SoLa Impact Hit with 24 Habitability Lawsuits in Six Years, Now Scheduled to Mediate with Inner City Law Center and Boies Schiller Flexner
Social enterprise developer SoLa is rapidly becoming one of the largest housing developers in Los Angeles, but they’re doing more harm than good.
Los Angeles, CA (January 13, 2025) — Rampant mold and mushrooms growing in apartments, chronic infestations of rats, roaches and bedbugs, water damage, crumbling walls and ceilings — these are the conditions residents of 720-722 West 79th Street have been living in for years.
These stories reached Inner City Law Center, spurring the organization to send advocates to the building and organize the tenant complaints for a lawsuit, which was filed on behalf of 22 plaintiffs in the building. Inner City Law Center is partnering with elite litigation firm Boies Schiller Flexner LLC for the case, which enters mediation January 15 and is scheduled to proceed to trial in March.
“There was actually a beehive growing between the roof and my ceiling. The outside is just wood, and the wood was rotted. They [the landlord] tried to seal the bees in with expanding foam, but they just ate through the foam. It went on for a couple years like that. At night, you’d hear the humming,” said 79th Street tenant Luis Garcia.
The building is one of many owned by housing developer SoLa Impact, a for-profit social enterprise founded by entrepreneur Martin Muoto in 2015 that boasts, “a double bottom line strategy focused on preserving, refreshing, and creating high-quality affordable housing in low-income communities.”
“This case is about exposing bad actors who have been exploiting vulnerable communities under the guise of affordable housing. SoLa Impact and the other defendants claim to support Black and Brown residents, but in reality, the defendants force families to live in deplorable conditions. Our clients intend to try this case in order to secure the safe housing they — and all Angelenos — deserve.” said Joshua Quaye, Associate at Boies Schiller Flexner.
Over the past six years, 24 lawsuits have been brought against SoLa over the inhumane conditions many of their tenants are living in. In an exposé about another SoLa property, CBS reporter David Goldstein asks tenant Maria Cruz, “Is this high-quality affordable housing?” Maria replies, “this is not high-quality affordable housing…this is a nightmare.”
SoLa Impact claims to own more than 1,500 units in Los Angeles, with another 3,500 in the works, making them one of the largest developers in Los Angeles and one of the largest minority-led developers in the nation. However, you won’t find their 720-722 West 79th Street property among the successful projects listed on the company’s website, and with good reason. Though SoLa acquired the property in December of 2018 for just $535,000 and has had plenty of time to bring the building up to code, they’ve done nothing to make the building more habitable.
In fact, the property was hit with violation notices from the Los Angeles Housing Department (LAHD) in June of 2019 for failure to maintain smoke detectors, windows, screens, doors, safe and sanitary floor coverings, plaster, drywall, ceilings, plumbing, heating, stairways, guardrails, and portions of the building that are dilapidated due to dry rot or insect infestation. The building was cited again in October of the same year, April of 2021, September of 2021, and April of 2024.
In the meantime, tenants are still battling mold, mushrooms, and flooding in their apartments — and ongoing harassment. “These tenants have been exposed to severe health and safety hazards in this building, not to mention the extreme stress from living day-to-day in uninhabitable conditions. These families are suffering from physical injuries and illness, including respiratory problems, bug bites, rashes, headaches, frequent colds, nosebleeds, and fatigue,” said Alexandra Irons, a Senior Staff Attorney at Inner City Law Center.
“A couple of years ago, they decided to do construction on the building a couple of days before Christmas. That Christmas was taken away from all of us,” said Garcia. “It was raining and all our stuff was sitting out in the driveway covered in plastic. We spent Christmas day trying to bring all our stuff back inside.”
###
About Inner City Law Center
Inner City Law Center is a nonprofit, poverty-law firm headquartered in Skid Row, working to end the homelessness crisis by providing free legal services to the most vulnerable residents of Los Angeles.
Inner City Law Center’s staff of more than 145 (including 70 lawyers), together with hundreds of volunteers, fight for people facing eviction, struggling with landlord harassment, fighting to secure their veteran or disability benefits or standing up to slum housing conditions.
Contact: Jacqueline Burbank, Communications Manager, jburbank@innercitylaw.org or (213) 947-7902
###
About Boies Schiller Flexner
Boies Schiller Flexner LLP (www.bsfllp.com) is a firm of internationally recognized trial lawyers, crisis managers, and strategic advisers known for our creative, aggressive, and efficient pursuit of success for clients. Our attorneys have an established track record of winning complex, groundbreaking, and cross-border matters in diverse circumstances and industries for many of the world’s most sophisticated companies.