Hammond, Indiana building has been without gas, heat for eight days
HAMMOND, Ind. (CBS) -- As the temperature keeps falling, patience is wearing thin at one building in Hammond, Indiana – where there has been no heat, gas, or hot water for eight days.
CBS 2's Sabrina Franza has been trying to track down the person responsible.
When Franza showed up to the apartment building on Webb Street in Hammond – just after she started calling the management company and left multiple voicemails – there seemed to be progress. The maintenance supervisor from Vilgar Property Management was on the scene.
Franza asked why the heat and gas would have been shut off.
Maintenance supervisor Jesus Ramos replied, "To be honest, I don't know."
Management points to NIPSCO – the Northern Indiana Public Service Company.
"NIPSCO hasn't shown up to fix their own leak," Ramos said.
Meanwhile, tenants were stuck just waiting in the cold.
"Having to take showers at other people's houses - it's embarrassing," said Dana Smith.
Smith contacted CBS 2. She is dealing with a tiny space heater management gave her – and now on top of everything else, she has COVID.
She is confined to her building and her balcony, from which she spoke to us.
"We're hungry," Smith said. "I mean, we can't cook on the stove or oven."
NIPSCO told us they shut down the gas after detecting carbon monoxide – but claims they are waiting on management to contact the City of Hammond to inspect the property before they turn the gas back on.
Management has a different story.
"I don't think it's fair, but like I, said we've been trying everyone to get that resolved. We did it we did everything that we needed to," Ramos said. "It was just NIPSCO that it's been giving us the runaround."
Even though Ramos said NIPSCO had not gotten back to them, he claims NIPSCO said they would be back on Friday to check the leak.
We asked NIPSCO, which did not confirm the inforamton, and the city has not responded to our questions about their inspection.
This was the full statement from NIPSCO spokeswoman Wendy Lussier:
"The landlord is responsible for making the necessary repairs, and also is responsible for working with the City of Hammond to obtain an inspection.
"Once an inspection is performed and passed, the process is that City of Hammond then submits that report to NIPSCO's Gas Dispatch Dept. Our Gas Dispatch then immediately schedules gas service personnel to return to the location to restore gas service.
"I do not have confirmation that NIPSCO is pre-scheduled to be at this location tomorrow morning, however we're at the ready to provide further guidance to the landlord if needed regarding next steps to help assist in restoring service to these affected customers as quickly and safely as possible."
