The suit, filed in Sacramento County
Superior Court, names Eskaton Village Grass Valley, Eskaton Properties
Inc., Eskaton Village Grass Valley Homeowners Association, Eskaton CEO
Todd Murch, Chief Operating Officer Betsy Donovan, Operations Director
Mark Cullen and former COO Trevor Hammond as defendants in the case.
Lead plaintiffs are Eskaton homeowners
Ronald Coley and Karen Lorini, filing on behalf of themselves and the
other 130-plus homeowners, alleging nine complaints of breach of
fiduciary duties, financial elder abuse, unfair business practices and
negligence.
“I can’t comment on the particulars,
since we are in open litigation,” Murch said on Monday. “The homeowners
association will be vigorously defending its side, so that means they
disagree with whatever’s being alleged.”
Part of the complaint alleges that the
Eskaton Homeowners Association, rather than being an organization
representing homeowners’ interests, is actually controlled by
management.
In addition to some Eskaton homeowners,
the board of Eskaton Village Grass Valley Homeowners Association also
includes corporate representatives such as Cullen, who served on the
board between 2003 through 2012, and Hammond, a board member from 2003
through the middle of 2011.
“Plaintiffs are informed and believe, and
thereon allege, that Eskaton has disregarded the separate corporate
existence of EVGV (Eskaton Village Grass Valley), EPI (Eskaton
Properties Inc.) and the HOA,” the complaint says. “Among other things,
Eskaton has treated HOA property as its own.”
Both Coley and Lorini declined comment on
the case, which is scheduled for a public case management conference on
May 21, according to Sacramento County Superior Court public records.
The hearing is set for 1:30 p.m. in Department 35 of the Gordon D.
Schaber Courthouse.
The 95-page complaint was first filed
Nov. 19, 2014, but an amended first complaint was filed on Jan. 5 by the
plaintiffs’ co-counsels, Sacramento-based attorneys David Diepenbrock
and Michael Vinding.
Diepenbrock on Monday declined all
comment on the case. Neither Vinding nor defendants’ attorney Rod
Baydaline of Sacramento could be reached for comment. Donovan also could
not be reached for comment.
The homeowners’ class action lawsuit is separate from a successful union organizing effort last June.
In a landmark election, employees of Eskaton Village Grass Valley
became one of the first groups of senior living workers to vote in favor
of joining a section of the local Service Employees International
Union.
Larry King, a campus patrol officer at
Eskaton, said there have been eight contract negotiating sessions since
September, when the union members delivered a proposed 49-page contract
to management. He said the sessions have so far been “slow-going,”
mostly confined to disputes over language.
“We haven’t gotten to the financial terms yet,” he said.
Sources who contacted The Union and who
declined to be identified said both the class action lawsuit and the
union election are indicative of a widespread pattern of dissatisfaction
with management attitudes toward workers and residents in the
community.
As an example of alleged management
intimidation, sources cite a Feb. 12 letter in which the Eskaton HOA’s
legal committee notified homeowners about the costs of the lawsuit and
warned that “special assessments levied against each member may be
required to pay for this unanticipated expense this year if our
insurance carrier denies coverage.”
In the letter, a copy of which was
obtained by The Union, the legal committee states that “the purpose of
this letter is to make you aware of this litigation, and to give you
sufficient notice that special assessments may be required.”
According to the complaint, Eskaton
Village Grass Valley includes 287 housing units, of which 130 are
individually owned condominium units sometimes referred to as “patio
homes.” The patio homeowners pay a monthly “assessment” to cover various
services, such as landscaping and security patrol.
Of numerous allegations in the complaint,
plaintiffs allege “breach of fiduciary duties” in regard to mandated 3
percent annual increases in the cost to homeowners for a variety of
services “supposedly needed to pay for increased personnel costs,” the
complaint says.
“Plaintiffs learned for the first time in
2014, however, that EVGV employees have received no raises since 2010,”
the complaint adds. “Thus, the increases were unjustified and improper
for nonexistent wage increases.”
Full Article & Source:
Class action lawsuit filed against Sacramento-based management of Eskaton Village Grass Valley
1 comment:
I can't remember exactly, but I think there was a case similar to this in CA last year.
I hope this class action suit is successful.
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