UPDATE: On Friday residents at the Horizon Seniors apartment complex told 8 News Now that the elevator at the complex, which has been out of order since Aug. 30, is working again.
8 News Now reached out to the complex’s attorney to confirm everything was signed and is awaiting a response.
LAS VEGAS (KLAS) — The elevator at the Horizon Seniors apartment complex – which has not been working since Aug. 30, leaving residents like 91-year-old Anna Mathews stranded in their apartments – is one of a growing number of serious problems, documents obtained by the 8 News Now Investigators reveal.
Henderson’s Code Enforcement Division, whose uniformed inspector was at the complex on Equestrian Drive Thursday, provided the 8 News Now Investigators reports from Sept. 6 and Sept. 14 showing multiple violations. A spokesperson from that office said the department was responding to complaints from tenants.
One such violation – a “Substandard Building Assessment” – details issues with water damage to the ceiling and roof of Building 1, where Mathews has lived since 2010. It also indicates that the building has other code violations, which is substantiated in a detailed report outlining several open matters in which the management company, Latitude Property Management of Las Vegas, is non-compliant. Those include matters like emergency exits and zoning violations.
Further, a “Notice of Violation & Order to Correct” from code enforcement says the management company must repair problems resulting from false alarms and immediately repair or replace “defective nonfunctioning emergency backup lighting for emergency egress routes.”
These violations, coupled with residents being unable to get downstairs to use those emergency exits regardless of whether they are properly lit, according to code, leave Mathews a sitting duck.
“I have thought about that,” Mathews said. “If there’s an elevator working, I can get out of here. I have a scooter on the patio. So I can get out of here in a hurry.”
But it is not working, so she would be unable to escape.
“It isn’t the way I want to go, at any age,” she said.
The attorney for the property manager, Terry Moore from the law firm Marquis Aurbach, told the 8 News Now Investigators the management company is working with code enforcement to “promptly” address the violations.
Additionally, Moore said Latitude Property Management offered Mathews a hotel room, offering to pay for a medical service to move her downstairs, but Mathews ultimately refused to be relocated.
Moore said the most recent delay in getting the elevator fixed since an electrical panel shorted out at the end of August is a drywall repair required in order to obtain a signoff from the Henderson Fire Department. He said the elevator should be operational on Friday.
