Monday, December 27, 2010

Living in Jamaica building is no picnic

From the Daily News:

A rent-stabilized building in Jamaica has become hell on Earth for many of its tenants.

Residents of 88-22 Parsons Blvd. have battled vermin, sporadic heat and moldy apartments - and until yesterday many of the 37 units had little to no water.

The building's water pump was shut down Dec. 12 after a strange noise began emanating from the basement, she said.

The pump controls the water flow in each unit. After it was turned off, tenants on the building's top floors complained their water stream had been reduced to an anemic trickle.

"There's not enough water for the toilet to flush sometimes," said Asahafik Chowdhury, 16, who grew up in the building. "When you're taking a shower, water trickles out. Sometimes the water comes out discolored."

Tenants have complained that the building has been left to deteriorate since it came under new ownership in late 2007. It was bought by five corporations, including the New York Affordable Housing Associates III LLC, said city Department of Finance spokesman Owen Stone.

The facility now has 132 city Department of Housing, Preservation and Development violations. And there are another 24 active Department of Buildings violations against the facility, DOB officials said. This led HPD to sue the owners of the building in May to force them to make repairs.

11 comments:

Anonymous said...

Where did the water in the bucket come from?

Anonymous said...

Why do these people stay there? Find a new place to live if this has been going on for years.

Anonymous said...

Can someone name me one building in NYC (that's not on the upper east side or forest hills etc...) that doesn't have at least 9000 violations?

Anonymous said...

Can someone name me one building in NYC (that's not on the upper east side or forest hills etc...) that doesn't have at least 9000 violations?

QueensZach said...

If they paid a fair rent amount like the rest of us, they would probably get decent basic services. I know I do.

Queens Crapper said...

Ah, blame the victim! This is not a debate about section 8, etc. This is about a conglomerate of landlords who took over a section 8 building and decided not to take care of it. They knew what the rules were and what their income would be.

No excuse for this. If they wanted a market rate rental building, they should have bought one and passed on the "affordable housing" one.

Anonymous said...

yuck, Jamaica is such a dump, too bad it was a decent area in the past, get out of NYC while you still can, its turned into the 3rd world!!!

Anonymous said...

yuck, Jamaica is such a dump, too bad it was a decent area in the past, get out of NYC while you still can, its turned into the 3rd world!!!
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complete with the nasty indians in the picture. those people totally ruined jamaica.

Anonymous said...

Doesn't matter who the owner is. If your operating expenses are greater than the rent income, then guess what, repairs cant happen.

Its a simple mathematical equation, but the tenants never get it. Then again, they probably aren't too smart if they are in that kind of housing in the first place!

Queens Crapper said...

It's not the tenants that have to "get it". The landlords who buy up these places are the ones that need to "get it."

Anonymous said...

you get what you pay for; especially when you want something for nothing.