Urban Affairs Unit; Paul Friedman Special, "Heatless Apartments", 1967-02-27

it's bold and reading aloud will not be heard this evening so that we may bring you the following special program by wor the osborne affairs unit this is paul friedman when a cold spell its new york the people it hits hardest are the poor that was the case last week and the buildings in four and eight a manhattan avenue as of last friday when w r dr first learned of the situation these buildings had been without heat and hot water for nine days the boiler serving the two adjacent buildings was in the words of one city official a broken down piece of junk this same boiler had left the same two buildings without heat on an all for twenty one days in january here are the voices of three principles and the situation first was as carmen soto who spent the final days of her pregnancy and her apartment at four manhattan avenue so how long ago did you have your baby and can you tell me what to the doctors at the hospital say our show david

she was born with the us our scheduling call because there was no house will have it so she came out to say that their color next the william j diamond deputy commissioner buildings mr diamond when a boiler breaks down as this one did what steps can the buildings department take suppose you've got a complaint would you do that are we immediately have a complaint inspected and if we determine inspection inspection determines that joe the premises says in need of emergency repair because their lack of essential facilities such as no heat no our gas on no electricity are we will learn our emergency repair division and the city will take measures to immediately remedy the situation basically of course we must rely on ten complaints then we send our inspectors trying to ascertain the condition the

problem is that our inspectors can only ascertain the condition at the time there in the building and it's necessary for us the second level to make a more comprehensive analysis we only have this emergency procedure for what we consider dire emergency support and the danger to well help farmers said we've gone to great lengths to make those a lot of the communication even clear and strong about initiating the way for three thousand civil complaint phone number the problem is that when i want a cold snap occurs how we cannot possibly service or calls that come into that number nor can we expect the risk fast as we'd like to we'd made big improvements but of course there's always room for more improvement third tom o'brian who was a staff member of the strikers bay community action program an organization working to improve conditions in the slums of the upper west side i believe from my experiences it's almost impossible situation under the present structure or the buildings department does hear complaints over the phone

and occasionally they are able to do something about it but i think the foreign aid is one example of how the buildings department and the city structure cannot handle the problems the tenants face in new york city that information there were complaints going back beyond three months and it's only when a crises arises in only when the situation is so bad that political forces step in or the news media steps in at the city the city isn't pressured into doing something they're not doing it because the situation is bad but primarily because if they don't do something about it they will look ahead and that's why something was done about foreign aid says was done primarily because of a person's like yourself and the view of the always

interested in the local district leader friends like the greater involvement has been very involved a long time congressman ryan's office was involved in the phone calls were made to them and some of the other news media were involved so the pressure was on the city from these sources and this is what they this is what they reacted to not to the problem and not to the fact that people were suffering for the background to the situation we talked first on friday for tom o'brian tom what more buildings are affected by this lack of heat for minimum annuity minute <unk> the other buildings are affected with this like economical in how long they've been without heat or hot water what's the present situation has existed for approximately eight or nine days that's been running straight nailed back in january that without heat and hot water for about twenty one days there is one landlord around both his brother's it right is one of the most notorious slum landlords around that i've come across in his name is arnold winner don't

quite a few an assyrian from what i love what i've heard quite a few in the city but anoint quite a few in the city all of them in terrible condition one of the tenants been trying to do to deploy more to provide heat what the tenants and four and eight and some of the buildings are on by this man had been attempting to do it since the beginning of the summer they've been getting together on a regular basis and they've filled out of what we call these substandard housing complaint form smith sent them we sent copies to the buildings of mormonism copies to the winner they've sent copies to the local area services which is a city agency that's set up to handle housing problems they've gone to areas services and requested inspections which they didn't get an internal accounts or the buildings department and request inspections down there and on the first visit they didn't get them was only going down the second visit after promises were made

