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ISD shuts East Boston garage that had been converted into bunkrooms for flight attendants; says place was illegal, unsafe
By adamg on Wed, 04/06/2022 - 11:33pm
Photo by ISD.
Boston ISD reports its inspectors yesterday shut an old garage that had been illegally converted into a two-bedroom apartment shared by up to 20 flight attendants on the dead-end side of Geneva Street behind the Logan Airport car-rental garage.
This unit was constructed illegally, stored hazardous material, missing smoke detectors and no 2nd means of egress.
WBZ reports the right to crash in the apartment apparently cost $300 a month.
According to city assessing records, 37-39 Geneva St., built in 1946, is owned by Aaron Daigneault, a local real-estate developer. It's assessed at $608,300, although Suffolk County Registry of Deeds records show he paid $700,000 for the property in 2015.
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Comments
sh*t
I've been putting off getting a roommate for reasons.. but I've often thought of finding a flight attendant to rent to. I'm walking distance to the Massport Employees garage.. you can be at the airport in less than 7 minutes. Plus they wouldn't be here much.. and I'd lower the rent to relate to that frequency of them actually being here. (its not much)
And to be frank. what folks were paying that illegal apartment.. uh my 2nd bedroom wasn't much more than that with utilities included. (to give you an idea, my last roommate asked to be charged more cuz he thought I wasn't charging enough...yeah it was that low)
Gee maybe I should re-evaluate getting a roommate.
Jokes aside.. geez. This is why we need more housing in general. I'd also like to see more micro apartments for single people. Families are great and large units help them, but there are single people living in the city & finding affordable singles is hard. Studios around here (chelsea) start 2200 right now. Its insane....
Also the airline industry just sucks. Flight Attendants need to be paid more. Talk to one, its amazing how 'not so glamorous' it is. Low pay, long hours, bitchy people..
People will do almost
People will do almost anything to make a buck these days.
Everyday
These days are no worse than any other. There will always be folks looking to profit by any way possible. That is part of the nature of laissez-faire capitalism. Creating the greatest profit with the least interference.
Yet it is proven over and over that without any regulation, check and balances, that there are folks who will sell snake oils that cure cancer, increase sexual libido and cause world peace in just one pill a day.
Same goes for religious hucksters.
Can I Convert my shed that I
Can I Convert my shed that I have in my back yard into a 6 bed apartment for out of state airline workers, they wouldn’t know the difference if it’s legal or illegal. I know people will think it’s a scummy way of making money but I’m extremely desperate to keep up on mortgage payments on my other properties in Eastie.
People will do
People will do almost anything to
makesave a buck these days.The tenants must have known this place wasn't legit, but it was cheap and practical so they went along with it.
According to the article in the Globe ….
… one of the tenants called the Fire Dept because of an electrical panel that appeared to be malfunctioning. The Fire Dept then contacted ISD.
Often tenants aren’t even aware of health and safety violations where they live. You want to trust your landlord but …..
My mother’s friend started
My mother’s friend started with United in 1973, right out of college…she worked full-time on 747s, DC-10s, Lockheed L-1011s and 767s until November of 2001, where she was faced with early retirement with whatever pension she had accrued, or termination with nothing.
The way the airline industry treats the folks in jumpseats, who keep you safe- it’s despicable.
its ridculous
They only get paid when the doors are shut, so anything else.. delays, layovers, standing around at the gate.. they do not get paid. I mean how the F is this legal?
Then you go thru all this safety training that gets drilled into you, only to be basically a beverage cart person. Where the airline is more concerned about you giving a half a can of soda to save a few bucks than to pay you a bit more to care.
The supreme court sucks
There was a similar supreme court ruling a few years ago about the time Amazon employees wait in line for the security checks to let them into the warehouse. Amazon claimed they shouldn't be paid since they weren't "working" even though the process was mandatory.
See here
It's absurd and shows why unions are needed. If a job requires someone to be somewhere, they should be paid for their time irrespective of how much "work" they are doing at that moment.
Most flight attendants *have* a union
And yet it sounds like they still aren't being paid for the time when the door is open.
To which I say
I have no doubt things would be even worse for them without the collective bargaining.
First you say that they need a union because they’re not
Being paid fairly. Then you discover that they are part of a union and you say that they could have it worse? Lol
Here's your clue
You seem to have missed it.
Sounds like you don't know anyone in the airline industry.
LOL
https://www.chicagotribune.com/business/ct-biz-breeze-airways-college-fl...
I do, actually
She lives in LA and does quite well.
LOL?!!! What are you? Swirlyanon?
Except
The vast, vast majority of flight attendants in the United States are unionized, so all of this is written into their collective bargaining agreements.
I heard about this
From a flight attendant who was active in their union. They didn't like it but noted that the hourly wage kind of makes up for that part of it.
Still, no one's going to tell me that the flight attendants aren't working once passengers start boarding, and that's definitely before the doors close.
