DOB assesses more than $94,000 in new fines

A recent search of the DC Department of Buildings SCOUT information system found that DOB has imposed $94,083 in fines on Equity Residential for housing code violations at 3003 Van Ness since January 1 of this year.

The Department of Buildings has been conducting hundreds of inspections of apartments and common areas of 3003 Van Ness since August 2023. In August of 2024, the tenant association retrieved records of fines assessed by DOB for violations at 3003 Van Ness and found that the totaled more than $1.2 million. DOB later determined that Equity corrected those infractions it and forgave the company for more than $1 million in fines.

However, the tenant association has continued to complain about serious safety and maintenance problems at 3003 Van Ness, including chronically broken security doors (allowing unauthorized access to the building), elevators that don’t work, fire-safety doors that do not shut automatically, and other problems in individual apartments and common areas. Because of these complaints, the tenant association and individual residents have requested additional inspections, which have turned up more violations — $94,083 in total as of March 3rd, 2025.

Equity Residential has told the tenant association that it plans to address the violations.

City Paper finds more fines at 3003 Van Ness than any other building in DC

The Washington City Paper published a story today finding that in August 2023, the owners of 3003 Van Ness owed the city more than $1.2 million in unpaid fines for housing code violations. This affirms a previous report by the tenant association, which also included a detailed list of those fines.

The WCP story reports that more than $1 million in fines had been wiped away in recent months, despite ongoing housing code violations at 3003 Van Ness.

A recent informal inspection by the tenant association found that extensive problems persisted even after the Department of Buildings conducted inspections of 3003 Van Ness for more than a year.

Many apartment doors lack self-closing, fire-safety mechanisms even after two arson attempts at 3003 Van Ness.

The Department of Buildings plans to continue inspections of 3003 Van Ness this month.

D.C. Landlords Owe More Than $40 Million in Unpaid Housing Violations - Washington City Paper

Data source: DC Department of Buildings

““The District’s decision to forgive the property’s fines only underscore that the current system does not incentivize landlords to provide timely responses to safety concerns. The fact that DOB forgives fines—even more than $1 million of them—means that a landlord can ignore serious housing code violations for a long time. The company does not fear the Department of Buildings, so it does not repair serious problems that put their residents at risk.””

— Harry Gural

Tenant association reminds residents to sign inspection permission forms NOW

The Van Ness South Tenants Association today sent a newsletter to all members, reminding them to fill out permission forms to get their apartments inspected by the Department of Buildings.

Between August 2023 and fall 2024, the DC Department of Buildings conducted a “proactive inspection” of many units at 3003 Van Ness, assessing well over $1 million in fines for violations of the housing code. Some of those violations were potentially life-threatening, e.g., the lack of GFCI electrical outlets and self-closing fire safety doors.

DOB was not able to inspect all units at 3003 Van Ness.

Nevertheless, residents report that many some violations in apartments have not been repaired. Also, serious problems in common areas persist, e.g., two elevators in the West building that have been out of order since December, and apparently won’t work again until at least the end of the year.

For these reasons, the tenant association has asked DOB to inspect all remaining units that have potential housing code violations, as well as all common areas.

However, for residents to get an inspection, they must fill out a permission form and send it to the Department of buildings at DOB.OAR@dc.gov.

See more information below in the newsletter that was sent to tenants.

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DON'T MISS THIS LAST CHANCE TO GET PROBLEMS IN YOUR UNIT FIXED

Thanks to the advocacy of members of our tenant association, the DC Department of Buildings (DOB) has decided to inspect 3003 Van Ness AGAIN. This is a critical opportunity to get long-standing problems in your apartment and in common areas addressed.

PROBLEMS IN YOUR APARTMENT

For DOB to inspect your apartment, you MUST fill out a permission form and send it to DOB. Without this form, DOB will not be able to inspect your unit.

NOTE: In the past, even when residents filled out permission forms, DOB had trouble getting into apartments because Equity Residential did not make an effort to make this possible. DOB says that this time Equity has pledge to cooperate.

If you have any of the problems listed below, please print the permission form (English or Spanish), and email it to the DOB at DOB.OAR@dc.gov. Please cc: the tenant association at vnsta@vnsta.org.

If you have issues in your apartment, now is the time to act. If DOB finds housing code violations, it will order Equity Residential to fix the problems or face a steep fine. 

Examples of Possible Housing Code Violations:

• Door to the hallway doesn't close by itself (fire hazard)

• Electrical outlets without circuit breakers in the kitchen or bathroom (electrocution risk)

• Problems with heat or air conditioning

• Rodents

• Insects

• Mold

• Peeling paint

• Plumbing leaks

• Broken appliances

• Lights that don’t work

• Warped flooring or other effects from the recent flooding

• Other problems 

PROBLEMS IN COMMON AREAS

As you know, we also have experienced many problems in common areas -- broken elevators, malfunctioning exterior doors, leaks, loose floor tiles, rodents, etc. The tenant association has reported many of these problems to the Department of Buildings, along with extensive video evidence in many cases.

