COLUMBUS, Ohio — The remaining residents at Colonial Village Apartments in east Columbus have to move out by Dec. 31.
Capstone Real Estate Services told the residents on Monday that they have to move out due to major renovations.
The city of Columbus is working with the community shelter board to help displaced residents. They will pay for up to four months of a hotel room for families currently living in colonial village units that should be vacant because they don’t have heat or hot water. Hannah Jones with the department of development said she is disappointed with the property owners and managers.
“Ultimately they were the responsible party and we would’ve hoped that they would’ve shown a little more humanity and tried to find some compromise that didn’t force us to have to take this sort of action,” said Jones.
This is the latest troubled chapter in a years long legal dispute between the city of Columbus and Colonial Village. Columbus City Attorney Zach Klein filed a new motion in a nuisance property involving the apartment complex. According to the motion, three men brought hundreds of people from Haiti and Florida to Colonial Village.
The motion claims the men collected rent from them, and gave the money to a woman who was hired to manage the property. The city did an investigation and found out over 850 people including adults and children who were living there no lease. Many were living in units that were supposed to be vacant.
“It was concerning to discover 800 plus asylum seekers, most asylum seeker from Haiti that were living in our community basically off the books. It was concerning to learn that, and I asked the division of police to investigate,” said Klein. “How are they living in sub-standard conditions in units under court order that were required to be boarded up? There's a reason it was done off the book, because nobody was allowed to live in those units. So, someone was taking cash from these vulnerable individuals and doing what I believe was some sort of scheme,” added Klein.