The landlord’s inclusion on the watchlist doesn’t seem to have shamed him into compliance, Louis said in a statement.

“Year after year, we come back to [the Landlord Watchlist] hoping that this public display of outrage might hold them to account. Instead, they seem to be wearing it as a badge of honor,” Louis said in the statement. “Instead of striving to get off of [the Landlord Watchlist], Jason Korn has moved from 9th place in 2018 to 1st place this year. With the privilege of tax exemptions comes the responsibility of properly managing the upkeep of the buildings that thousands of New Yorkers call home.”

Louis specifically called for more enforcement against four of Korn’s properties in her district, which currently have more open violations than Williams’ calculated as their monthly average:

• 250 East 29th St. (477 open violations)
• 1439 Ocean Ave. (258 open violations)
• 712 East 27th St. (237 open violations)
• 3402 Avenue I (289 open violations)

The buildings dot the Flatbush-Midwood border. Korn’s nine other Brooklyn buildings are in Prospect-Lefferts Gardens and elsewhere in Central Brooklyn, and he owns two more properties in Manhattan. No one answered multiple phone calls for comment to a number listed for Jason Korn’s properties.

Putting the properties into the HPD’s Alternative Enforcement Program would step up inspections of the property and give the landlord four months to make repairs. If an owner fails to act, the city can then step in to make emergency repairs and bill the landlord.

The agency selects properties for the program annually, releasing its list in late January. Properties put in the program also need to notify tenants and post signage that provides instructions for filing complaints against the landlord.

Despite Louis’ call, HPD has no discretion about which properties land in the program, HPD spokesperson Matthew Creegan told the Brooklyn Eagle. As is written into law, 250 buildings are enrolled each year, determined by the number of hazardous and immediately hazardous maintenance violations and the dollar value of emergency repair charges incurred as a result of work performed by HPD.

One of the properties on Louis’ list, 1439 Ocean Ave., was in the Alternative Enforcement Program last year. Two other properties, 1616 President St. in Brooklyn, and 192 Nagle Ave. in Manhattan, were also in the program.

All three were discharged from the program in 2019, meaning all immediately hazardous conditions and 80 percent of other serious violations were remedied, among other criteria. They continue to be monitored.

Despite progress within the program, the Ocean Avenue property currently has 261 open HPD violations for issues ranging from mold, collapsed ceilings, blocked fire escapes and lack of hot water, according to the agency’s website. President Street has 42 violations and Nagle Avenue has 114 violations.

That properties enrolled in the Alternative Enforcement Program still found themselves racking up enough violations to make the worst landlord list was concerning to Councilmember Louis, according to a spokesperson.

“If [the Alternative Enforcement Program is] not effective what we’d like to do is explore in different ways the solutions we can implement through legislation,” said Louis’s spokesperson, Kristia Winter. “It’s a good opportunity to explore whether a hearing on the program could happen to see what lapses exist as tenants are in dire need of support.”

Winter said the councilmember, who is a member of the council’s Housing Committee, would see if there are improvements in Alternative Enforcement Program properties next year. If not, Louis will work with the chair, Councilmember Robert Cornegy, to look more deeply at the program.

“It’s an opportunity to make the quality of life better, and we have an expectation that these programs work and if they’re not working we have to fix that,” Winter said.

Violations can continue to mount at buildings even while they are in the Alternative Enforcement Program, as some of the properties have long-standing and complicated issues that take time to remedy, HPD spokesperson Creegan told the Brooklyn Eagle.

Through the Alternative Enforcement Program, the agency makes emergency repairs to ensure the immediate safety of residents — but it doesn’t renovate a property.

“It’s more like a babysitting program where tenants have a direct connection to HPD,” he said. “It’s a huge enforcement tool for owners and it’s very expensive for owners to be in this program — paying repairs, fees, and such — it’s in the owner’s best interest to get out of the program and we put them on track to be out.”

Looking at the current number of violations doesn’t create a clear picture of the program’s efficacy, he said, since it doesn’t take into account the severity of the violation or the percentage remedied.

“The Alternative Enforcement Program puts owners under the microscope when they neglect their buildings and endanger their tenants. It’s one of the most powerful tools we have to help get the most distressed buildings in the city back on the right track,” Creegan said.

He added that eight more of Korn’s buildings — all in Brooklyn — were selected in September 2019 for HPD’s Underlying Conditions Program, which targets buildings with a high number of units suffering mold or leak violations. Only about 50 buildings are put in the program each year, and landlords who fail to make corrections can be put into Alternative Enforcement.

All together, that means 11 of Korn’s 15 buildings are in two of HPD’s programs that target the severest of conditions.

Korn’s property with the most HPD violations, 250 East 29th St., was the last stop on Public Advocate Williams’ press tour on Monday that coincided with the release of the 2019 Landlord Watchlist. That building was enrolled in the Underlying Conditions Program in September.

Resident Megan Adams, 65, said she’s been living under horrendous conditions for about 16 years. In January her bathroom ceiling collapsed from water damage and the heat is frequently shut off, she said.

“When you call they office they say, ‘Oh, we’re going to try to do our best,’ like we are begging them,” she said. “It’s like we are nobody in here.”

A full list of Korn’s properties, and all properties owned by the 10 worst landlords on the public advocate’s list, search the table below.

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