From Owning a Motel to Driving a Cab
Nowadays, Khalid Ali can be found driving a cab around the streets of Reno. It’s an occupation he’s had to rely on to pay the bills, ever since, he says, he was essentially forced to give up his motel business.
“I want to shed some light on these three motels, two of which mysteriously caught on fire,” Ali said. “The end result is that the city decided to go after me and shut down my motels.”
The former owner of Everybody’s Inn, Ho Hum Motel and the Desert Sunset Motel alleges he was discriminated against due to his Pakistani origins and forced by the city to give up each of his motels. This version is disputed by Alex Woodley, the Assistant Director of Neighborhood Services for the City of Reno, who also has code enforcement manager duties.
“I know he's made claims of his ethnic background and it had nothing to do with that whatsoever. It had to do with the quality of life that he was providing and services that he was providing for the tenants,” Woodley said. The city official also said the fires were minor chapters in a long-running downward spiral of the three properties.
After arriving in Reno in 1978, Ali spent years working in the casinos before buying his first motel, Everybody’s Inn, in 1994. He later acquired Ho Hum in 1999 and Desert Sunset in 2000, respectively.
Disagreements over Blame
Ali says he paid off both Everybody’s Inn and Ho Hum ten years after their original purchase in the 1990s and in 2000, and was on his way to paying off the Desert Sunset before a series of fires and interactions with Reno code enforcement changed the course of his business, and life, forever.
The first fire, he remembers, occurred at Everybody’s Inn back in 2014. According to his recollection, the Reno Fire Department later determined that a baseboard heater malfunction was the cause of the fire. After the fire, however, Ali says the city would not allow him to re-open half of his motel.
Then when a second fire occurred at the Desert Sunset in 2016, the Reno Fire Department ruled that “arson could have been suspected,” but then he alleges they did not go further into any type of confirmation. Ali believes he may have been the target of hate crime. We contacted Tray Palmer, a city of Reno official in charge of fire prevention, to get the files on these two fires, but did not get the information in time for this article.
Ali says in the last years of his ownership the city repeatedly used tactics like coding violations to make running his motel business financially impossible. Although Ali says he worked to meet every alleged violation, but he ultimately could not keep up.
“The city used these government agencies like [Occupational Safety and Health Administration] OSHA, the court enforcement, the health department, the police department, all these agencies as an excuse to harass me and my business,” Ali alleges. “They're fining you for things like some water that is leaking and all kinds of jokes like that. They hurt us financially so we cannot stay in the business and that's what they did to us.”
As detailed in captions below throughout this story, the city official Our Town Reno spoke to, Woodley, pointed to more serious allegations, from violence to prostitution to a total lack of following safety codes at the motels to becoming a “slumlord.”
At Everybody’s Inn, Woodley says he noticed there were “two 55 gallon drums with flammable material to heat up the water. It was a hazard, something that could have blown up. So at that point we had to require the closing of the motel. My understanding is that he had a partner and between him and the partner, I guess they got into a dispute and the partner wasn't willing to invest any more money and the property was condemned. “ Ali said this was a temporary solution that was being fixed after another tank was allegedly stolen.
Everybody’s Inn Motel still stands in Reno but it’s fenced off and out of use, as more and more motels are being bought out or auctioned off and bulldozed away. “We had a lot of problems,” Woodley a city official told Our Town Reno in an interview. “The city of Reno was receiving many complaints from tenants. We had criminal activity occurring there. We had to do an entire inspection of the property and there were so many problems. We had a storage room, which was converted into a living space with no bathroom. We had an individual living in there. I think she was paying a much lower rate on rent, but it was not approved living quarters. As a matter of fact, it didn't even have a window … so if there was a fire or anything that would have been a disaster.” Ali told Our Town Reno it was the maintenance worker who was using the room, and only staying there when he had been needed for work late at night.
Mounting Coding Violations and Suspicious Fires
Ali says he recalls a time he was once fined $7,000 by OSHA for one coding violation and then another $1,000 for another coding violation right after that. On top of that, Ali alleges the court enforcement agency fined him thousands of dollars through court hearings.
Eventually, two of Ali’s properties, Everybody’s Inn and Ho Hum Motel, were declared under court receivership, meaning that the court now owned the properties and they were put on the auction block.
“The thing is, when these motels catch on fire, needless to say some of these motels went to the auctions,” Ali said. “But I don't see why these properties go to auction when you don't owe any money.”
