Sitting inside Polk Street watering hole Shanghai Kelly’s, Justin Kleigman smelled a familiar scent — and it wasn’t his drink.
“It’s like sewage,” Kleigman said. “Every time I come in, even today, I’m like, ‘Yup, there it is.’”
“Sometimes it’s like a septic tank; sometimes it’s like formaldehyde,” said Kleigman’s friend Cole Bonner. “It’s straight butt.”
While unconfirmed, the stench permeating the bar may be linked to the squalor above drinkers’ heads, where Broadway Hotel residents say their landlord has left them surrounded by trash, roaches and rodents.
The tenants further complain about holes in the walls, damaged ceilings and clogged toilets and drains — which some blame for the stench in the bar.
“The biggest problem is the pest infestation,” said a resident who spoke anonymously because of fear of eviction. “Roaches and bedbugs, they’re all over.”
Shanghai Kelly co-owner Brian Gates said he’s aware of the nasty smell but declined to comment further, saying he has a “good relationship” with the building’s owner.
Nasir Patel, the operator of the Broadway Hotel, a privately run single-room occupancy, or SRO, hotel for low-income tenants, disputed many of the complaints. Patel said clogged drains, mold, holes in walls and ceilings and piled-up refuse in hallways are caused by problem tenants.
“The reason they know [the issues] so well is because they are doing it themselves,” Patel said. “It’s a common thing across SROs, because we’re taking in the population that other people don’t take in. We’re taking them in, but it comes with a price of nuisance, vandalism, damage.”
Roaches, rodents and trash
During a recent visit to the hotel, The Standard observed piles of trash buzzing with flies, junk piled in hallways and stinking garbage bags heaped in a line by the staircase on the third floor.
The hotel was dilapidated, with golf-ball-size holes in the walls and a large hole in the ceiling. The carpets were filthy and worn-down. The stairwells were blocked with trash and hoarded belongings, and trash lined two hallways. In the main stairwell, there was a broken window, which a resident said had been in a state of disrepair for a year.
Another resident, who also spoke on condition of anonymity due to eviction fears, said mice scurry around trash bags near the bathroom every night, and tenants are forced to spray their rooms for cockroaches every day.
Residents also complained that homeless people get inside the building and sleep in the shower room. They said the trespassers clog drains and toilets with foreign objects like soiled clothing and broken glass. One said residents often have to unclog the toilet with a wooden rod.
Abram Lang has lived in the Broadway Hotel for four years. He said he has no electricity in his room and has to run an extension cord from a neighboring room to watch TV and charge his phone. Like other residents, he was outraged at the piled-up trash, especially in the kitchens.
“You want a clean place to cook, but there’s flies everywhere,” Lang said.
A history of complaints, city inspections
Complaints against Patel are not isolated to the Broadway Hotel. He was sued by the city in 2022 for poor living conditions in the Tenderloin’s Marathon Hotel, another SRO he runs. The city attorney’s office alleged the Marathon suffered from similar issues to the Broadway.
“No human being should be subjected to the conditions that exist at the Marathon Hotel,” City Attorney David Chiu said in a press release.
On July 24, Patel agreed to pay the city $550,000 in damages and fees related to the Marathon. He will have to notify the city if the Marathon receives violation notices at any point over the next five years.
Patel disputed Broadway tenants’ allegations that filth and dilapidation are due to negligent management and homeless trespassers, claiming that issues with trash, pests and plumbing are caused by residents and their visitors.
He claimed some of the residents The Standard spoke with had been served with three-day notices to pay rent and suggested that they are smearing him as part of a defense tactic for likely eviction lawsuits. He declined to name those tenants.
“I know their angle. They say, ‘I got served a three-day notice, I have to look good,’” Patel said.
Since 2019, there have been 22 complaints to the Department of Building Inspection, 17 building code violations and seven health inspections for issues tenants complained about at the Broadway. Building inspectors deemed the hotel a “nuisance” four times over that period but ultimately closed all complaints.
Property records show the building has been owned by Raymond Choy since 1972. The hotel is owned by Nasir Patel and the Abdul Rashid Patel and Zarin Abdul Rashid Patel AB Living Trust, which is controlled by his uncle, Abdul Patel. Attempts to reach Choy were unsuccessful.
Patel’s uncle is suing him over alleged misuse of at least $40,000 of hotel finances for personal gain. Patel declined to comment on the lawsuit.