David Nissanov is steamed about Eden Flunker, his neighbor across the street on 24th Avenue West. The reason: she plans to expand an adult family home there.
Adult family homes can house up to two staffers and six clients who suffer from disabilities such as Alzheimer's Disease, according to state and city regulations.
There are a dozen such homes in Magnolia, and Flunker owns two of them. Her sister, Amor Youngs, owns five, and one of their cousins owns yet another one on Williams Street, they said.
Nissanov is not alone in his objections. In all, he said, 20 neighborhood residents in the area have signed a petition objecting to the expansion plans Flunker has for her single-family property.
But unlike his neighbors, Nissanov is the subject of an anti-harassment order Flunker successfully filed against him on Sept. 28. "I went there (Flunker's house) on behalf of the neighbors," said Nissanov, an unofficial community leader who helped spearhead a project to underground utilities in his area. Flunker came out of the house screaming at him, he said.
Flunker tells a different tale. "He went overboard," she said, alleging that Nissanov tried to intimidate her. Youngs added that Nissanov also grilled her sister's staffers about their salaries, and he wanted her to convince Flunker to sell the house to him for $100,000 above market value.
Nissanov allegedly threatened that it would get ugly if Flunker didn't sell, according to Youngs. Flunker said she wasn't interested in the offer.
Furthermore, Youngs said, one of the neighbors started a rumor that one of the sisters' homes was a drug house because there was so much traffic associated with it.
The bigger picture
Allegations from all parties aside, the dispute underlies a fundamental objection among some neighbors to having a business in a single-family neighborhood. "It's just not right," Nissanov said. "It's pure hell for us."
Noise, parking and traffic have gotten worse because of the adult family homes, he added. "It's workers, it's friends of workers, it's medical suppliers."
Part of the traffic involves food deliveries, Youngs said. "I have a cook who cooks in one house and delivers food to the others, except for breakfast." That's prepared in each house, she said.
Ambulances and fire trucks also end up in the neighborhood at least once a week, grouses neighborhood resident Amy Allen, who worries that the impacts are only going to get worse. "She keeps buying them here," she said of Flunker converting Magnolia houses into care facilities.
Neighborhood resident Lori Gadini was bothered about having to catch an Alzheimer's patient who had run away from Flunker's home last year.
And Nisssanov said he's bothered by seeing staffers in blue uniforms outside the house, and he worries that property values will suffer because of that and the other adult family homes in the area.
Other neighbors interviewed for this story who didn't want to be identified also object to having adult family homes in the neighborhood for a variety of similar reasons.
But adult family homes are allowed outright in single-family zones, according to Alan Justad, Department of Planning and Development spokesman. "There are no dispersal requirements," he added, meaning there is no limit to the number of such homes allowed in a given neighborhood.
Still, Allen said there appears to be different standards in play. "If you talk to the city, it's one thing. If you talk to the state it's another."
A DPD inspector who did not return a call for comment said Flunker's expansion plans were out of the city's hands, according to Allen. Seattle's land-use code allows up to eight unrelated people to live in a single-family home, Justad said.
But the state's Department of Social and Health Services regulates adult family homes statewide and - as noted above - allows up to six unrelated people to live in them, along with a maximum of two staff members, according to Pat Jennings, a regional administrator with the DSHS in King County. That's eight people allowed in a house under either set of regulations.
Adult family homes are licensed by the state, and both owners and staff members working in them have to go through training, she said, adding that specialty training is required if the home deals with Alzheimer's clients.
State law requires that adult family homes be inspected by the DSHS every 18 months, but there are enough inspectors in King County that inspections take place every 15 months, Jennings said. Flunker's home was inspected last December, and there were no problems, according to DSHS records.
"If the violations are small or minor, we might just do a consultation," Jennings said. There are some adult-family-home horror stories out there, she conceded, but Jennings said the homes can be closed down the same day if the situation merits it. "We have four or five of those every two months in King County."
A needed service
According to the state legislature, "adult family homes are an important part of the state's long-term care system." Indeed, according to DSHS records, there were 2,200 of the homes licensed by the state as of Sept. 30 this year. That's up from 2,162 as of January 1997.
Youngs said she opened her first adult family home in Magnolia in 1994 and kept adding one a year until she had five. Flunker opened her first adult family home in 2000, she said.
The sisters charge clients $5,000 a month to stay in the homes. Medicaid, by contrast, pays a maximum of $2,500, Youngs said. But if a client has lived in one of her homes for at least five years, she will let them stay for the lower Medicaid payments, Youngs added.
It's worth the full price, according to Magnolian Anetta Grubisich. First her sister and then her husband have lived in Youngs' homes, she said. "So I know what kind of care they have, and they're wonderful."
Grubisich also said her husband made her promise not to put him in a nursing home if something ever happened to him, she said, illustrating the popularity of adult family homes as an alternative to institutional care.
Grubisich doesn't see what the problem is for the neighbors near the homes. Neither does Roselie Tudor, who said her 98-year-old mother - a former Queen Anne resident - lives in one of Flunker's homes. "Oh, I think Eden is certainly fulfilling a need in our community," Tudor said.
Flunker said she isn't maxed out on the allowable number of clients in her home on 24th. "I only have three residents right now," she said to explain why she wants to expand the house.
Her land-use application calls for adding another six units to the house, but neighbors said they have heard different numbers depending on who's talking. Flunker said that while there will be six new units, she only plans to use three for clients. Neighbors are skeptical.
The neighbors also said they had hoped to block the expansion at Flunker's home based on a DPD rule concerning home occupations allowed in residential zones.
That rule states: "In single family zones, no exterior alterations are allowed to accommodate the home occupation. Only those interior alterations customary to residential use may be made."
However, the restrictions apparently don't apply to adult family homes. Flunker said she got the permit for the expansion the day before she was interviewed for this story last week.
Russ Zabel can be reached at rzabel@nwlink.com or 461-1309.[[In-content Ad]]
