UPDATE: Upper East Side Building Finally Gets Heat, Hot Water Back
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) -- Residents have had to bundle up in their Upper East Side apartments and use stoves to keep warm. They said not only have they been without heat for days, they also didn't have hot water.
UPDATE (9 p.m. ET): CBS2 has been demanding answers on this story for two days and just before 6 p.m. on Monday, CBS2 got action. Tennants reported they just got their heat and hot water back. The city says they were able to turn it back on by making emergency repairs to the building's boiler.
MORE: Exclusive: UES Residential Building Without Heat For A Week
The Department of Housing and Preservation's emergency repair unit arrived on the scene at the building at 260 E. 72nd St., near Second Avenue late Sunday night and issued more violations for inadequate heat. According to CBS2's Lisa Rozner, the team is now looking to see what emergency repairs need to be done.
After another frigid night in her apartment, Carole Cusa made more calls Monday to Plaza Management to find out when her unit and more than two dozen others will get heat.
"There is no heat. I mean, it's as cold as can be," Cusa said.
Geraldine Czenszak, who is 87, said she is doing everything she can to stay warm.
"It's the worst ever. I've never been so frozen. I had two to three layers of blankets on me," Czenszak said.
Residents were told the boiler is broken, so for the last month a mobile unit on the street was supplying warmth to the building. However, on Wednesday they woke up to frozen air and found out the unit was no longer working. Margery Koen, who has been using a heating pad to sleep, said no one has been back to fix it since Friday.
"That's what's getting me so upset, that nobody's working on it. It's an emergency," Koen said.
On Nov. 1, Plaza Management out of Williamsburg, Brooklyn, took over the rent-stabilized property. On Wednesday, a lawyer for the tenants sent a letter to an executive stating, "They were told by Plaza Management's representative the heat and hot water would be restored immediately," adding this is "egregious and unlawful tenant harassment, intended to force our clients from their homes."
"Nobody told me anything. I could have maybe made other plans, arrangements, to go somewhere else, or, you know, to a relative. But I did not know until I got home," another tenant said.
The mobile boiler remained at the scene Monday morning still not repaired. CBS2's Rozner reported she did see someone come by to check it out, but that person would say what city agency they were from. They could be from the property company, but that company was not returning CBS2's calls or emails.
