Area improvements have some worried about homes

Planned changes to an area south of downtown Colorado Springs have some worried about their future living situation.

Mary Schwietzer was one of several tenants that received 30-day move-out notices from their management company On the Ivy.

Their homes are located near South Tejon Street and East Navajo Street. They will be torn down to make room for new developments in the area.

On the Ivy offered to place tenants in other properties it owns, for the same rent price. For most of them, utilities are currently included in the rent, but that wouldn’t be the case in the properties they are being offered. Schwietzer, who currently rents a two-bedroom, said she’s unhappy with what the company offered.

“They want to offer me a one-bedroom for the same price, with utilities, which means I would have to put half my stuff in storage, which could run up to $129 a month, so I’m basically paying more,” she said.

Schwietzer said she’s even more concerned about her elderly neighbors. She said they are disabled and have been living in the area for years, some even decades.

“They’re not going to have a place to go,” she said. “Everybody here is on disability, so I’m kind of looking out for them.”

Those neighbors haven’t received move-out notices, but they will eventually.

“We like to give them a 30-day notice, which is what people usually do, but most of them know that in a year or so. When they moved in they knew it would happen eventually,” property manager Cherie Elsemore said. “A lot of them have been there for years, but I tried to talk to them and tell them they have so much time, and this is just an estimate, but I’m letting them know.”

Elsemore said there are currently no plans for residents who are yet to receive move-out notices to be placed in a different property, but that she is hopeful they can help them find new places when the time comes.

Schwietzer hopes for more.

“I feel like some kickback should happen, like maybe not pay the last rent so you can go out and find a place to live,” she said. “That would be the right thing to do.”