AURORA, Colo. — Tenants at an Aurora apartment building reached out to the FOX31 Denver Problem Solvers after going without hot water for more than a week and they say it’s just the latest in a series of issues.
Georgene Zimmerman has been forced to heat water on her stove for the past 10 days in order to take a bath at her apartment.
Zimmerman lives in one of several buildings that make up The Courtyards at Buckley. She says everyone in her building has been dealing with the same problem.
“It’s a hell to live in here,” her neighbor Sanjuana Ramirez said. “It’s terrible.”
Ramirez has lived in the building for less than a year but says she has encountered several problems that have yet to receive a response from management.
“They don’t do nothing,” Ramirez said. “We complain and they don’t care.”
Zimmerman agrees. She said she’s still waiting for someone to examine the mold she believes she found above her shower. She also has several unfinished projects, and in May, she said the entire building also lost heat for more than three weeks.
“When I complained, they brought up a little space heater that had a short in it,” Zimmerman said. “I was afraid to use it.”
Residents lost their hot water Saturday. After three days without a response from management, Zimmerman went to Aurora code enforcement.
“Code enforcement informed the management that they had to inform the residents what was going on,” Zimmerman said.
Tenants received a letter two days later saying the boiler was being replaced and that a temporary system would return hot water on June 12.
“This is the 16th and we still don’t have hot water,” Zimmerman said.
In the meantime, management has offered few answers and fewer accommodations.
“They say, ‘No, we’re not reimbursing money for nothing,’” Ramirez said.
But management did respond quickly as soon as it learned FOX31 was paying a visit.
Maintenance crews were sent to Zimmerman’s apartment. They tried to tell FOX31 to leave. Management later refused to answer questions, saying it was in the process of calling the impacted tenants and “taking care of it.”
The city of Aurora took another complaint about the cold water Tuesday. It said management appears to be moving forward with a fix.
If you are a renter, find information about your rights here.