Trump Official Sees 'S---hole' Apartments On NYCHA Tour, She Says

THE BRONX, NY — A Trump administration official used blunt terms Wednesday to describe conditions she has seen during her stay in a Bronx public housing complex.

"We went to a ton of s---hole apartments, as my boss would say," said Lynne Patton, New York and New Jersey's regional administrator for the Department of Housing and Urban Development. "We went to a ton of them. They are horrible."

Patton was referring to some of the homes she has visited during her five-day residency at the Patterson Houses, the first of four New York City Housing Authority developments she's slated to visit over the next month.

Her remarks during a town hall meeting at the complex echoed President Donald Trump's inflammatory description of El Salvador, Haiti and African nations, as reported by The Washington Post last year.

Patton was responding to people in the crowd who argued she did not understand the depth of the problems tenants faced before her stay.

"Floor is leaking, no hot water, I got to go to work, it's freezing cold," one man said, according to video shot by NY1.

Patton documented her Wednesday visits to several apartments on her Facebook page. She encountered mold, leaks, peeling paint and a hole in one woman's bathroom wall that the tenant had to cover with cardboard.

The conditions point to NYCHA's massive fix-it list. The authority has nearly $32 billion in capital needs over five years, with apartment fixes accounting for $12.6 billion of that.

Patton said she is bringing change to Patterson, as NYCHA has addressed tenants' problems during her visit. She pledged to follow up with every tenant who has an open work order. And she stood by using an expletive to paint a picture of just how dire the situation is.

"I don’t mince words & I’m not going to sugarcoat @NYCHA’s failures," Patton said on Twitter. "The majority of residents agreed with me afterward."

Patton plans to spend five days in four NYCHA complexes over the course of a month. Her tour comes as federal officials choose an independent monitor for the housing authority and identify candidates for its next chairperson under an oversight deal announced two weeks ago.

The monitor will "effectuate real change" at NYCHA, Patton said, though the agreement says the person will not be responsible for the agency's day-to-day operations. While the city will ultimately pick the next peramanent chair, Patton suggested its authority is limited. "If somebody handed me a list of three husbands I had to choose from, that to me is not really a choice," she said.

"At the end of the day, NYCHA is a billion-dollar company with a billion-dollar budget," she added. "You need somebody who understands that, who understands from the ground up how to operate a company of this magnitude."

(Lead image: HUD Regional Administrator Lynne Patton is staying at the Patterson Houses this week. Photo via Lynne Patton - U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development/Facebook)