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Milwaukee apartment building evacuated, what's next
Tenants of a Milwaukee apartment building are trying to figure out what's next after the city conducted an emergency safety evacuation on Thursday.
MILWAUKEE - Tenants of a Milwaukee apartment building are trying to figure out what's next after the city conducted an emergency safety evacuation on Thursday.
Apartment building evacuated
The backstory:
The Milwaukee Department of Neighborhood Services described "life safety issues" that included no heat, no water and burst pipes that forced tenants out of the near west side apartment building.
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"It's horrible, it's completely freezing inside our home," said Bianca Rivera, adding that she was without heat for at least four days.
"You could hear the pipes below busting during the night. Like a loud ‘kaboom,’ and that was the pipes bursting below," said Desrea Johnson.
Johnson and Rivera are among the 47 adults and six children who have been displaced.
Milwaukee County records show Berrada Properties owns the building at 29th and Wisconsin. FOX6 News has reached out to Berrada Properties multiple times, and went to the company's office, but has not heard back.
When can tenants return?
What's next:
The apartment building is located in Ald. Sharlen Moore's district. She said the city, with help from the organization Community Advocates, made arrangements to put displaced tenants in a hotel.
"I want to make that explicitly clear. This is something that is not the city or the county's responsibility. Landlords should be responsible and taking care of their property," Moore said.
Tenants have a place to stay for now, but the question is what happens when those resources run out.
Apartment building at 29th and Wisconsin, where residents were forced out due to conditions that included no heat, no water and a burst pipe
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"I don’t know when it's going to be fixed, I don’t know anything about compensation for rent or anything. I have no clue," said Johnson. "Overwhelmed is an understatement."
The city said tenants can only live there again if there is a new certificate of occupancy to reopen for habitation.
Editor's note: FOX6 News translated some quotes from Spanish into English.
The Source: FOX6 News spoke to tenants, heard from city officials and made multiple attempts to contact Berrada Properties.