Cut Shuts Down Legal Rooming House Citing Safety

Two weeks ago News 3 joined the City of Savannah as inspectors checked out a suspected illegal rooming house. While it had some safety issues, it turned out to be legal.
The owner of the building agreed to make the needed changes, and he was issued a subpoena to make sure those changes were in fact made. But when the owner showed up in court on Monday, he says the city had changed their tune.
News Three's Community Reporter Alice Massimi met with the owner and the City to find out what's going on.

The building's owner called us in shock after he was ordered to shut down the rooming house and the building was condemned. He says he was doing all they had asked him to do, making all the safety upgrades, but as it turns out, the city sees it differently.
Joseph Scruggs is packing up and saying goodbye.
After living in this rooming house on Park Avenue in Savannah's Eastside he is being evicted...not because he didn't pay rent but because the city says the building's owner didn't make court mandated safety upgrades.
“It catches you off guard if you don't have anywhere to stay. So basically half of us were almost in tears we didn't know what to do,” says Scruggs.
John Wilder, the buildings landlord says he never imagined that after the city's inspection it would be shut down.
“They said I had life safety issues. I didn't have emergency lighting and had burglar bars on the windows. They said I had 24 hours to remedy, which I did,” says Wilder.
Which is why he was so shocked when on Monday a judge ordered his certificate of occupancy be revoked...the main reason there was no sprinkler system.
“Did you ever think you needed one here?”
“No it never crossed my mind,” explains Wilder.
Wilder says the city had inspected the building in 1998 and again in 01. He says a sprinkler was never mentioned.
“If we would have known we would have tried to remedy the problem years ago.”
“The certificate of occupancy that he received in 1998 they went through and did an inspection weren't they looking for sprinklers then?”
“They should have been,” explains Savannah’s Assistant City Manager Rochelle Small-Toney adding the 1998 certificate was issued conditionally...a sprinkler system had to be added.
“I won’t say there was an error. I will say we failed to go back and re-inspect it. The property owner knew at that time that that needed to be done so there was a breakdown on both sides,” says Small- Toney.
Just because the rooming house never had a sprinkler system does not mean it never needed one. Small Toney says it’s simply a life safety issue and while they feel bad evicting the residents, safety comes first.