Maitri hospice is suing the AIDS Healthcare Foundation, claiming that the Los Angeles-based nonprofit hasn’t paid the rent for one of its Out of the Closet thrift store locations since August 2013.
Maitri, the San Francisco agency that provides 24-hour residential care to people living with AIDS, has rented space to AHF at 100 Church Street for more than a decade. The foundation uses the space, which is adjacent to Maitri, for the thrift store, a pharmacy, and other services.
Through its civil complaint, filed in October in San Francisco Superior Court, Maitri seeks “unlimited” damages over $25,000 for failure to pay rent, failure to negotiate in good faith, and other causes.
AHF filed a response in December, denying Maitri’s allegations and denying that the hospice “sustained or will sustain damages … at all.”
In an interview last week, Maitri Executive Director Michael Smithwick expressed support for AHF’s work but said, “The rent revenue we receive on that space is almost 10 percent of our total revenue, so for an organization of our size, that’s significant, and it certainly creates challenges.”
Prompted by AIDS activist and blogger Michael Petrelis, AHF recently released its tax documents, which show that the foundation’s budget for the most recently completed fiscal year was $164,870,149.
Read more at the Bay Area Reporter
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