LANSING, Mich — LANSING, Mich. — No longer feeling trapped, tenants at the Porter Apartment complex can now use working elevators after FOX 47's investigation prompted swift action from city officials.
Earlier this week, I reported how tenants felt trapped inside their units because the elevators weren't working. Less than 24 hours after our story aired, I witnessed firsthand that the elevators were fixed.
Making my way to the top floor of the Porter Apartment complex on a recently repaired elevator, I was joined by tenant Luann Shotwell.
"It's actually exciting, very exciting, even though it may just be a little thing," Shotwell said.
The trip to the sixth floor was dramatically different than the one just 24 hours before, when tenants showed me the stairway they were forced to use because elevators had stopped working.
"One elevator had been down for two months, the newer one had been down since Labor Day. There's no assistant in the stair well to get us up and down," one tenant said.
Many of the tenants at the Porter are elderly or disabled, prompting the city to get involved with fixing the issue.
"I also reached out to the mayor and said we need to get this resolved immediately and he agreed," said Council President Ryan Kost.
Kost said he believes the help of the mayor, along with the story we aired, played a role in the elevators getting fixed.
"Your news coverage of it... It was really hard to watch. I mean watching the lady go up with stairs. It was just hard to watch," Kost said.
Hard to watch, but Kost said it needed to be shown because it led to where we are now — tenants feeling a sense of gratitude.
"I really think it was the media outcry that got us where we are today and that's just my opinion," Shotwell said.
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