Landlord says she wasn’t evading rent control board
The Santa Monica Rent Control Board dropped a lawsuit against local landlord Sunnie Han for allegedly violating terms of a voluntary low-income housing program.
Doris Ganga, the board’s general counsel, said Han avoided being served long enough for the contract she signed to participate in the city’s Incentive Housing Program to expire.
“She knew we were trying to serve her,” Ganga said. “She managed to evade process of service until the terms of the program expired, so we gave up.”
Henry T. Heuer, an attorney representing Han, denied Ganga’s statements and Sunnie Han dismissed Ganga’s assertions of evading being served with the lawsuit as a matter of racial bias.
“They target me because I am an Asian female,” she said. “But I try to bend over backwards with them and to cooperate fully. Then they come around with this lawsuit anyway.”
Heuer said attorneys with the rent board had repeatedly been in touch with him and knew how to contact him and how to reach Han.
In fact, Heuer said he had successfully filed a motion to move the lawsuit out of Los Angeles County, where he said Santa Monica had an advantage.
Heuer also said he thought once the case had been reassigned outside the county, the board no longer wanted to proceed with the litigation.
“They know they shouldn’t be filing a case in Santa Monica when the city is a party,” Heuer said. “It’s an improper venue, and they know it.”
Heuer also threatened to sue The Daily Press if the accusations were repeated in this article.
“You publish anything personally defamatory about my client, and you personally and your paper will be sued,” he said. “Saying someone is trying to avoid being served is a horrible thing to say and is an attack on a person’s character.”
“If you are interviewing me for another story, certainly I think you’re making a mistake,” he added.
Although the rent control board does not file many lawsuits, the vast majority of them are heard by judges in Santa Monica Superior Court, Ganga said.
The lawsuit was the first time in the board’s 28-year existence it had attempted to sue a landlord for violating terms of the voluntary agreement, rent control board officials said.
Han, who owns rent-controlled apartment complexes at 1322 and 1328 Euclid St., was charged with not renting some units to low or very low-income tenants.
As a participant in a city program called the Incentive Housing Program, Han was required to rent at least two of her apartments under affordable guidelines, city officials said.
However, the 1995 Costa Hawkins Act — which allowed all vacated apartments to go to market-rate rents — ended the incentive for landlords to continue participating in the program.
But the board’s attorneys couldn’t find Han for almost a year. They tried serving her with the lawsuit at her apartment complex, her home, her office in Los Angeles and finally at the office of an attorney that works for Han. All were unsuccessful.
Han said she thought maybe the rent control board had the wrong address for her Century City office.
“If they send it to that address, I will get it,” she said.
And Han said she always returns calls from the rent control board, though probably not as quickly as officials would like.
While Ganga said “it’s too bad” how the failed lawsuit turned out, Han said there were no hard feelings.
“I appreciate the rent control board,” she said. “They are very nice, and they are trying to do good for the public.”
“Personally, I like everyone in there — I go all the time,” she added.
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on September 23, 2002. Read the original PDF.