Ali says his late wife, a Jewish-American woman from Philadelphia, warned him that he likely would be treated differently as a Muslim-American in a post-9/11 world. Consequently, after his last purchase in 2000, Ali decided not to pursue any other motel properties, instead focusing on the three he already had.
Ali notes that although fires do happen in buildings and structures, a lot of these motel fires in Reno have happened at locations run by people of Indian and South Asian origin.
“Fires do happen, but the thing is I've been noticing is that a lot of fires in downtown Reno are mostly fires happening with Indian-region people who are the owner of these motels,” Ali said. “So the problem is that right after September 11th, we feel that basically it's a systemic racism against us as Indian or Asian people, especially. They're trying to go after us and eliminate us and the end result is that once they caught on fire, then some of these motels were simply completely shut down and never opened again.”
Woodley says he has personally assured Ali the situation of his motels had nothing to do with his origins. “We have a stance that no matter what your socioeconomic status, everyone in the city of Reno has a right to live in a clean and safe rental property,” he said in his interview with Our Town Reno. “We require, and we will cite, property owners that are not maintaining their property, but are benefiting from the rent that they're charging their tenants. So that's how we got involved with this. Normally our code enforcement cases, they typically last 30 to 60 days, the cases we had with him, they lasted for years. “
Motels which are often the first or last resort of housing for some have steadily closed down, as city council members have talked of the need to fight blight as well as saying motels are not good for long term living solutions. “We had multiple units that had to be condemned and he was required to bring them up to code,” Woodley said of the Desert Sunset Motel. “We later on had individuals that were squatting in there and we were arresting individuals and pulling them out of the property. At some point he [Ali] was living on the property, keeping it secured. And we came to find out through investigations and interviews with the occupants that they were paying him cash. One individual claims that she had an arrangement with him with favors and we had to go out there with the police department because she was trying to attack him with a knife. She was trying to stab him … turns out that she had been arrested for prostitution.”
Steadily Declining Availability of Motel Rooms and Accusations of Slumlords
Motels, like those once owned by Ali, are put on auction then typically go to developers who go on to utilize the property for their own projects. Consequently, the number of motels and rooms available to the Reno population has dropped dramatically.
“At one time there were 24,000 people living in 93 motels across Reno,” Ali said. “Now, because they keep on shutting down these motels I don't think there’s even 13,000 rooms left outside that people can rent and live in like a decent human being.”
Ali admits that motel rooms may not always be in the best shape. But he’d rather see the city offer the landlords and motel-owners a low-interest loan to improve the property, rather than hand their properties over to developers via auctions.
Ultimately, however, Ali believes that the city just wanted him out of the motel business altogether.
“My wife told me after September 11th that the city position is that they don’t want me in the business,” Ali said. “So what can I do? [The city] is the judge, jury and executioner. So where do you think we stand as a people?”
Above, an official notice of violation sent by the City of Reno concerning the Desert Sunset Motel. After being informed we were in contact with Woodley, Ali forwarded us this email (cut and paste below) which he said was sent by his wife to the Reno-Sparks Convention Authority several years ago, trying to find another party to help them in their interactions with Reno. “This is Khalid Ali, wife, Earlene. I have had numerous conversations with Joe Henry. He stated to me that he will not give Khalid a license or a permit for the motel. He will offer to me or Khalid, sister. please understand I am disabled and in a wheelchair. Joe Henry also stated that Khalid would not be allowed on the property. I think he has gone way beyond his authority. At this point in time, RSCVA has lost 9 months of revenue needlessly. This seems to be a personal agenda of Joe Henry to get Khalid out of business any way he can. no one was in danger when the fire started. It was not next to the rooms. If he had to close down a portion of the motel, I understand that. But not the entire motel. We have continually been required to have the electrical system checked. Each time”
The Last Days of the Desert Sunset Motel
Woodley has an entirely different take on the last motel Ali owned, the Desert Sunset Motel.
“There were unstable platforms for the second floor where people were walking on,” he said. “There were unstable stairwells that, I mean, if you walked on it, it was wobbly. We had situations of doors not being sealed. Like you could see daylight through the room. We had toilets and sinks, they weren't secured to the floor. We had infestations of bugs. We had let's see, what else, lack of appropriate caulking around the window seals. We had doors that were being closed with a padlock, like not even a regular door with a door handle deadbolt. We had an actual padlock, so the person would leave their room and they would put a padlock on the door. And then when they would go inside, they would padlock the door. So you can imagine if you had a fire or something, someone needs to get out of that room, they would have to go find the key, unlock the door, their padlock. It was a very unsafe situation.”
