and organizations and to be a tool for neighborhood development efforts. The Norwood News runs the Bronx Youth Journalism Heard, a journalism training program for Bronx high school students. As you navigate this website, please let us know if you discover any glitches or if you have any suggestions. We’d love to hear from you. You can send e-mails to norwoodnews@norwoodnews.org or call us anytime (718) 324-4998.