If you know of problems that you think may not have been reported, please take photos and video of the problem, including both close-ups and medium shots (to help show the location). Please send these to the tenant association, along with a description and more details about the location, so we can forward these to the Department of Buildings.

DON'T MISS YOUR CHANCE

This may be the last chance you will have in a long time to get problems in your apartment or in common areas fixed. This rare opportunity was only made possible by many hours of work. Don't miss your chance to get things fixed so you can enjoy 3003 Van Ness again!

““The landlord must ensure that your unit and all common areas are safe and sanitary as of the first day of your tenancy. This is known as the “warranty of habitability.” The landlord must maintain your apartment and all common areas of the building in compliance with the housing code, including keeping the premises safe and secure and free of rodents and pests, keeping the structure and facilities of the building in good repair, and ensuring adequate heat, lighting, and ventilation.””

— DC Tenant Bill of Rights

New Year's Eve inspection finds chronic security and maintenance problems

An informal inspection by members of the Van Ness South Tenants Association found that many of the same security problems that have been reported in the past have not been addressed. The tenant association has recorded well over 80 videos of malfunctioning security doors over the past two and a half years.

Many of the problems recorded on video on December 31st are the same issues that were witnessed by the DC Department of Buildings (DOB) during an official inspection of 3003 Van Ness on December 17th. The DOB discover many malfunctioning security doors, and it issued a 21-page Notice of Infraction to Equity Residential and levied $609 in fines.

On December 31st, two weeks after the DOB inspection, the tenant association found that only two doors had been repaired, while many others remain broken. One door that was repaired is the second Veazey Terrace entrance, which has been broken almost continuously for more than two years — it now has a reinforced handle and lock mechanism. The main entrance from Veazey Terrace also received a stronger door handle, but the hinge mechanism still does not work properly so the door does not close automatically.

The chronically broken security doors are of especially serious concern given that an intruder attempted to light a resident’s apartment door on fire on Monday, December 30th. Equity Residential management has not informed residents about this incident, and it is not clear whether it has taken any steps to prevent the intruder from entering the building again. In any case, as the videos below indicate, it is extremely easy for anyone to enter 3003 Van Ness.

An intruder attempted to light a fire outside a resident’s apartment.

The informal inspection of 3003 Van Ness by the tenant association found that exterior security doors were left open, and other security doors malfunctioned or had broken locks and could be opened without a fob.

The door at the main entrance from Veazey Terrace does not close automatically.

The door in the G2-level garage to the West building by the gym can be opened without a fob, allowing easy access to the West building.

Door N to the South building in the G-2 garage can be opened without a fob, allowing easy access to the South building.

This door has been broken for months, allowing easy access to the apartment building from the underground garage. It is easy to get into the underground garage from other entrances, so it is easy to walk off the street into the garage and then into the apartment area.

Door G on the G-1 level of the garage into the South building won’t open with a fob. As a result, someone frequently props it open with a fire extinguisher, allowing easy access to the building.

Door Q on the G-3 level of the garage remains broken, allowing easy access to the buiding.

The loading dock door is left open at approximately 10 am on December 31st. There is no Equity Residential employee in sight.

The same loading dock door is still open four hours later, allowing easy access to the building.

Two of the four elevators in the West building are broken, including the only freight elevator. One of the remaining elevators is frequently used by contractors, so only one elevator is operational for residents of the 11-story West building.

In the 11-floor South building, one of the three elevators is out of service.

One of three elevators in the South building is out of service.

Residents of 3003 Van Ness are extremely concerned about the fact that there are not enough working elevators to serve the residents of the two large apartment buildings. Older and disabled residents cannot climb the stairs or exit the building easily. Other residents are forced to wait a long time for an elevator. Residents cannot move large furniture in or out of the building due to lack of a service elevator.

LAUNDRY ROOMS

Residents largely welcome the recent upgrade of laundry rooms, with the installation of new washers and dryers.

However, it seems like some of the new washers are leaking or were incorrectly connected to the plumbing. One resident recently alerted management to this leak on the 5th floor laundry room in the West building.

BROKEN LIGHTS

Residents also report that many lights are out in stairwells and some hallways.

While management has claimed that the broken lights are due to the recent massive flood in the West building, residents say that many of these lights have been out for a long time. In fact, there is a lot of email evidence between residents and management showing that residents have complained about broken lighting in stairwells long before the flood.

