On Saturday night, July 25, 2026, the Monitor was notified by a tenant of the Village Place Apartments (located at 602 East 5th Street) that her apartment building had been without water since Thursday. The tenant said that the property management company, DW Jones, had informed tenants that the issue would not be resolved until sometime next week. Instead of offering residents water and portable toilets, they taped a sign to the door which read:
ATTENTION–UPDATE
WATER WILL CONTINUE TO BE TURNED OFF TO THE BUILDING DUE TO AN ACTIVE WATER LEAK.
WE ARE WORKING TO RESOLVE THE ISSUE. WATER WILL REMAIN OFF UNTIL THE SITUATION IS LOCATED AND RESOLVED.
I learned that the problem was first discovered when Jeff, who lives on the first floor, noticed water leaking from the light fixture in his kitchen. He called the property manager’s emergency number and a plumber came out to investigate. The plumber then called A. G. O’Brien Plumbing & Heating Co. to request an inspection.
Jeff told me over the phone that he had lived in Village Place for 15 years, and that he was getting by, because he had filled 5-gallon buckets of water at his daughter’s house, which he was using to fill his toilet tank and wash his dishes. He was not happy with DW Jones. “They didn’t say anything to anybody. They left little notes on the doors … We have handicapped people that live here. You know, it’s difficult. They just don’t care.”
When I visited the 55-unit apartment building on Sunday, July 26, the weather was humid and the thermometer in my van reported that it was 90 degrees outside. I spoke with several tenants. Everyone was frustrated, and many occupants expressed concern for the children and disabled tenants who lived in their building.
“I’m super fortunate that I had a couple gallons [of water] in the refrigerator,” Charlie told me. “They provided us with no drinking water. A couple of the neighbors went into town and bought cases of water and set it there for us to grab, but those were tenants of the building … I love living here, but this is inexcusable.”
Wheeling a cooler behind her, Trudy approached the door and said, “It sucks. I’m hauling water home from work [at Speedway, across the street], so luckily I don’t have to go far. One of our neighbors left a case of water down here.”
“Three cases,” said Mike. “We called the fire department. We called the police department. Nobody brought water. They said it’s our problem—we gotta deal with it ourselves. This is ridiculous. They should have somebody here addressing it this weekend.”
“I want to take a shower,” said Trudy. “They should have been fixing it Friday.”
“I go to my friend’s house to shower and do all that stuff, but I just feel bad for the families that live here and don’t have somewhere else to go,” said Caitlyn. “I just went and bought water at Walmart today to finally do my dishes.”
“I can’t use the dishwasher,” said Scott. “I’m on cancer treatment, so I’ve got a feeding tube. I can’t use the dishwasher to sterilize a lot of stuff that I need—syringes that I clean the tube with and stuff. It’s a real health hazard. I go to my sister’s house. There’s people in wheelchairs here. I don’t know if they have any place to go.”
“It sucks,” said Denise. “You can’t take a shower when you’re coming off of work—you can’t go in and say, ‘Hey! Shower!’, you know what I’m saying? … The landlord sucks. You can put that in there. They suck bad. They don’t care … I have to go all the way over to the West End to take a shower at a friend’s house.”
“It is annoying,” said Derek. “Thankfully, I have family in town and I’ve been able to get up to their place to get some basic hygiene done, but there’s been no potable water provided. Absolutely no communication beyond, literally, two fliers, only one of which was given to me—and even that was just posted on my door.”
After I left, another tenant, Anthony, texted me the following:
No one has been here working on the problem all weekend. No sign of when it will be fixed. The apartment offers no water, hotel, or anything. I literally stink at work really bad right now—haven’t showered … I had an accident on my bike yesterday and I can’t even clean my wounds.
When I contacted Chris Adatte, A.G. O’Brien’s owner, to see if more information was available for the residents, he texted me the following:
We were called late Thursday and sent someone out Friday to take a look at everything. There is a leak in a waste stack, so the staff had to shut off water until it was found and repaired. We are returning back Monday, per their request.
Adatte invited me to visit his office on Monday, to get information directly from the technicians working on the issue.
A voicemail left at the offices of DW Jones did not receive a response as of press time.
