What is this panel with two 30A breakers for?

Question

I recently newly moved into an apartment in the west Bay Area, in California. Because I have an electric car & want to use L1 (120V 12A) charging, I took a look at the breaker panel to see what circuits were present. Here's what I saw:

I'm no electrician, but my understanding was that 30A breakers aren't allowed on 15/20A receptacles (my apartment has 15A receptacles). Is that correct, why are these breakers 30A, and will this pose any dangers especially if I use it for heavy loads like EV charging?

The apartment was constructed in the 1950s to the best of my knowledge.

Edit: Yeah, the apartment is definitely underpowered by modern standards. It was built all-gas (gas stove, gas oven, gas heating) but did get a normal window AC retrofitted at some later date.

Edit 2: Ok, you all asked for it. Here's a photo of the whole electrical box. As you can tell, it's a fourplex with a separate attached room for washer/dryer hookups.

I have not been able to find another panel beyond this one - I've looked in all interior rooms.

Answer 1

This apartment building needs some serious professional help

Because this is an apartment, what you can touch on your own is very limited, and certainly doesn't extend to what appears to be issues with improperly retrofitted/overfused service equipment, nor to the Fire Protection Eliminated "house panel" serving the shared circuits. (Certainly, 15A receptacles on a 30A circuit would be a Code violation when the building was built!)

You'll need to have the landlord get an electrician in to sort everything out, which may very well involve having to cut power to the entire building, given that the incoming cable from the utility appears to be entering the utility's trough from an unknown point inside the building, not a proper service mast or stub-up.