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The owner of 55 New Main St. in Haverstraw has been cited by the Health Department for violations, including having no running water. (Kathy Gardner/The Journal News)
HAVERSTRAW -A village woman and her children have been living in a rental house under foreclosure that hasn't had water since May, health inspectors said yesterday.
Officials from the Rockland Department of Health have been trying to contact the owner of 55 New Main St. for months.
Rockland officials tried to serve owner Charles Polanco with legal papers at a residence in Florida where he said he lived.
"But that house had been foreclosed on, too," housing inspector Tim Hekl told the Board of Health yesterday.
County officials went to court in June to ask a judge to order the two families renting the two-story brick house in the heart of Haverstraw's downtown to leave the residence.
After the water was turned off in May, one tenant left. But the other tenant told state Supreme Court Justice Margaret Garvey that she had no other place to go and needed time to make other plans, inspectors told the Board of Health.
The front yard of the house is strewn with overgrown weeds and garbage, including empty shoe boxes and Pepsi bottles.
A teenage girl answering the door yesterday declined to identify herself. But she said the home has had no water, and she has gone to a family member's home when she needs water, including using a toilet. At least one of the rooms of the apartment was air-conditioned. A younger boy was also in the apartment. He came out to the door to ask if he could use the phone the girl had in her hand.
The girl said she and her family would be moving out of the apartment very soon.
The mother was not available yesterday, and it could not be determined if she was still paying rent to the landlord.
The house is bordered on both sides by well-maintained buildings. Former Haverstraw Trustee Angelo Cintron lives in one of them.
Cintron said he didn't know anything about the family next door, adding that he believed that both apartments in the building were vacated about three weeks ago.
"There were a bunch of people sitting outside all the time," Cintron said. "They didn't make friends with anybody as far as I know."
Cintron said that when he moved into his house in 1978, the owner of the next-door building lived there. But since the owner sold the house and moved, the property had changed hands a number of times.
"People who bought it rented the whole place," Cintron said. "They did nothing to fix the house. The house is a mess."
Garvey, the justice, had told the county that she was adjourning the matter until July 7, but when county officials went to court July 7, they were told that Garvey was on vacation, the officials told the board.
When Garvey returned, they showed her that the court transcript showed that she had adjourned the case until July 7.
The justice then ordered all parties to appear in court Aug. 12.
"Is she aware that people are living with no water?" board member Jeffrey Oppenheim asked Hekl.
Hekl said he had made the justice aware of the situation.
Public health law prohibits anyone living in a home without drinkable water.
Hekl said the tenant -a woman with her three children, ages 20, 14 and 9 -has not been very cooperative with housing inspectors.
No one has been able to locate Polanco, who also has an address in the Bronx. Yesterday, the board assessed a $6,000 fine against him for failing to provide water to the home and for failing to clean garbage from the property.
A bank is in the process of foreclosing on the home, but it is still owned by Polanco.
County officials will ask Garvey again Aug. 12 to order the home vacated.
Reach Jane Lerner at jlerner@lohud.com or 845-578-2458.
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