Open Windows, Doors At Worcester Public Housing Complex Infuriate Some
WORCESTER (CBS) - We all know how expensive it is to heat our homes.
Energy experts will tell you to seal all cracks and make sure your windows are air tight to save every dollar.
With that in mind, real estate agent Sue Meola got fed up recently while driving through a public housing complex in Worcester on a frigid February day.
WBZ-TV's Joe Shortsleeve reports
"It was not just one day, it was about five weeks every morning. I am driving thru and the doors are open - wide open - and it incensed me," she told WBZ-TV.
And the temperature the day she got boiling mad was a bitter 26 degrees.
She took pictures and she emailed them to WBZ.
They do show open doors, one after another, and open windows at the Curtis Apartments in Worcester.
"If they were paying for the heat themselves I would not have any problem with it, but the taxpayers are paying for it!" Meola said.
The average bill in New England for home heating oil heat last year was $2,500. That is up 45-percent over the past two years.
WBZ went out to the Curtis Apartments recently on another cold winter day and, sure enough, we found exactly what Sue Meola found - a significant number of doors and windows wide open.
Craig Leslie is the property manager for the Curtis Apartments.
"In some cases, people prop open doors and I do not like it any more than anyone else," he said.
The Worcester Housing Authority says open doors and windows are a problem, but a recently installed a state of the art $15 million heating system - even with things wide open - is saving taxpayers roughly $20,000 each winter month.
But Leslie admits they could be saving more.
"You have the seen the Department of Energy ads. You open up a window and you can see change going out the window. Any parcel of air that is heated and you lose it, that represents value," he said.
The new heating system has already saved taxpayers $160,000 year-to-year.
Nonetheless, the authority works hard to make sure all doors are closed and they were the second time WBZ was there.
Another complicating factor is that residents don't have thermostats.
The buildings in the complex are kept at a constant temperature.
That means the only way they can cool their unit is - you guessed it - by opening the window.
