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<\/p>\nA New York State Supreme Court Judge has\u00a0ordered one of the city’s \u201cWorst Landlords\u201d to cough up more than $2.1M in fines and follow a strict timeline to make repairs \u2014 or risk even harsher penalties.<\/p>\n
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\n Seth Miller’s 919 Prospect Ave. is at the center of the city’s first-of-its-kind judgment.\n <\/p>\n
The\u00a0city sued South Bronx<\/a>\u00a0property owner Seth Miller in 2022 under former Mayor Eric Adams. Mayor\u00a0Zohran Mamdani<\/a>\u00a0celebrated the ruling\u00a0Thursday as\u00a0the \u201cfirst-of-its-kind\u201d under the city\u2019s Nuisance Abatement Law, his office said in a press release.<\/p>\n The rent-stabilized building at 919 Prospect Ave. is at the center of the judgment. The property\u2019s violations include unsafe electrical equipment, obstructed fire escapes, an inoperable boiler, peeling lead-based paint,\u00a0rodent\u00a0and roach infestations, and the failure to erect a necessary sidewalk shed. It is also subject to a partial vacate order.\u00a0<\/p>\n Advocacy group TakeRoot Justice, which joined the city in its case, said it has supported tenants’ demands of Miller to make repairs to 919 Prospect since 2016.\u00a0<\/p>\n The building is on the Department of Housing Preservation and Development’s Alternative Enforcement Program list. The program isolates the residential properties with the most violations, allowing the city to increase inspection frequency or make emergency repairs and bill the landlord for them.\u00a0<\/p>\n In addition to a $2.1M payment, covering retroactive penalties, Miller now has two weeks to resolve the most severe violations and one month to address all other noncompliant conditions. He will have to pay $1,000 for each day the violations persist.\u00a0<\/p>\n Miller is president of Midtown-based Aegis Realty, which didn’t immediately respond to\u00a0Bisnow\u2019s\u00a0request for comment.\u00a0<\/p>\n During a\u00a0press conference on Thursday<\/a>, Mamdani said the ruling serves as a warning for other bad actors.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cFor far too long, New Yorkers have been abandoned to a living nightmare when bad landlords are able to operate with impunity. And now we are working together to bring that time of living nightmares to an end,\u201d Mamdani said. \u201cSo, let today not only set a legal precedent; let it also set a precedent for what the future of renting in our city will look like.\u201d<\/p>\n The mayor highlighted that his administration has allocated more than $85M in its preliminary budget to add 200 new attorneys and 100 support staff to the city\u2019s law department, \u201cso we can take on more cases just like this one.\u201d<\/p>\n Miller has long been on the city\u2019s radar.<\/p>\n In 2016, then-Public Advocate\u00a0Letitia James<\/a>\u00a0dubbed 919 Prospect Ave. the worst building in\u00a0the Bronx<\/a>\u00a0after it was cited for city housing violations 525 times in one year.<\/p>\n At the time, Miller was\u00a0No.\u00a036 on the public advocate’s 2016 list of the city’s worst landlords. Last year, he held the\u00a040th spot on the list<\/a>\u00a0with 643 open HPD violations.\u00a0<\/p>\n In 2017, tenants sued Miller for hazardous conditions. Two weeks later, he put the building’s ownership into bankruptcy. A\u00a0federal judge stripped the landlord<\/a>\u00a0of management rights for the building and chastised\u00a0him for using the bankruptcy process to avoid his responsibilities.\u00a0<\/p>\n Miller was\u00a0reinstated in 2019<\/a> as the property manager. Tenants sued him again shortly after.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n He’s the latest apartment building owner to be held up by the mayor as an example of the new regime of accountability. In January, the Mamdani administration struck\u00a0a $2.1M settlement<\/a>\u00a0with A&E Real Estate, ordering\u00a0the prolific landlord\u00a0to correct more than 4,000 building condition violations across 14 buildings.<\/p>\n