SPEEDWAY — Vance Donahue is just about fed up. Every time it rains or snows the sidewalk and courtyard between his apartment and his car turn into a shallow pond and of course in the winter, an ice rink.
"This morning when I went out to go to my appointment at 4:30, the whole sidewalk was ice," Donahue said.
Donahue has a number of medical issues that already make it hard to get around. He said even after maintenance crews shovel the snow, the standing water turns to ice and it makes it dangerous and difficult to get to his doctor's appointments and impossible to bring in his own groceries. He said for the past 10 months he's been complaining about the issue to the management team at the Legend at Speedway apartment complex, but his calls of concern don't seem to do much good.
"I don't want when I call and ask them to call me back to call me three or four days later, that doesn't show that they're trying," Donahue said.
Donahue, who uses a cane or sometimes a walker to get around is not alone in his concern about the path to his apartment. His neighbor, Colleen Kelly, has a lot to say about it.
"I hate it! Water gets under the sidewalks and makes the sidewalks unstable. So that when you walk on them you feel the water bubbling up. I'm a leg amputee, so I feel senses differently than other people do, and I can feel the shifting of the sidewalk," Kelly said.
Both Donahue and Kelly say they know what appears to be a drainage issue isn't a simple fix, but the both say just walking outside of their homes can be scary. They are speaking out now in hopes of sending an even louder message to apartment management.
"I don't want to miss dialysis just because I can't get to the car. But I surely don't want to break a leg, or re-break my shoulder, or worse yet hit my head on something and end up dying," Donahue said.
Donahue says he has been told numerous times the issue would be taken care of.
WRTV reached out to the complex's management team twice today and at one point was told management had already talked with Donahue, but we did not receive a call back with details on plans to fix the problem.
