Broken elevators force emergency crews to carry man down 11 flights of stairs

REVERE, Mass. -- Responding to a 911 call in one Revere apartment building is an uphill battle.

A man with disabilities on the eleventh floor of 364 Ocean Avenue needed to go to the hospital, but the emergency response was slowed because the only two elevators in the 13-story building didn't work.
Residents tell Boston 25 News that is nothing new.

"The elevators have never both worked at the same time ever. And there’s two elevators," said resident Dianne Bonia.

Bonia is the man's caregiver and lives with him. She says the residents are lucky they haven't had a major emergency yet.

"It's heartbreaking, it's sickening. This is where you got to live," said Bonia.

Emergency crews have responded to the apartment building numerous times to help residents get down the stairs because of the broken elevators. In fact, Deputy Chief Glen Rich tells Boston 25 News reporter Kelly Sullivan it’s an issue that’s been going on for six to eight months.

"It’s stressful on the men, it’s stressful on the patients being carried down that way, but again, we have to deal with whatever we’re facing at the time so we just try to overcome the obstacles we encounter," said Rich.

Boston 25 News made multiple attempts to get in touch with property management from the Carabetta Company - which runs the apartment complexes - in person, and when we did reach someone by phone at the leasing office, they refused to comment.

Boston 25 News received a statement from the Revere mayor's office:

"We are disturbed by the ongoing conditions at the Carabetta apartment complexes on Ocean Avenue and we are flabbergasted by the landlord's inability to properly maintain these properties.

Over the last year, the City of Revere has taken aggressive enforcement action to address the violations at these properties, including a several hundred page administrative order requiring improvements to 364 and 370 Ocean Avenue.

Most troubling of all the violations documented are the persistently malfunctioning elevators, which threaten residents' safety and impose unlivable conditions on those living in the upper floors.

The city, through counsel, is collaborating with state elevator inspectors to have the landlord finally replace the elevators in two buildings. In the meantime, city staff with tremendous help from partners such as CAPIC, Speaker of the House Robert DeLeo's office, Revere City Councillor Ira Novoselsky, the Revere Commission on Disabilities, the Revere Veteran Services Office and Cataldo Ambulance are making every effort to identify and assist residents with particular needs, such as the disabled and elderly, and to connect them with appropriate agencies and social service organizations to relocate them into suitable temporary housing.

The situation is being closely monitored by city staff and our assigned counsel. We will continue to advocate aggressive action against the landlord until the conditions at these buildings are addressed and corrected."

Cox Media Group