they get the inspections know what they've also done is they went down last friday to complain about the conditions in foreign aid and had never knew they went down again this week and once again thursday and the people are just about given him given up hope that the city or anybody can do one is happy with the conditions that the building in iowa these people send forms they've gone to the police department to also former buildings department yes that's the first up with any complaints that anybody in the city of new york is told to do it all call up the reward for three thousand which is the city number forty four complaints particularly handle thousands of complaints around lack of heat no hot water and the tenants get together and call called an organized fashion where they would take turns using somebody's phone so they would fall a lot of complaints in on the same buildings and hoping that that way that we get some action i was one of the first apps that they performed say that the internet where

no no nothing has done anything other then they bring up inspectors who go through the building until tell them until everybody else what everybody knows already there's no heat no hot water circle and uncomfortable and here in the building that's the most of the inspectors have been it's a most of the city has done so far the same building one without heat and hot water for twenty one days you say in general a panelist one wonders what finally happened the boy was repaired and it'll move back and work and in the course of the time that they will without heat and hot water the city agencies came rolling in the welfare department made arrangements for the people in the buildings to limit some hotels and i will roll over to the hotels and buses and they lived there until until the oil was fixed and abroad by and unfortunately what happened was some of the pardons have been broken into by some junkies but there are quite a few products in the area the word got around at these buildings were empty and it was just

impossible to keep them shut up completely through the rooms and backyards and back windows some of them were broken into now after a stammer hotel a move back in supposedly the boiler was fixed and that has broken down again now another period with these buildings where there's no heat that's the situation that's right and also in between these two periods when it was no heat and hot water there was no heat and hot water on weekends which is another problem that they've always had people want to have ordered has never been continual a study i hear from one of the people that that was a kiss of the woman who is pregnant during this period of no heat no hot water and she became ill and delivered a child was born with pneumonia is accurate the tri i had i've spoken with one of her neighbors were brought her children in here and what had happened was that the last few days of pregnancy and there was no heat not water and she could call which in

turn fairly effective a baby when the baby was born and it was was born quite ill and her baby still in the hospital now tom you've told me that if these people become frustrated enough they're gonna wanna move and you say that this will be a bad thing in the long run was that i think it's a bad thing because these are people who lived in a building great number is most of their friends are people who live in the building this was a great spirit in and these these two buildings there's a sense of this last thing will just friendliness and the sense of closeness with people problems are other people in the building could help them out and that that's one of the reasons why the people in the building have been attempting to get the problems taking care of what they do just about tossing and talented and start moving out they'll be leaving most likely in the west side which is a neighborhood where they've lived most of their lives in many

cases people come from puerto rico this with that limit ever since that come from pr and i love it here there's a rarified ago and where there is this foreign communities spurred in front of us it's hot states where it's it's unusual because there's great deal of a shifting and moving around but there are quite a few buildings like this where people have lived for a number of years they've gotten to know people have gotten another neighborhood and and they we feel a certain attachment to admit it's their home in this neighborhood is their home and this is one thing which is which we don't see too much evidence that it's the sense of community here at four and eight manhattan avenue the immediate problem is how to keep warm when you walk from the street into the hallway inside for manhattan avenue you feel no difference in the temperature of the apartments were discovered on not very much warmer we talked first with william ramirez and his family live in a second

floor apartment mr maris your apartment years without heat what you the boilers broken down what you doing to try to keep the apartment is warm as possible while lemmings i would try to tell we put that all the wrong foot along the all night long lonely a couple of electric heaters around with one yellow warblers and the b side up a lot of loose lid blew both real forbidden the same but the woman so that you have two children who really just right you have any word on the apartment no have orders and leon bauer and the right now only yet the only caught them i understand that you and the same building had no heat for twenty one days in january separate the spirit of the wright and what happened then it was a somber occasion the bomb and around the world for the bombing in olympia and to below six or seven people to the other my culture seven to force feed them away and we will have to

