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Resident urges council to hold landlords accountable after alleged conditions at historic 1402 Military Street
Summary
Aileen Astra testified that her unit at 1402 Military Street—the city's oldest home and a trolley tour stop—lacked heat, electricity and functioning plumbing and described verbal abuse from her landlord; she asked the council to strengthen inspections, revoke repeat offenders' licenses and create a human-rights commission.
Aileen Astra told the Port Huron City Council she lived at 1402 Military Street and described repeated failures of heat, electricity and plumbing during her tenancy, and what she called demeaning treatment by the landlord. "I stand here before you to confront the harsh reality of some of the slumlords within our community, especially in 1 of the landmark historical homes," she said, asking the council to hold landlords accountable.
Astra detailed months without heat, a three-week electrical outage she attributed to a broken fuse, and plumbing problems that included human waste backing into her shower. She asked the council to consider stronger building-inspection policies, ordinances targeting landlord associations, and creation of a city human-rights commission to address pattern problems rather than individual legal cases. The clerk thanked her for her comments; no formal action was taken during the meeting beyond recording the concern in public comment.
