Lakewood closes Rainier Inn for violations, displacing residents

The end of Lakewood’s Rainier Inn arrived with a knock on the door.

The new management put Paul Seaman and his fiancee, Sarah Vogel, and other guests on notice: The motel on South Tacoma Way was closing. They could stay however long they’d paid for. Then they had to leave.

Seaman and Vogel had moved there six weeks earlier so he could be close to his full-time job as a cook at the Black Angus Restaurant. Vogel was laid off from her bartending job at Red Robin last summer and is still looking for work.

For $220 a week, the Rainier Inn was a roof over their heads. Many guests settled there for longer than the 30 days allowed by law.

Then came the knock early last month by the new motel managers, who were backed up by Lakewood police and community service officers. Between 30 and 40 people were displaced.

Shoddy living conditions and legal troubles were the Rainier Inn’s undoing.

The owner filed bankruptcy three times over an eight-month period to thwart a court-appointed receiver from controlling the property and collecting its rents. The lending bank had accused the owner of defaulting on loans totalling about $1.9 million to buy and repair the property.

Meanwhile, Lakewood city officials acted to close the motel by revoking its business license for health and safety violations.

A Pierce County Superior Court judge dismissed an appeal filed by the property owner challenging the city’s decision. And a different judge officially appointed a receiver to take over the property.

The double legal whammy hit the Rainier Inn on Jan. 6, hours before guests learned the motel was in its last throes. Several guests called Elizabeth Powell, a Tacoma attorney who specializes in landlord-tenant law.

Powell said the guests had no prior warning that the motel was in dire straits and many had trouble finding another place to live.

“There are plenty of people down there that are just down on their luck and don’t deserve this,” she said.

last resort

The troubles at the Rainier Inn shine new light on one of Lakewood’s dirty little secrets: A 30-day limit on motel stays is often flouted by property owners, managers and the down-and-out residents who live there.

Before the construction of Interstate 5 took their business in the 1960s, the motels along the South Tacoma Way-Pacific Highway strip were a welcome respite for travelers on Highway 99. Today, years past their prime, the motels are a last resort for the working poor and people who otherwise would be homeless — “the tag end of the 99 percent,” as Powell put it.

City officials have long frowned on this practice. Motels aren’t designed for long-term occupancy. Guests often invite crime.

David Bugher, Lakewood’s community development director, said officials have clamped down on illegal occupancy at most older motels along the corridor. There are 13 with active business licenses in Lakewood.

But the closure of the Rainier Inn confirms that the practice continues, leaving challenges both for city enforcement and for relocating guests who may have nowhere to go when motels close.

To get around the 30-day restriction, Bugher said, motels move guests to other rooms after 29 days. In the case of the Rainier Inn, court documents indicate the motel kept a false set of records to hide the facts guests were staying longer than allowed.

“There are ways to get around (the 30-day rule),” Bugher said. “It’s difficult to (enforce), but we have attempted to try.”

The city has focused on redeveloping the corridor. Last week, it announced construction on two new motels would begin later this year on Pacific Highway.

shut down

Four older motels were shut down in 2007 in the midst of state and local actions to clean up unsanitary and unsafe conditions. One of the four, the Budget Inn, was reopened under new ownership as the Rainier Inn.

Today, the Rainier Inn and two others are vacant; the fourth motel was converted to a lumber yard.

In July, the city revoked the business license of the Gloria Inn, located next to the Rainier Inn, also because of poor living conditions.

The Rainier Inn was vacated Jan. 14. The receiver installed a chain-link fence around the property, connecting to the one already in place around the Gloria.

Richard Hooper, president of the Renton-based receiver, Pivotal Solutions, said in a brief interview that he intends to sell the property.

Although the city prohibited guests from staying more than 30 days, it was clear the restriction was violated at the Rainier Inn, according to Hooper.

Powell, the tenants’ attorney, determined the guests who had stayed more than 30 days were entitled to relocation assistance under state law.

Ultimately, Hooper secured $35,000 from the bank to relocate guests. Powell said households in 14 rooms received between $2,000 and $2,400 each.

without a home

The guests have moved on.

A friend referred Willie Carroll, who has a criminal history, to the Rainier Inn after he completed a 60-day drug rehabilitation program. He spent most of the $500 he had in his pocket to stay there. After three weeks, he moved in with a woman he met when money got tight.

“It really was a good place for me to have a decent place to live,” he said in an interview.

Since being forced to leave, he’s hopped around. When he got paid, he’d stay at another motel. He had already found temporary work unloading trains for $9.40 an hour. When the money ran out, he stayed a night or two at a homeless shelter.

Earlier this month, he began his trek to Mississippi to move closer to family.

In a court declaration, Renata Miller said she started calling homeless shelters because she and her children had nowhere to go after being forced out of the Rainier Inn.

“We have been living here for a while and I’ve accepted this as our home (for now),” Miller wrote. “And even though I feel like a failure to my kids, I’ve tried to make the best of it; and now it has been taken away from us.”

Tania Fale, the former manager of the shuttered motel, said she used the $2,000 she received in relocation assistance on a U-Haul, storage unit and a room at the Golden Lion Motor Inn, located a mile to the north of the Rainier Inn in Lakewood. Several other guests landed there as well.

Fale hasn’t found work, has applied for public assistance and is awaiting a tax refund. She lives with her husband and two young children.

“Right now, I’m just worried about having a stable home,” she said.

Seaman and Vogel used some of the $2,000 in relocation assistance to move to the Golden Lion. The motel is more expensive, running $250 a week, but they can afford it and it’s still close to Seaman’s job. They’re waiting for a tax refund so they can move into an apartment.

The couple said they liked living at the Rainier Inn.

“There are good people and bad people everywhere,” Seaman said. “Seems like there were a lot of good people there.”

Christian Hill: 253-274-7390

christian.hill@thenewstribune.com

Twitter: @TNTchill