stand up for the whole night you're there for my right and when you came back was married in your apartment or that the doubling of political will worsen the one that was drying up drawing a lot of field south another carving and then how you're doing the bombing cable agreement and the way the gulf an overseas the hottest oven the central will be in the fire department came over because those dangers the straight wire why did the boyer break down again after only a couple of hours to know well because the boy that the beginning of the ticket but conditions there are a lot of violations had been cracked for long times and a lot of like to build little boy who is to become the fix a castle the mechanic who refused to fix it because it so that the sort of the talk to the landlord about this a lot of times what does he say to you was it like a lot of people were promises when you know when the get the producer as he said it all when you would when you affect the world was nato mailer

was working last night that he came here and now to make a promise that i'll do that first at nothing to be done about it right now he's working on a van thinks it'll be fixed thursday style and the boarded up you told me before that you have spoken to a lot more about two weeks ago and he said he was gonna wait until when to take the boy around and put a new one in and to let sama he was going to wait all through winter and the spring and then when we were mixing the side but in the meantime we suffered in the world because of the cold weather and we have the ball a lot though bloom do everything what the dishes are no big deal it their watch so again we're literally lived is about do you think the people of the buildings department have tried to help you were well as a duo of sight the goal one of the biggest month in a debate in the bombing yesterday he told me that he said they spent billions i mean if they let

their low low billed the boy low for the next i mean what they spent those watching it it can do nothing to live and know that the bill to halt or the rebel brigade me it's that that i've seen in other words as long as the landlord is doing something he can't do anything but the gondola then think that they can know it cannot wait on me in the meantime you've been without heat for how many days this time was in the last three weeks we have it today says you keep your filing good health when i applied to them i bet you can see yourself on my wise but it's at the same message the fish a couple boxes i'd used to going to the hospital we found was a sotto in her sixth floor apartment she was bundled up in three sweaters and complained of a fever and headache so how long ago did you have your baby and can you tell me what to the doctors at the hospital say our show david

she was born with wires that because you got sick and support and esl or scheduling call because there was no loan so she came out to say it very cool and no use <unk> you're hearing is called apartheid we're here in the kitchen you are blowing more and you got the stove on this is the warmest room in my apartment how are you were you in this building during january when it was it without heat for twenty one dares to union which we will then only every night as an ally of the sun and heats up he suffers from asthma as he may hear now in space and then

they do that they move you out a hot out to be a hotel for one night last month lived in mind about them because i was expecting that they you know so some films and one people so to have the chance to move to another part and would you want to do you know grandma do you ever spoken to you what you talked to him about it but they encountered a thing in the family and was his city mario if that's i don't play that he'd face a known for his muslim who is going to win but it hasn't been just a promise as the soldiers dead men realize till it comes to collect this is so you're on welfare didn't your well for inspecting over this was going on yet who came last night and our last monday in it you know about this or did you ask him to do

something and then they kick it came to know how it was no nothing so he called to the daily mail department said that way personally has to quote because you with a name and they have that we have been without one and did you call that they haven't done nothing this is so told us that one tenant had been appointed to act for them and talking to the landlord and the buildings department filing as a service directions we went down the frigid stairwells to apartment to be as sophie i understand that you've been acting as sort of a representative of the tenants here in this building and talking to the buildings department have people the buildings department responded to a pawn of unhelpful when you're trying to get them to hack womack or all of that activity map and patient in the eye as clone one time and they told me that they conduct a boy aloud and in the week i turned to be impossible because of how much how sick

they know what they can do nothing about it was it a dead then the sunday because someone in my navy analyst than half of what was wrong with while on a days he's good to many an acting nominees and the court has affected his innate yes he cried every not be good if you feel so called the us back when i said that when i see and cry you know at crime i said that and nothing to do you've called the building's apartments several times yes i called many times i always cry they please do stunts not buy that you remember and a man you've spoken to intervene only you know were you did you speak to go into farming yesterday when the sentence prompted you to avoid as i tuck does it look like yeah we call a few got to cry every night they say they can do something about it a man waiting away yesterday i walked out on the day before you sell walk on that

