STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. \u2014 A Staten Island mother of two who endured days without heat amid freezing temperatures no longer needs to bundle up inside her own home.<\/p>\n
On Saturday, a 30-year-old resident of 240 Park Hill told the Advance\/SILive.com that she and her daughters, ages 7 and 8, had been living without heat for three days, with temperatures inside her unit dropping into the single digits.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis situation is inhumane, especially with children involved, and it feels like no one is listening,\u201d the resident said. \u201cI\u2019m telling them [maintenance] we are freezing; my daughters are crying all day. We have three pairs of socks on, and we have thermals under pajamas and we have jackets on inside the house because it\u2019s freezing here. I have been boiling hot water so the house can be warm, and still it\u2019s not working. It feels like five degrees or six degrees in here.\u201d<\/p>\n
At the time, a representative from Park Hill\u2019s maintenance office told the Advance\/SILive.com the boiler was being worked on and he didn\u2019t know when it would be fixed.<\/p>\n
The resident said that her heat has since been restored, but that it took multiple calls and complaints to have the issue addressed.<\/p>\n
\u201cDuring that time, my family and I were without proper heat, which was extremely difficult, especially with children in the apartment,\u201d the resident said.<\/p>\n
While the maintenance office previously told the Advance\/SILive.com that the boiler was being worked on, a representative for Progressive Management, which recently assumed management of the eight-building complex, said the boilers remained operational and that there were no widespread heat outages.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe new management team is working to ensure all Park Hill residents have heat. We have been able to keep the boilers up and running during this cold stretch, and there have been no building-wide issues \u2014 we are also going door-to-door checking on temperatures. If any tenant is having heating issues, we encourage tenants to call the management team and we\u2019ll be there in-person to check on your individual unit,” a Progressive Management representative said.<\/p>\n
New owners plan long-term fix<\/p>\n
Loss of heat and hot water have been recurring issues at the Park Hill Apartments for years, leaving hundreds of Staten Islanders to suffer during the cold winter months.<\/p>\n
The longstanding issue, which stems from repeated problems with the buildings\u2019 boiler systems, has left residents out in the cold, at times resorting to boiling pots of water to raise the temperature in their frigid apartments.<\/a><\/p>\n In the past, residents have repeatedly said that the buildings\u2019 former owner, DelShah Capital, refused to fully address the issue, instead opting for cheaper, stopgap measures.<\/p>\n But with a new ownership group now in place, a more permanent solution is on the way.<\/a><\/p>\n