photo credit: Noah Abrams/KRCB
Beth Gallock (center) speaks in front of the Woodmark Apartment complex on Bodega 
Avenue in Sebastopol, on Tuesday, 13 January, 2026.

Despite threats of eviction at year's end, residents at the Woodmark Apartment complex in Sebastopol remain, including those who aren't farm workers.

The saga at the 48-unit apartment complex has been simmering since September, when many residents first learned they'd need to either be, or live with a farm worker, or risk eviction.

The situation stems from how the apartment complex got built.

The developers, the Pacific Companies, Aperto Property Management, and the Central Valley Coalition for Affordable Housing applied for a US Department of Agriculture loan to help finance the project.

But it carried strings, requiring the units, deed-restricted so as to be affordable, house a farm worker, whether working, retired or disabled.

When the property management couldn't fill all the units with farm workers and their families; they rented units to others who met the income criteria.

Then, last fall, those households without a farm worker were told they'd need to leave by the end of the year. Some took buyout offers reported to be as much as $10,000; but 14 households stayed, unsure if they'd be forcibly evicted, said Beth Gallock.

"We paid rent [on January 1st] and they accepted our rent in full," Gallock said. "We have been given no information about whether they will take our money, or when they will stop, or when they plan to issue any form of unlawful detainer."

Unlawful detainers are the legal mechanisms for evictions in California.

Gallock is one of the non-farm worker residents at Woodmark, where she lives and cares for her partner, who she said suffers from early on-set dementia.

"Every day, every week is a waiting game," Gallock said. "It's very stressful. It's incredibly stressful...but we are taking that initial acceptance of our rent for January as a good sign."

The City of Sebastopol put a slate of tenant protections in place on a temporary basis to offer some cushion for renters in the city, including the residents at Woodmark at risk of eviction.

The Woodmark residents have also organized a tenants union - a growing organizing strategy in Sonoma County. Gallock, speaking at a Tuesday morning press conference, stressed the unity amongst the remaining residents.

"We are in no way positioning ourselves in opposition to farm workers," Gallock said. "We are joining with farm workers. There are farm worker tenants here whose families have also been harmed because they haven't been provided apartments."

The residents have also brought on an attorney, Anthony Prince with the California Homeless Union, to help navigate the situation.

"We think that that the it's entirely possible to work this out," Prince said. "It seems to me that it's entirely possible for [Woodmark] to continue to be part of the agreement with the USDA."

Sonoma County Supervisor Lynda Hopkins, who represents Sebastopol, has called for an immediate pause on further displacements at the complex, and residents have also turned to state level representatives to aid their case.

Representatives for Aperto Property Management, the Pacific Companies, and Central Valley Coalition for Affordable Housing did not return KRCB's requests for comment before deadline.

Woodmark residents said they've sent a formal demand to the property management and ownership to stop any displacement actions, and extend the existing leases in good faith, without an addendum residents said would fraudulently represent them as farm workers.