landed in tucson to nominate and you tried to talk to my mood not a song for him that i can get him because i got a gamble yes to that winter day did they do that off of the deadliest this dish in the game but actually getting new china bring legal action yes yes do you have a lawyer you do interviews from all because i'm in a year when that's about twelve people anonymity and even a once a victim stepped up their lawyer when joe you don't have very much success trying to get them going to point to do it didn't do it did they do anything like that i cry so many times and an entire does china keep the reporters wanted the stove and so i don't have hot water no not he the other part of the story deals with the buildings department and procedures at five o'clock on friday william tatum assist into buildings mr charles murry told me that he was

generally familiar with the situation and that he would check on the details for me a half hour later you have this information he did meet with tenants during the previous week after that meeting he in the building support and put pressure on the landlord to provide heat when he did not hear from the tendons during the following few days he assumed the landlord had taken action then attendance appeared at his office again on wednesday and thursday and he sent an inspector toured the buildings to check on the situation the inspector found violations and made the recommendation that the city undertaken urgency repairs on the border but the repairs would cost more than two hundred and fifty dollars and sold by law the city had to take three bids from repair companies that meant delay then friday and inspector returned to the buildings and found that the landlord had stripped the boiler and begun repairs this meant that the buildings department could take no further action but repairs could not be finished for a week could the department move the people to warm shelter until that lester tatum said

no unless the situation met certain criteria and the health code for example there must be no water at all and there must be no auxiliary heat these buildings did have cold water and the tenants could use oven heat to keep or so nothing to be done but lester tatum said he would talk to the commissioner and see if the rules can be bent my next thought was to take a while i was in the ramirez apartment i told him of the conditions i had seen he said he was in the commissioner's office and that he and the commissioner were very concerned about the situation they would send inspectors immediately a while later deputy commissioner diamond told the blue rv er that action could be taken if there was an imminent danger to the health of the tenants evidently more information convinced the billings apartment that there was such an eminent danger for around seven thirty friday evening representatives of the buildings department the relocation department and the welfare department appeared on for innate manhattan avenue and offered to take the tenants to the hotel empire there they would stay until the landlord installed a new

border fifteen families elected to go to the hotel so there were two major problems first what could the city do to make sure that the border provided heat of the buildings here's deputy commissioner diamond filed by tom o'brian it appeared that during this period of twenty one days he was being supplied intermittently either emergency repair crews or the landlords contractors were busy at work trying to put the border back in operation so well you'll have heat for a few hours and then you wouldn't have heat at one point the situation went without heat for long enough time to to work was dangerous so the tenants were evacuated and the repairs are made and they were brought back in the building what finally happened was that the border went altogether out of operation and it was necessary to rebuild it from bottom up this is why the tenants are out for a period of five days now at least we're sure that when the job is done it would be done right because we got through that i have to restore

newborn to hear either the department of buildings using emergency repair phones or the landlord and sell i understand exactly what he what commissioner diamond means when he says that it is that once the landlord makes a move and that shows the city officials or shows the georgian port or whoever is questioning him once he says it shows that there's some good faith on his paw or there's some movement towards doing something or whatever be the cases against and that generally generally is dropped for example and in january apparently the landlords to win each show the city to a degree that he was going to do something about the situation there was only one car completely out of hand that the city stepped in again in these in these last nine days from the people without heat and hot the landlord said well he's making arrangements to put new boiler in and so the city says

what you miss nothing we can do the second major problem was when the conditions warrant emergency action by the city to move the people from the unheated building the essential problem here that the department faces in any such situation is does the situation merits its graduation because the condition is such that it will endanger life and health at the time there was he being maintained in many of these apartments with the use of exhilarating heat are wallace is not advisable it was insufficient to work to prevent the situation from the tyranny of the point where records imminent danger to life or health ultimately when it was determined that the war would have to be replaced in four and then another week would go by we are came to the conclusion that the situation cannot go on any further and therefore it was necessary to our vacate those persons who wish to work hotels or other combinations in

