In summary

On this episode of “Gimme Shelter: The California Housing Crisis Podcast,” CalMatters’ Manuela Tobias and the Los Angeles Times’ Liam Dillon sit down with data reporter Aaron Mendelson to discuss poor living conditions and lack of oversight at an LA apartment complex.

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Mold, spilled raw sewage, inoperable smoke detectors: these are just a few of the things tenants put up with in recent weeks at Chesapeake Apartments, a massive apartment complex in South Los Angeles.

This particular complex and its owner have been under public scrutiny for years. In 2017, the Los Angeles city attorney’s office sued its owner, Pama Properties, along with Pama President Mike Nijjar, over crime there, and a LAist investigation in 2020 found it forms part of a more than $1 billion rental empire where slum-like conditions run rampant. Yet the deplorable conditions persist.

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