Long “dolly shot” of maintenance problems in stairwells and hallways of 3003 Van Ness

MORE bROKEN LIGHTS

Residents have recorded more videos of broken lights. The videos below were recorded on January 6th in stairwells 1 and 2 near the 10th floor in the West building. Both show that many lights are out in these stairwells.

We are concerned about this safety and security issue, in part because two elevators are out of service in the West building, forcing residents to walk up or down stairs in some cases.

DC Department of Buildings inspects broken security doors

At the request of the Van Ness South Tenants Association, the DC Department of Buildings today inspected broken security doors at 3003 Van Ness.

Just two days earlier, VNSTA reviewed the security doors leading from the street into the underground garages, and from the underground garages into the West and South buildings. The tenant association found that it remains easy to enter the residential hallways of 3003 Van Ness from the street, through multiple doors.

The tenant association has recorded more than 80 videos of broken security doors at 3003 Van Ness over more than two years.

VNSTA awaits a report by the Department of Buildings.

See video below recorded on December 15th, 2024.

Fines against Equity Residential lowered from $1.2 million to $164 thousand

In August, we reported that the DC Department of Buildings (DOB) had levied $1,218,612 in fines on Equity Residential for almost 750 violations at 3003 Van Ness over the past three years. Updated data, which shows far less in fines, is now available.

The information was retrieved from the DOB’s SCOUT online data system and Landlord Violations Tool.

The fines were the result of the DOB’s "proactive inspection" of 3003 Van Ness, which was supposed to inspect the entire building. Sixteen months later, only a portion of the building has been inspected, but the exact percentage isn’t known.

It also isn’t clear that any of the $1.2 million in fines has been paid to date.

However, review of Department of Buildings online data for 3003 Van Ness as of Dec. 11th, 2024, shows that the amount has been lowered by more than $1 million to $164,492. It appears that the reason that the amount has dropped so precipitously is that, according to DOB, Equity Residential has fixed the violations that had been cited.

If that is correct, it means that Equity Residential will have paid little or nothing in fines for widespread violations of the housing code.

Moreover, it isn’t clear if Equity Residential has fixed housing code violations in the units that were not inspected by the Department of Buildings.

The Van Ness South Tenants Association will seek clarification from the Department of Buildings about its policy about housing code violations and fines.

Residents of 3003 Van Ness who want to find out if there are any outstanding fines for violations in their units can view the PDF file above or the identical Excel file below.

Download an easier-to-read Excel version of the current fines

Fire doors have not been repaired

The inspection of 3003 Van Ness by the DC Department of Buildings found that most doors to apartments lack a self-closing mechanism, which is necessary for fire safety.

This fire safety issue was reported by DOB inspectors, but it appears that only a few doors have been updated with a spring mechanism that would close the door automatically as the resident exits his or her apartment. This is necessary to slow the spread of fire in the case of an emergency.

The tenant association recently began an informal survey of residents to find out how many doors have been repaired. So far, 95% of respondents report that the doors have not been repaired.

It isn’t clear why Equity Residential is not addressing this fire safety issue.

VNSTA sends letter to Equity Residential asking it not to remove information about inspections

The Van Ness South Tenants Association today sent a letter to Josh Luper, Equity Residential building manager for 3003 Van Ness, requesting that he instruct Equity employees not to remove posters informing residents about building-wide inspections of 3003 Van Ness by the DC Department of Buildings.

The letter states that the tenant association posters are important because they provide residents essential information about a very serious electrical problem that has been discovered in recent investigations, which can be life-threatening in certain circumstances. The flyers also tell residents that they must fill out a permission form to have their apartment inspected.

The posters are particularly important because Equity Residential has not made vigorous efforts to inform residents about the inspections. For this reason, the Van Ness South Tenants Association has taken steps to make sure that residents receive information that may be important to their personal safety.

See the letter in print-friendly format at this link.

We ask that you instruct your employees not to remove tenant association flyers of any sort, specifically, those that are designed to alert them to a potential safety hazard and to let them know that they must sign a permission form to get an inspection of their unit. We also ask that you instruct them specifically not to remove information posted by the Department of Buildings.

"Proactive Inspections" to begin at 3003 Van Ness

The DC Department of Buildings will soon begin inspections of all apartments and common areas of 3003 Van Ness, as part of DOB’s “proactive inspection” program.

The Department of Buildings website explains that buildings are chosen using a special algorithm “to address apartment buildings with an increased likelihood of violations. The algorithm takes into account factors like a building's age and the landlord's history of code violations.”

Residents who do not want their apartment to be inspected can fill out a form at this link on the DOB website.

Equity Residential has shared little information with residents about the pending inspections. For this reason, the tenant association has posted a flyer in common areas to inform all residents.