The Jones family has been living in an apartment complex for almost ten years.
They have been good tenants and have been late with their rent once. The
apartment has not been painted or the carpet changed within those ten years. When
the Jones moved in, they had a dog and two cats. They were told the dog had to go but,
the cats were ok.
The apartment complex over the past ten years has had over ten managers and each manager
knew about the Jones' cats. In those ten years, tile has come off the kitchen floor. The
tile in the bathroom is up and curled over, the bathtub has been slathered with
something almost every year to keep it from leaking on the tenants below and the smoke detector
is hanging by the wires. In those ten years the heating system has never worked, in fact
causing the smoke detector to go off when it is turned on.
Mrs. Jones was putting away dishes from out of the dishwasher, she stepped back from
the level floor into the section that had no tile and her back popped, causing pain and
numbness in her left leg. This transpired in 2006, it is now 2007. The Jones family wants
the apartment repaired. The manager agreed telling the family they would have to move their
belongings out and find a place to stay for five days. Which wasn't possible, because of
finances (if they could have afforded that they would have moved in the first place) and it
just plain didn't make sense.
There were three apartments available in the same complex, one right across the hall. The
manager was asked if the family could move into another apartment and they could go ahead and
repair the old one (which made sense). The manager said she would have to talk to the regional
manager.
When the manager was asked if the move was ok, the Family was told no because they had cats.
Now mind you, it is ok for them to stay in the apartment that needs repairs and pay rent and,
keep their cats. They have never been asked to get rid of the animals.
The manager decided to set up a day for the floor to be repaired, that means the Jones family
will have to put some of their belongings on the patio, for how long? No one knows.
When she was told it would have made better sense if they'd let them move to another apartment,
she replied they couldn't allow the family to move to another apartment with the cats, they
had a no pet policy...
