Apartment tenants: Raw sewage overflowing from sinks, homes are unlivable
Some tenants at Forrester Gardens Apartments in Tuscaloosa are fed up and frustrated after they say they’ve had to live with raw sewage backing up into their sinks.
Tina Moore Blair has lived in Forrester Gardens for three years. For the past 13 days, her bathroom sink has been filled with as much as 4 inches of what looks and smells like feces.
“They came in and poured some kind of stuff down my drain and it went to bubbling and it made me real sick,” said Blair.
Blair said she’s covered her bathroom sink with a trash bag to mask the smell enough so she can sleep.
“If y’all can just get me somewhere I can live decently,” Blair said. “I’ll cook for everybody cause I love to cook, but I don’t want to live like an animal. I was homeless for three and a half years. I don’t want to have to live like this paying a bill to stay somewhere.”
After residents’ complaints, the Tuscaloosa branch of the Alabama Department of Public Health closed one of the apartment complex’s buildings, displacing some tenants.
Tuscaloosa District 7 Council Member Cassius Lanier said he’s ready for action.
“It makes me feel disappointed in the property owners,” Lanier said. “It’s showing me that they don’t really care about the tenants who pay them rent. That’s very unfortunate and it’s a bad look on them as property owners. You’re property owners in the city of Tuscaloosa and we are not gonna stand for it.”
According to its website, Forrester Gardens is under new management.
While tenants living in the building shut down by the health department were sent to hotels, others are still stuck in apartments they say are unlivable.
The WVUA 23 News team spoke with Tuscaloosa Fire Chief Randy Smith, who said the fire department and Tuscaloosa Police Department will check in on tenants and take another look at the apartment complex next week to ensure the sewage issue is being addressed.
WVUA 23 News reached out to the leasing office for Forrester Gardens, but they have not yet responded.
