BMHA answers to Common Council over heating issues

In January, we introduced you to Bobbie Spencer, the 70-year-old woman who had been living in a BMHA housing unit without heat for over a week.

Her heat has since been restored, and today, the Buffalo Common Council called BMHA officials, along with officials from Shinda, the property management corporation that manages the properties to their chambers to try to prevent what happened to Spencer from happening again.

During Tuesday's meeting, BMHA admitted they denied Shinda's repair quest for Spencer's townhome because the repair was going to cost $10,000 dollars, and in May her home, including the heating unit, is set to be renovated.

The heating units currently being used at the Fredrick Douglass Townhomes on Jefferson Avenue in Buffalo, where Spencer lives, are obsolete, and replacement parts are no longer available.

BMHA suggested Spencer be moved to another unit instead of completing expensive repairs but Spencer refused and Shinda says they have no other available units with working heating systems, something Buffalo Common Council President Darius Pridgen says is unacceptable.

"If I were a resident of any of these places, I would go to bed at night praying that my unit did not go down. I would go down praying because I don't know what's going to happen in the morning."

The Council tabled the issue and no resolution was reached today, but they have requested the director of the BMHA come to a future meeting to discuss the issue.