Residents of a Sunrise apartment building say it’s been a month since they were able to use their elevator, leaving a 97-year-old woman among the elderly stranded inside.
Those affected live in 40 apartments in a four-story building near Sunrise Lakes Boulevard and Northwest 104th Avenue.
Resident María Delfina Quintero Castro is 97 years old.
“I’m asthmatic and every day is worse because I can’t go down. With the elevator, I’d go down to the park; I’d walk with my little chair and now I can’t go down or anything. I’m just locked up in here,” Quintero Castro said. “They told the administrator [about my situation], and his answer was to call the fire department for them to bring me down.”
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The elevator was damaged on Aug. 4, and a note placed on it says a lightning strike disabled the electronics and five circuit boards.
After four weeks, there's no solution in sight.
“It worries me tremendously because I’m a person who’s had heart surgery, so I can’t lift much [up and down the stairs],” Álvaro Recio said.
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Some residents say they've even fallen trying to get down.
“I fell down the stairs… like around three days ago,” María Alvarez said.
Sunrise Property Management responded to an inquiry about the ongoing issue with a statement: "We are relying on our service vendor, TK Elevator, to get these installed as quickly as possible. We have no ETA yet but have been working non stop to get the parts sent and fixed. It is priority One! Being at the mercy of a vendor is very frustrating and upsetting to us."
