Residents at Thomas Paine Square Apartments in the Fillmore say they're dealing with substandard living conditions and a city government that hasn't helped them so far while their landlord ignores their complaints.

It's the latest saga among the group of affordable housing complexes, mostly developed by Black churches in San Francisco's Fillmore District 50 to 60 years ago, which in the last decade have entered a period of instability with issues of deferred maintenance and properties changing hands.

Mission Local reports that tenants at Thomas Paine Square, which sits on the block between Turk Street and Golden Gate Avenue, and between Laguna and Buchanan streets, are accusing their landlord and property manager of negligence, with apartments experiencing persistent mold issues, rotting carpets, and more.

Some residents at the complex have been there for decades, with units that have rent subsidized by the US Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) — and maintenance issues like these can sometimes trigger HUD threats to revoke Section 8 permits.

One longtime resident, Barbara Carthen, tells Mission Local, "I’ve been here in Thomas Paine Square for over 50-something years. It has never been as bad as it is now."

The residents say that their complaints to the landlord, the Fillmore-based Bethel AME Church, and the company hired to manage the property, Domus Management Company, go largely ignored — though occasionally requests for mold mitigation will be met with some repainting, only for the mold to return again.

Residents also cite warning signs about asbestos being removed at one unit, though apparently the city Department of Building Inspection does not have any record of this.

Mission Local's shining of the spotlight on the property may lead to some action being taken by Bethel AME Church and its board.

Other troubles have arisen in recent years at several neighboring complexes where units are of a similar age, and where many of the tenants are low-income and subsidized by Section 8. The nearby Frederick Douglas Haynes Gardens, built by Third Baptist Church in the early 1970s, was the center of one such drama in 2015, when the board of the church's nonprofit that oversaw the development of the complex was looking to sell the property to a real estate speculator looking to flip units to market-rate, with rents between $3,000 and $7,000 per month.

Residents at Plaza East, where former Mayor London Breed once lived and which at just 24 years old is relatively new by comparison to some of the other Fillmore developments, reached out to a HUD official last year to come personally inspect the terrible conditions there. It's not clear where that situation now stands.