Option one was a non-option. Tobin was a landlord to make a living, and if he was too lenient he could lose his business. But Tobin also did not evict most tenants who owed him. Pushing tenants out and pulling new ones in cost money too. In an average month, forty of Tobin’s tenants were behind—nearly one-third of the trailer park. The average tenant owed $340.4 But Tobin only evicted a handful of tenants each month. A landlord could be too soft or too hard; the money was in the middle, with the third route, and his tenants were grateful for it, though often not at first.
Jerry Warren wasn’t. Jerry used to ride with the Outlaws, a biker gang, and was covered in tattoos, several of which he had acquired in prison. Eviction notice in hand, Tobin had whapped the side of Jerry’s trailer, an aqua-blue 700-footer Jerry had painted himself. Jerry balled up the notice and threw it in Tobin’s face, yelling, “Tobin, I don’t give a shit about this fucking eviction! And Lenny, I don’t care how old you are. I’ll still take to whooping your ass something good!” Lenny and Jerry exchanged words, but Tobin was unfazed. He had begun a conversation, and a few days later, after he had cooled off, Jerry would pick it up.5 He offered to clean up the trailer park and attend to some maintenance concerns if Tobin canceled the eviction. Tobin accepted the offer.
He took a different tack with Larraine Jenkins. A month before the Licenses Committee had rejected Tobin’s renewal application, he had given her a ride to eviction court in the Cadillac. Larraine received SSI for learning impairments attributed to a childhood fall out of an attic window. Her monthly check was $714. Her monthly rent was $550, utilities not included. Larraine had been late with the rent several times before Tobin finally took her to court. “It’s just hard to give up that rent,” Larraine admitted. “You’ve got to wonder if the street people don’t have the right idea. Just live on the street. Don’t have to pay rent to nobody.” She sat in the passenger’s seat, while another tenant named Pam Reinke, a pregnant woman with straight-cut bangs and freckles, sat in the back. In court, Tobin offered them both stipulation agreements, a civil court’s version of a plea bargain. If they stuck to a tight payment schedule, Tobin would dismiss the eviction. If they deviated, Tobin could obtain a judgment of eviction and activate the sheriff’s eviction squad (with something called a “writ of restitution”) without having to take Larraine or Pam to court again.
Throughout his fight with Witkowski, Tobin had worried that tenants would hold their money until the fate of the trailer park was settled. But most tenants went right on paying. Larraine wasn’t one of them. Already behind, she had withheld June’s rent because she didn’t know if the park would be shut down. If she had to move anyway, she figured, she might as well pocket the $550. Larraine was pushing her luck. Besides owing back rent, she had been one of the critics who had appeared on the nightly news, where she admitted to seeing prostitutes and drug dealers in the park. (Phyllis Gladstone, the most vocal supporter of Witkowski, had put Larraine up to it.)6 When Tobin found out about everything, he recalled that Larraine hadn’t fulfilled her stipulation agreement. That meant he could ask the sheriff’s eviction squad to remove her. So he did.
Soon, a letter from the Milwaukee Sheriff’s Office arrived in Larraine’s mailbox. Printed on a bright-yellow sheet of paper was the following message:
CURRENT OCCUPANT
You are hereby notified that the Milwaukee County Sheriff’s Office has a court order (Writ of Restitution/Assistance) requiring your immediate removal from the premises. Failure to vacate immediately will be cause for the Sheriff to remove your belongings from the premises.
If an eviction is necessary, risk of damages or loss of property shall be borne by you, the defendant, after delivery by the Sheriff to the place of safekeeping. Movers will not take food left in your refrigerator or freezer. REMOVE FOOD ITEMS.
The words had terrified Larraine. It showed. Her emotions projected onto her face like a movie screen. When she was happy, she beamed, flashing a gap-toothed smile; and when she was depressed, her whole face drooped as if being pulled down by a hundred tiny lead sinkers. At fifty-four, Larraine lived alone in a clean, white trailer, though she prayed to one day be reunited with her two adult daughters and her grandson, who, along with God, occupied the center of her universe. She was tub-bellied, with a broad face and freckled white skin. Years ago, she had been gorgeous and liked to dress in a way that made boys lean out of their car windows. Larraine still cared about her appearance and would leave her eyeglasses at home because she thought they made her look “like a dead fish.” When she wanted to look nice, she put on jewelry she had acquired as a young woman, using safety pins to expand the necklace chains so they fit.
Smelling of sweat and vinegar, her brown hair in disarray, Larraine stepped into the office, wringing the yellow paper like a dishrag. After a brisk exchange, Tobin led Larraine outside and called after Susie.
“Susie? Susie!” Tobin yelled.
“What, Tobin?”
“Take her to the bank, will ya? She’s gonna get some money for the rent.”
“Come on,” Susie said, stepping briskly to her car.
When Susie returned with Larraine, Tobin was in the office, shuffling through papers. “How much?” he asked Susie.
“I have four hundred,” Larraine answered.
“I’m not calling off the eviction,” Tobin said, still looking at Susie. Larraine owed another $150 for that month.
Larraine just stood there.
Tobin turned to Larraine. “When can you get me the other one fifty?”
“Tonight, okay—”
Tobin cut her off: “Okay. You give it to Susie or Lenny.”
Larraine didn’t have it. She had used $150 of her rent money to pay a defaulted utility bill with the hope of having her gas turned back on. She wanted to take a hot shower, scrub away the smell. She wanted to feel clean, maybe even something closer to pretty, like she used to feel when she danced on tables for men, back when her daughters were babies. She wanted the water to soothe the pain of her fibromyalgia, which she likened to “a million knives” going up her back. She had prescriptions for Lyrica and Celebrex but didn’t always have enough for the copay. Hot water would help. But $150 wasn’t enough. We Energies accepted her money but didn’t turn on her gas. Larraine felt stupid for paying.
Susie made out a receipt on a piece of scrap paper and stapled it to Larraine’s eviction notice. “You should go ask your sister for the rest,” she suggested, picking up the fax machine’s phone and dialing a number she knew by heart. “Yes. Hello? I need to stop an eviction at College Mobile Home Park,” Susie said to the Sheriff’s Office. “For Larraine Jenkins in W46. She took care of her rent.” Office Susie had canceled the sheriff deputies, but Tobin could reactivate them if Larraine didn’t come up with the rest of what she owed.
Larraine sulked back to her trailer. It was so hot inside that she thought lukewarm water might run in the shower. She didn’t turn on the fan; fans made her dizzy. She didn’t open a window. She just sat on the couch. She called a few local agencies. After several unsuccessful tries, she said blankly to the floor, “I can’t think of anything else.” Larraine lay down on the couch, tried to ignore the heat, and slept.
4.
A BEAUTIFUL COLLECTION