Soiled mattress. Discarded syringes. Insect infestations.
These are just some of the wonderful amenities you might find at Costa Mesa's motels.
Some officials are fed up with many of the city's extended-stay motels as they've become breeding grounds for filth and crime. At last night's City Council meeting, Councilman Steve Mensinger and Mayor Eric Bever asked city CEO Tom Hatch to issue fines and other civil penalties to bring the properties up to code, Daily Pilot reports.
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As part of a study, city officials visited 12 motels, including the Regency Inn on Newport Boulevard. It turns out those businesses were responsible for 1,677 calls for police service in 2011–about 2 percent of the department's total calls for the year. When they walked into the rooms, they encountered all sorts of sights that would make you want to dive into a pool of Purell.
Rick Francis, the city's assistant CEO, showed a photo of a stained mattress, saying it “should not be something that humans even come in contact with.”
Though the city can't just shut the properties down–some serve as state-mandated affordable housing units.
