The owner of a building at Ellis and Hyde streets is in hot water with the city for not providing hot water for tenants, and a new city lawsuit says he also allowed rampant rat infestations, sewage leaks, and doors that didn’t lock.

A landlord named Charles C. Kartchner has owned the ten-unit residential apartment building at 646 Ellis Street for only less than a year and a half. Yet in that short time, SF Department of Building Inspection director Patrick O’Riordan says that Kartchner’s short tenure as landlord there “really stands out for the sheer number of violations that led to unsafe conditions for the tenants.” Those alleged violations and unsafe living conditions include tenants not having heat or hot water in their units, facing rodent infestations, sewage leaks, and mold problems, plus the building lacking functioning locks on some doors.

This is all coming to light now, as KRON4 reports that SF City Attorney David Chiu is suing Kartchner over the conditions at 646 Ellis Street. The lawsuit notes that the Department of Building Inspection (DBI) has slapped Kartchner with five notices of violations regarding the building, and that Kartcher has no-showed at all of the public hearings about these violations.

“This property owner took rent from each tenant then turned around and refused to provide the most basic necessities like hot water and heating,” Chiu said in a Wednesday press release. “Every tenant deserves a safe and clean place to live. It is the landlord’s responsibility to ensure their property doesn’t deteriorate. We gave this owner ample opportunity to address these issues to no avail. We have no choice but to file this lawsuit to bring accountability, protect the tenants living at the property, and cure the many health and safety violations.”

There are reportedly around 25 tenants in the building, and the Chronicle has the interesting footnote that they are all Vietnamese immigrants. Those tenants had already brought a separate lawsuit against Kartchner over these alleged violations, a suit filed in April by the Tenderloin Housing Clinic.

“It is essential to enforce tenants’ rights to promote a high quality of life for San Franciscan residents,” Tenderloin Housing Clinic program manager Gloria del Mar Lemus said in Chiu’s release. “Tenants are already paying a high price to live in the city. Landlords cannot continue to violate housing codes by allowing their tenants to live without hot water or in properties with pest infestations or collapsing ceilings. The role of the City Attorney is essential when the violations get out of hand.”

According to the full lawsuit, Chiu’s office is asking a judge to fine Kartchner “$1,000 for each day that the Housing Code violations alleged in the Complaint existed or were permitted to occur in the amount of at least $224,000 through October 18, 2025, plus $1,000 per day thereafter through the entry of judgment.”

Related: SF’s ‘Cruelest Landlord’ Back in News, Tenants Win $2.7 Million Harassment Appeal [SFist]

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