Residents: Oil Spill Building Long Problematic

Residents of the 12-story building found by investigators to have caused the oil spill of hundreds of gallons of heating fuel say that ongoing construction in the building's basement may have caused the spill, and complain about unreliable heating conditions and management problems in the building.

Tenant Association president Bill Campbell, who has lived in the building for more than 20 years, says that the is not responsive to tenants and heat went out this winter. 

"Whatever the maintenance consists of, they're not doing it," said Campbell. "Some of them is not maintaining like, if I make a report, they don't do what they're supposed to do - they don't maintain it."

Aside from drafty windows and electrical wiring that flickers upredictably ("the electrical comes on sometime when it shouldn't," he said), he said that heating also went sporadically last winter. "I don't know what month or day, but a few months ago we had that problem," he said. "It was in the winter time, the heat that heats the building disappeared."

A fifth-floor tenant, Tiffany Lightfoot, who lives with her husband and children, said the heat was only just turned off last weekend despite Sunday's 82-degree highs.

"My mother heard the heat come on in the middle of the night, and it was hot out already," she said.

Her husband Jonathan Lightfoot chimed in, "She had the A/C on but it didn't work  because was right over the heater. When they put the oil in there, oh my God, the oil that comes through" he said, referring to the smell.

The NYS Department of Environmental Conservation said the investigation is ongoing, but that until culpability is determined, the state department will be paying for the cleanup efforts.

"We are in contact with the apartment building owners regarding liability and those discussions will be ongoing," said Maureen Wren, spokeswoman for the DEC.

The "responsible party" will eventually foot the cleanup bill, according to County Executive Rob Astorino. It appears that municipal costs of manpower for local labor and overtime, as well as safety crews, will be paid for by local governments. 

Calls to Bronstein Properties, LLC at both their Westchester phone number for residents living at 235 S. Lexington Ave. and their Forest Hills, Queens-based offices were unreturned, along with messages left for principal Scott Silverman, and owner Barry Rudofsky.

Patch contacted the owner, Rudofsky, and his wife, Caryn Bronstein, at their Old Westbury, L.I. home yesterday evening.

Bronstein came to the door after a young teenager answered it, although she spoke through the window next to the door. When asked about the spillage, Bronstein said, "I don't know anything about it." She did confirm that she owned property in the area of the spill,  but initially said she didn't want to comment and ended the interview.

Campbell said he was not aware of any heating oil problems, but he also did not know there had been an active electrical permit with the City of White Plains for the wiring related to sub-metering of apartments.

"There's lots of water leaks, and they have electrical problems at times," he noted, as well as window problems. 

But Jonathan Lightfoot said he had been concerned about the ongoing construction he heard in the basement.

"You can be coming down the elevator and you can feel it, it feels like they're rebuilding the basement when I bring my daughter out to catch the bus. You hear all kinds of banging and stuff," said Lightfoot. "I only go down there to get into my storage bin, but every time I go down they've got construction workers down there."

Campbell, the tenant association president, said he has been a staunch adversary of the building's efforts to raise rent. "How can you ask us to pay more but you give us nothing in return?" he said. "My feelings about my management company now is, we've had three managers since 1990 and none of them have come up to par."

Superintendents at the property refused to speak to Patch, and several calls the management company have not been returned.