Community helps beleaguered landlord

<p>Connie Cook felt little joy this week when her tenant Gwen Smith finally moved out of the converted barn apartment Cook had rented to her 18 months earlier.</p><p>Cook, 66, said she is on the verge of financial ruin after the protracted dispute with her tenant and was distressed at the condition of the rental unit her evicted tenant finally left behind.</p><p>But on Thursday, Cook found her fortunes lifted by total strangers, starting with Mike Joerger, a Santa Rosa carpet cleaner who called around 7:30 a.m., the first in a series of Good Samaritans to reach out and offer help after her story was detailed in The Press Democrat.</p><p>“I am just overwhelmed and very heartened,” Cook said. “It's like one great big massage, a great long hug from these people.”</p><p>It's a welcome turn in depressing story. In February 2009 Cook rented the two-bedroom apartment to Smith without realizing her new tenant's tangled history with landlords and the courts, including eviction cases in Arizona and Wisconsin. Smith has repeatedly denied wrongdoing.</p><p>This week Cook laid eyes on the inside of the apartment she owns and found holes in the wall, ruined carpet and accumulated filth. The damage only added to Cook's mounting financial woes. Another apartment on the property has been vacant for months because the former tenant left amid Cook's dispute with Smith.</p><p>Without rental income, Cook has not been able to pay her mortgage. And repairs cost money. What now?</p><p>Her story touched a nerve and turned from heartbreaking to heartwarming.</p><p>Joerger, who owns Sequoia Carpet Care, said he was so angered when he read her story he looked her up to see what he could do. Something similar happened to him years ago.</p><p>“People have to look out for each other,” he said. ”I just wanted to help her out.”</p><p>Another man offered to powerwash her deck, delaying going to his son's birthday party to complete the chore for free, Cook said.</p><p> A contractor came by to survey the damage, removing nails in the walls and a wood covering from a skylight with plans to return again, she said. He wasn't the only contractor to call and offer his services.</p><p>Maureen Baumgartner volunteered her cleaning skills. She's in the midst of cleaning up after her own former tenants, a process that has cost her $5,000, she said.</p><p>She remembers Cook as a customer years ago at her store “Fine Art & Frame.” They bonded when Cook adopted a tiny feral kitten from her and called back devastated when it died two days later, she said.</p><p>“She's just a dear, compassionate person,” said Baumgartner who planned to finish cleaning her rental house on Friday in time to go to Cook's today.</p><p>“I'm on a roll.”</p>