news-record.com

GREENSBORO — A Guilford County judge is expected to rule against a tenant alleging that her eviction from subsidized housing owned by a Shiloh Baptist Church board is in retaliation for tenant organizing.

But district court Judge Polly D. Sizemore’s forthcoming ruling, announced from the bench Tuesday, was on a matter of procedure rather than substance.

When J.T. Hairston Memorial Apartments tenant LaTonya Stimpson, a mother of four, filed a notice of her appeal of a magistrate’s Nov. 25 eviction order, she took 10 working days. But the law requires notice within 10 calendar days, the judge noted, including holidays and weekends.

The judge, meanwhile, denied a motion for a temporary restraining order filed by the city human relations department on the tenant’s behalf to stop the eviction.

Sizemore wrote that the motion, invoking the fair housing ordinance, lacked grounds for a cause of action.

“This does not go to the merits of any restraining order, the merits of Ms. Stimpson’s complaint to the city or anything else,” said Sizemore, who will enter the proposed order Friday.

Stimpson was one of six tenants taken to small claims court in November for nonpayment of small repairs, in some cases as minor as the replacement of miniblinds or stove drip pans.

The tenants allege the actual reason for the evictions was in retaliation for having drawn up and signed a petition demanding that the Hairston housing board fire property managers from Westminster Co., whom the tenants accuse of inept and unfair treatment.

Both Westminster and Shiloh officers deny those allegations. An attorney for Westminster, T. Keith Black, said Tuesday that Westminster had been a “good corporate citizen” and has played by the rules.

“We are completely denying the allegations of discrimination,” Black said. “Everyone is treated fairly — that’s why we follow the HUD rules.”

A representative for the city legal department said the city attorney’s office was still reading the proposed order and had not decided on a next step. Stimpson, who said she will appeal the judge’s ruling, came to court Tuesday with her children, including a baby daughter.

She said she was frustrated that she had devoted time to fighting the eviction that could have been spent on studies at GTCC.

“This is all because I complained,” Stimpson said. “And they’re still going to put me out.”

Contact Lorraine Ahearn at 373-7334 or lorraine.ahearn@news-record.com