Owner should have added a
Owner should have added a roof deck on that garage and charge more for rent.
Color me shocked
At most US airlines, flight attendants are only paid once the boarding door is closed and the jetbridge is pulled back. Their full hourly pay ends once the door is opened at the destination. All the “Hello, good morning” and “would you like a beverage before we depart?”, if you’re lucky enough to fly up front? That’s a nicety required by their employer in order to not get grounded.
When all is said and done, a first-year FA at JetBlue or Delta (the two largest airlines at BOS, both non-union for FAs) barely takes home minimum wage and works a schedule that has them away from home 10-15 days out of every month. Can you blame them for having “crash pads” in the cities where they’re based?
Pilots too
Many pilots, especially for the smaller regional carriers, don't make a lot of money. They also frequently stay in these "crash pads". I never heard of a crash pad like this one in East Boston, but typically it's an apartment with nothing much more than beds for furniture.
Barely takes home minimum wage!
According to this atricle they make well over minium wage and senior FA's can make over $50/hr.
https://www.thesegoldwings.com/salary-jetblue-flight-attendant/
Two tier system
Cursory google searches from biased sources are not your friend.
Check out what the entry level wage is - barely enough to cover uniform costs.
Great location
Was it the whole building, or just part of it? That part of a room looks like it has three bunk beds, or six bunks. Up to 20 means seven more bunk beds elsewhere?
That gas can, though. Folks, don't keep gas cans in your living space.
Two bedrooms
According to ISD.
Doesn't necessarily mean
Doesn't necessarily mean twenty at a time.
I took it to mean there were twenty who used it but not all the same days.
If someone's schedule was five on/two off, they might use this four or five nights a week to be conveniently positioned for early-morning departure, then go to their "regular home further from the city for off days.
Or- maybe someone working a long-distance route would alternate days in the crash pad - sleep Sunday daytime, work Sunday night flight to Europe, stay a night in whatever hotel the airline provides Monday, work the return flight Tuesday...
Not enough parking
Using a garage for people? They're meant for cars. And even still, with this many people, where did they all park their cars? We know everyone has lots and lots of cars. Cars!
Talked to a JetBlue flight
Talked to a JetBlue flight attendant acquaintance about renting. He said no one wd do it bc they get rates much cheaper at hotels than I was asking—which was not much.
old mechanic shop
It's not a parking garage, it's an old mechanic garage. Half the space was converted into living spaces and half still has the maintenance garage equipment in it.
I'm more surprised anyone noticed since the city seems to turn a blind eye to everything else going on on this part of Geneva Street. If you want an abandoned car towed you have to file 311 complaints for months before you can get a supervisor (only ones able to ticket on Geneva Street for some reason) to come out and ticket/tow. Then the car comes back same day and the process starts all over again.
It’s official.
Aaron Daigneault is a slumlord.
Oh great...
Where are these flight attendants supposed to live now? Mass and Cass? (/sarcasm)
They can set up tents on
They can set up tents on Hanover street but first they have to come up with $7500
Obviously there is a market for this
If someone played by the rules (no second egress is unforgivable) this makes total sense as a business.
2nd egress?
I had a landlord who locked up the 2nd egress. Then they had a cow because I refused to continue paying rent until that (and some other issues) were fixed. This done after ISD cited the landlord and based on law that permits escrowing rent in these situations.
Same landlord that I paid a high rate every month for over 6 years (they basically had me over a barrel due to weird circumstance). Then the same landlord claimed to charge damages - months after I moved, and despite the fact that they planned to gut the apartment.
Six + years of friendly relations were thrown out because I stood up for myself when they were not willing to do their part of landlording. based of greed and control.
Worse, they admitted to me a few thousand due to some side retail business.
There will always be folks who ultimately put money and wealthy ahead of basic human decency.
no second egress
Judging from the photo, there's a window behind the curtain which is behind the dresser. I don't know if it could qualify as an egress - I'm not a biologist - but it's something.
Might count in some places
But only if it were openable and let people outside on the first floor.
It would never count if it is just a window overlooking the shop or other interior area.
Its not hard to get a room in
Its not hard to get a room in eastie if youre a flight atendant or pilot. thats the ideal housemate!
Sad that this happens
Assuming it's flight crew and the national average salary is $40k, how on earth can they afford hotel stays or reasonable/safe crash pads, especially in places like Boston? They can't. And I'm guessing this isn't the only crowded/hazardous crash pad.
2 exits
my home i grew up in somerville had a fire and the fire chief said that the bottom floor 'studio' needed to have a front and back entrance so he wrote us up on it.
reminds me of:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hzsTI04uiFo
(The Boston Globe Spotlight Team's investigation of off-campus housing in Boston revealed that a collision of greed, neglect and mismanagement is endangering young people in America's college capital, enriching some absentee landlords who maximize profits by packing students into properties and routinely ignore the dictates of critical housing codes.)