Section 8 disbars Marcisso

AREA — Vince Marcisso, an area landlord with multiple apartment buildings in Norway and Paris, is the second landlord to be disbarred from the Section 8 subsidized housing program, according to a statement from the Maine State Housing Authority (MSHA).

Landlords who are disbarred may no longer rent to tenants who participate in the Section 8 program.

Three Section 8 tenants have moved from Marcisso's units to other area landlords.

Marcisso said that the disbarment came well after he had already decided to stop participating in the program, and that he is pursuing the matter through his attorney.

According to Deborah Turcotte, spokesperson, MSHA, the final decision was made on January 16. She said Marcisso failed to bring units into compliance with safety regulations.

"Vincent Marcisso was provided time to respond to our notification of Housing Quality Standards deficiencies, and to remedy those deficiencies," said Turcotte. "They were not corrected."

Marcisso, who does business as Western Highlands LLC, owns apartment units on High Street, Paris. He also has units on Hazen Street and King Street in Norway.

He said that, over the past five years, he has been responsive to violation notices from MSHA.

"People that get thrown out of the program have a history," he said. "I have no history. I was surprised and disheartened by the fact that I received this."

Marcisso was one of three area landlords who became the initial focus of a MSHA re-inspection effort in late October, after an Advertiser Democrat report highlighted substandard living conditions in their units.

Another of the landlords, Madeline Pratt, has already been disbarred.

The third landlord, Gordon Bryant, remains in good standing with the Section 8 program.

Marcisso said that, soon after the article was published, he made the decision to stop participating in the program.

"They told me about a single life safety violation on November 6. It was a hanging light bulb.  I fixed it November 7," he said. "They had a re-inspection sometime after that, and they kept adding things. I said, 'one lady's in arrears, and she's behind in her rent, so I'm not extending that lease. Don't worry about inspecting it.'"

He said that he gave 30-day notices to his three Section 8 tenants in November, and that they were supposed to move out before the end of the year.

"The first letter that came, I said 'I no longer wish to have these tenants.' I gave them 30-day notices. In December they're still there. In January they're still there. In February, they're still there."

All the while, said Marcisso, he was paying to heat and maintain the units, but receiving no rent from either the tenants or Section 8.

"The fact that they stayed in their apartments by their own volition was financially a burden," he said.

Marcisso said that the clock on the ongoing violations should have stopped when he made the decision to stop renting to tenants in the program.

"That should have stopped the reason to inspect it. That should have made the HQS non-relevant. I wasn't renewing the lease."

Marcisso had ongoing conflict with a Section 8 tenant, Darlene Paine, who has since moved to a different location. Paine and other residents said that Marcisso had provided only intermittent heat to their units over a period of weeks.

Turcotte cited the disputes when relating the decision to disbar Marcisso.

"MaineHousing also received complaints that he left tenants without heat multiple times, and that he was involved in a dispute with one of our voucher holders due to lack of heat," she said.

Section 8 tenants in Marcisso's buildings were given vouchers to help them move to other apartments.

Paine was already in the process of moving when Marcisso was disbarred, but she said that her unit repeatedly flunked inspections.

"Every single time they came to inspect, there was things that needed to be done," she said. "They would come back to check and recheck, and there was still things not being done."

Paine said that her life has improved since she moved out of Marcisso's building.

"I have to lug wood for my wood stove. I have to shovel my own snow. But I love it here," she said. "I have not been out of heat one time. During this cold spell, they called me just to make sure that none of my pipes had frozen and everything was going okay."