foreign aid there were complaints going back beyond three months and it's only when a crises arises and only one the situation is so then that political forces step in or the news media steps in at the city the city isn't pressured into doing something they're not doing it because the situation is bad but primarily because if they don't do something about it they will look bad and that's why something was done about foreign aid if if the people have continued to complain only it was only them will complaining why i doubt very strongly of what happened would've happened what did happen the fact that the city came in and moved on the landlord and got him to two to commit himself to a new boiler when the city came in and help people move

out who wanted to go to hotels in the city to provide other services this was done primarily because a person's like yourself that the view of the always interested in the local district leader friends liked to get her involvement he's been very involved a long time with that with this particular and were in these buildings in other buildings congressman ryan's office was involved in the phone calls were made to them and some of the other news media were involved and so the pressure was on the city from these sources and this is what they this is what they reacted to it not to the problem and not to the fact that people were suffering it it it's just beyond them that they the way the problems are handled just too slow and they're just that just isn't enough that can be done with these kinds of problems that once a landlord shows the city that he's doing something or it makes a statement it is doing something more fees and courtney says the to the judge well look i forty or higher demand is going to something about this

not generally is good enough it's good enough for the official it's good enough for the law deputy commissioner diamond believes that the city is doing a much improved job in situations like this one to this time i must that before there was an emergency repair program in the city of new york used to be used to be no real facilities for taking care of people in this time of crisis this is a tremendous improvement as pro emergency repair program is as i said before is this tremendous improvement over what we have in the past when there was nothing for people to do but even go to relatives or shiver in the cold i think we have saved life in many instances are very happy with the program course i'd like to see it expanded however i think that we're doing yeoman job now in a saving lives and i'm very happy with about the state i would generally agree with what that statement but in terms of what has been done before around

slum housing or terrible conditions and buildings but the present administration in the buildings department and the commissioner says the commission diamond certainly seemed to two to be interested and to be trying to do the best they can with the present machinery that they have personally like merkel comes out publicly many times in favor of tenants and against city departments and certainly against even a lot of his own inspectors in and publicly admitted as much corruption and much chaos going on his own department and says he's out to correct that that this a lot of other things that they've done that shows that there's a real desire on the part of a murder and the buildings department administration to do something and to do something effectively rubbed my own feeling is that is that this this makes it all the harder

to deal with because people see that there are good people that will really trying and they think automatically the problems are being solved or being handled better workers one of some sense of progress of action going on and i don't think this is the case i don't think at the present machinery in the present system can handle the problems that exist in that even though they're a very good man and you know very sincere man trying to to do it i just think it's above and beyond that it's a problem in and just how much the police department and the city administration can do and how much a handsaw tie until some of these problems now begun to be dealt with all of the goodwill on all the good people and the world they just haven't got the machinery and the tools to handle these problems those are the arguments on either side both sides agree that in this day and age it isn't necessary for people to suffer in the cold as the people of foreign aid manhattan avenue did and as thousands do all

over the city meanwhile mrs so and sixty four of her neighbors are large comfortably for the moment at the hotel empire now we're going to need it the promotional brochure for the hotel empire which is located just across the street from glamorous lincoln center says quote you live right on broadway a block from central park a few minutes from radio city a step from the theaters the smart shops and every point of interest all that is the real new york rove also around the empire unquote that is more true now than ever before this is paul friedman good evening paul freedman commentary and reading aloud when i heard this evening so that we could bring you the proceeding special broadcast tonight's presentation was part of the continuing coverage of the newly formed urban affairs unit of riverside radio the value of the euro

is your treated this evening is merely one of many problems confronting the metropolitan community members of the listening audience who wish to bring matters of public concern to our attention are urged to do so if you are similarly in need of emergency assistance with the heat water or electricity in your building called the buildings department emergency number worth forty three thousand vets were for three thousand and to offer other suggestions for the urban affairs unit of w r v e r u michael riverside nine five four hundred riverside nine far four hundred seed