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Relief in sight after tenants at Colorado Springs apartment complex go without heat for weeks

space heater

People living inside some of University Village's apartments in Colorado Springs say they have gone without heating since late November.

Blake Garner, who moved into one of the affected buildings a couple of months ago, says he's concerned about the issue as colder temperatures approach.

"We have a 7-month old child in the house and so if it starts getting too cold then we don't really know what we're going to do," he said. "Guess I'll bust out all the electric blankets, maybe."

In a statement to KRDO, the regional property manager Brett Shelton said an underground pipe had collapsed in multiple areas, causing tenants to go without heating in three buildings.

He says they've entered a $100,000 contract with a local plumbing company to install a new pipe, which was custom-made and arrived Friday. The manager says Bullseye Plumbing should be installing the new pipe next week.

"We are very anxious to get our tenants back on the regular heating system before Christmas," Shelton said.

In the meantime, Shannon Rishky says management provided each tenant with a 1,500-watt space heater. But even the supplemental heater can have some issues.

"I was over at my neighbors and she was vacuuming her bedroom with the heater plugged in and it popped the circuit breaker," said Rishky, who has lived at University Village for almost five years.

Garner says sometimes the heater they've been provided with is not enough.

"We've been using our own personal space heater and that's been doing good enough so far, but from what I've experienced it hasn't gotten really too cold just yet," Garner said.

Shelton says they tested the space heaters and were able to keep their test apartments between 66 and 68 degrees throughout the day and night by running them in 1-2 hour intervals three times a day.

"Obviously, we wish this underground collapse of the lines never happened, but we do believe that we have been diligent in taking care of our tenants during this difficult time," Shelton said. "We value their tenancy and want them to understand that we and Bullseye Plumbing have acted as quickly humanly possible to get the issue resolved.”

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Zachary Aedo

Zach is a reporter for KRDO and Telemundo Surco. Learn more about Zach here.

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