Host: City targeted me for speaking out
A Brooklyn Airbnb host says in a new lawsuit that his public support of the company landed him in the city’s crosshairs.
Stanley (Skip) Karol, 58, spoke at a City Council hearing in June against proposed legislation that he thought was simply intended to “scare me so I don’t do Airbnb” at his two-family home in Sunset Park.
Just over a week after he testified, city inspectors came knocking, Karol says in his suit filed Wednesday in Manhattan Federal Court. They slapped him with four summonses threatening a total of $32,000 in fines for illegal short-term rentals. One even cracked a joke after Karol warned them that he suffered from epilepsy, which could be triggered by stress, the suit says.
“I have to do Airbnb … to live in the only home I’ve ever known,” Karol said at a press conference organized by the company, which is covering his legal costs.
The fines are bogus and only an attempt at intimidation, Karol charges.
The city inspectors “had been dispatched to Mr. Karol’s home in order to retaliate against Mr. Karol for his speech and petitioning activity, including his testimony before the City Council,” his suit reads.
It was filed the same day the City Council passed a bill slapping the strictest regulations yet on the home rental company, requiring Airbnb to hand over the names and addresses of all its hosts to an enforcement office. Karol opposed those measures.
Mayor de Blasio has expressed concern that Airbnb creates a shortage of affordable rentals, exacerbating the city’s housing crisis. City officials have said its enforcement is aimed at “operators of illegal hotels who put people in unsafe conditions and take affordable homes off the market.”
But Karol’s suit charges that hotel owners and the union representing hotel workers are filing bogus anonymous complaints against any homeowners who speak publicly about Airbnb.
“He has been targeted and retaliated against for speaking his mind,” attorney Andrew Celli said. “This was not a coincidence.” A Law Department spokesman said the city would review the lawsuit and respond accordingly.