Owners of Springfield apartment complex meet deadline due to delay due to broken elevator

SPRINGFIELD, Mo. (KY3) – The owners of Jenny Lind Hall Apartments in Springfield have met their first major deadline with the city of Springfield.

In mid-October, the city issued an emergency injunction, giving Millenia, the owners, until October 31 to prove they were working with contractors to fix a broken elevator. Millenia turned in the paperwork on Thursday afternoon, but not everyone believes this will actually happen.

“I’ll believe it when the elevators are up and running,” Elvester Kennedy said.

Kennedy has been living in a hotel for almost two and a half months because of the broken elevators at Jenny Lind. He is a disabled tenant of the complex.

When the elevators broke down earlier this year, he couldn’t ignore it. He runs the apartment to pay for him to stay in a hotel for the time being. However, Kennedy says he never expected to live anywhere else for so long.

“At first I thought you knew when it first happened, maybe a month, but it was just one thing after another.” Kennedy said.

A statement to KY3 from the city says:

“We have received the contract, which shows that the property owner has contracted with an elevator company to replace both elevators at Jenny Lind Apartments. This lives up to everything the city owed today.”

KY3 asked Kennedy if he believed the owners would continue to comply with the city’s requests? He told us he doesn’t know what to think because he still doesn’t understand why it’s taking so long to make progress.

“When this first happened, they said it would take three to six weeks to resolve. So that should show that they had to follow the rules, but that wasn’t the case,” he said.

The company has a year to complete the repairs and must provide monthly updates. Without an approved inspection within a year, the city could take over the high-rise. If not, the next steps for the apartment complex will be discussed in the city council.

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