BY ROSE ADAMS
At least a dozen homes in
Brighton Beach have been
without water for 35 days after
a waterline broke underneath
a neighboring property
— and the owner has
refused to let anyone come
and fix it.
“What people are going
through are absolutely
ridiculous,” said Razwan
Mirza, a bungalow owner
on Brighton Third Place between
Ocean View Avenue
and Brighton Third Street,
who has been without water
for over a month.
The Department of Environmental
Protection
turned off the water to the
bungalow-lined alleyway on
Sept. 16 after one house reported
a leak, according to
Mirza. Neighbors pitched
in to fund the $7,000 repair
tab to that pipe, but soon
discovered a leak stemming
COURIER L 28 IFE, OCT. 25-31, 2019
from a waterline that
ran beneath another house
— and the owner has since
blocked plumbers from entering
their backyard to repair
the rupture, according
to a neighbor.
“They’re not granting
us access,” said Audrey
Gartner, another bungalow
owner.
Locals suspect that the
resistant homeowners are
hooked up to a different waterline
— meaning they still
have running water — and
that they may be resisting
the investigation because
they have unauthorized
water pipes that they don’t
want city officials to find.
“I think it’s an illegal
hookup,” Gartner said.
The uncooperative homeowners
did not respond to
a request for comment.
Residents suffering
through the drought have
also turned to the city seeking
relief, saying its outrageous
for officials to allow
one obstinate homeowner to
deprive them of one of life’s
essential ingredients.
“DEP should be responsible
for this. This line has
been there for 100 years,”
Mirza said.
But a DEP spokesman
claimed that the agency
isn’t responsible for the repair
because the leak is on a
private line that all the bungalows’
owners collectively
own, meaning that they’re
responsible for making the
fix.
Now, homeowners are
making do by buying packs
of bottled water every day
or filling up garbage cans
with water from nearby hydrants,
Mirza said. One homeowner
and her parents,
brothers, and his family,
were forced to move from
NO WATER: Oscar Sotto’s Brighton Beach home has been without water
for weeks Photo by Derrick Watterson
their two-family house in
Brighton Beach to her other
brother’s apartment.
“We literally cried,” said
Salina Bhuiyan. “I can’t
take it anymore.”
She added that the price
of the fixes are beyond her
budget — and the budget of
many of the bungalows’ lowincome,
immigrant residents.
“I’m under so much debt
already,” she said.
TAPPED OUT!
Brighton Beach residents claim neighbor
has left them without water for weeks