Woodley says the whole situation ended with Ali facing a criminal case against him. “The property had no electricity,” he said of the final months of the Desert Sunset Motel. “The property had no gas, so no one was supposed to be in there period. So we had to go out there on multiple occasions to secure the property. We actually ended up, because of the fact that all of our administrative process didn't bring to fruit, any kind of compliance, we actually ended up pursuing a criminal case, for lack of a better term, some we'll call it, for being a slumlord.” Woodley says the charges were in abeyance and then dropped as Ali eventually sold the property.
Ali instead blames losing his business on systemic discriminatory practices that permeate through American society.
“We all know what happened recently to George Floyd because the whole country rose up, but that's just one example,” Ali said. “[My experience] is a very small example because race is a big issue and unfortunately, we seem to be very helpless and we need to do better than that with where we are.”
Ali says he had done everything the city had asked him to do after the fires, even paying over $150,000, he alleges, in fines so that he could reopen his Desert Sunset motel.
“The [Desert Sunset] fire happened mysteriously and the city, although I spent $150,000 by way of city code enforcement, I was told it, ‘Just put up lipstick on the pig,’” Ali said. “Which is another way of saying that I lost the $150,000 over there and I had no way of [getting my money back] because they refused to let me open the motel and stay in the business.”
With motels like his being put out of business, Ali points to the rising homeless population on the streets of Reno as a result. “We always claimed that we represent the poor lifestyle of the homeless people. We tried to accommodate you for $20-$25 a night, $425-$500 a week. Now the bottom line is these big developers are coming in from out of town, declaring us as the slumlords and that they're the new Messiah.”
Accessible Housing Being Taken Off the Block
Motels have been used for decades as housing for those without good credit or with criminal records or elders not wanting to deal with complications of utilities or having more than a simple room.
“These [motels] were havens for the homeless people,” Ali said. “We never claimed that we were representing the rich and famous lifestyle [as motel owners].”
Ali thinks it’s the wrong approach, to bulldoze so many motels, even though city council members will complain of bed bugs, and the presence of prostitutes and drug dealers.
“We need to make sure these motels can stay in business because rent is no longer affordable,” Ali said. “Rent is rising to about $1,000-$1,200. The Reno Gazette Journal reported that renters are giving an ‘F’ as far as the rent costs in Reno goes. Housing prices are going up, everything is going up, but the wages are not there to back it up. So as the saying goes, ‘We cannot squeeze the blood out of turnips,’ and these people are suffering a lot because of it.”
The way that Ali sees it, he was treated differently also because the city favors large corporations and developers over small businesses like his.
“As a business owner, I feel like I was given no say in whatever the city does,” Ali said. “Unfortunately, the city became judge, jury and executioner and the end result is that I lost everything. If Tesla walked in, they would have been given big tax cuts and gone to the bed for them, saying they can build this and build that.”
Ali has been holding on to documents hoping justice for him will prevail.
Millions Estimated in Losses, Calling for a Commission
In the end, Ali says he lost all of his properties for a fraction of their value, which he claims to be at around $1 million each.
“Unfortunately, we knew from the beginning that we were going to lose it and that's what eventually happened anyway,” Ali said. “So basically our losses are $3 million from these motels and we think that the city has to do better than that. We should be able to recover the money somehow, but the bottom line is we have no money in the system.”
Ali is now calling for a human rights commission to come together to get to the bottom of what happened.
“We went through four or five lawyers that we hired and we got nowhere,” Ali said. “But if you have a suit under some kind of commission of human rights, I think we can go somewhere to put our grievances because financially, it is not possible for us to keep on going back to the court system and spend literally thousands of dollars. The end result is you going through bankruptcy.”
Ali believes a human rights commission is necessary, particularly because motel owners won’t speak out on the discrimination and problems like the ones he faced.
“When [motel owners] try to say something to [the city] about it, they retaliate against us,” Ali said. “We have to make a living too, and we cannot go on like this.”
As a Pakistani-American having lived in America for over 40 years now, Ali’s experience with the American public has been largely positive. He just wishes the bureaucratic system would treat him equally as well.
“My experience with the American public has been a very positive experience,” Ali said. “The American public are really good people. So my final message to the community is that they should be rising. They should be going to city councils meetings. If the big developers are coming in, then needless to say, where's the fair share for the minorities out here?”