NewsWest 9
ODESSA - Don Raynor's Odessa apartment has a busted AC and he said management is doing nothing about it. So Raynor, his daughter and fellow neighbors have took to the street for two days with a sign that says, "Springwood Apts. takes my rent, won't fix A.C."
Raynor said it's too hot to be in his single bedroom apartment, but, "the Devil would be comfortable, I think. I pay my rent on time or early every month. I don't make problems here, I go to work every day. I just want my apartment to be livable," Raynor said.
Raynor, who's a single father, felt it was so uninhabitable, that even though he raised his daughter, he had to send her to her mom's place for a few nights.
"Everybody wants the weekend off but maybe they should have made some type of other arrangements if their AC guy was gonna be out of town to handle emergencies like this," Raynor said.
Neighbors told us this isn't the first time something like this has happened.
"You have to beg and beg and beg and beg and practically threaten them to get anything done around here," Michael Harris, another resident at the complex, said.
In Harris' eight years at the apartments, he said he's seen roach problems, delayed repairs and inconsistencies in rent increases across the complex.
NewsWest 9 tried to speak to management we received the following response from an answering service, "The residents are free to say what they want to but she does not have a comment at this time."
The operator also told NewsWest 9 that management said the air conditioning would be fixed as soon as possible.
According to Raynor, the manager had seen him earlier in the day and told him they were trying to get their AC worker in the same day, and that when he got there, he was going to go straight to Raynor's apartment.
"I really hope that something can change, they can at least improve things to make things worth paying the money that people are going to have to pay around here," Harris said.
As of October, Harris will have to pay $850 as opposed to his $675 per month for his upstairs two bedroom, two bath apartment, something he's concerned about since he provides for his disabled wife.
