COUNCIL BLUFFS, Iowa (KMTV) — A senior apartment building in downtown Council Bluffs had a broken elevator for the better part of two months, but now it's up and running again. Robin Beam spent most of that time in a hotel and she's glad to back in her apartment.
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I'm Southwest Iowa neighborhood reporter Katrina Markel in Council Bluffs, following through on a story I first covered in January.
The older adults who live in the Bennet Building, here behind me, finally have a working elevator after going without for months.
Sometime around New Year's Day a small fire triggered a sprinkler system, which in turn, damaged the Bennett's only working elevator.
That left residents like Donna Beam, who has limited mobility due to her medical conditions, unable to leave their apartments.
After our first story aired the landlord put Beam in a hotel, but she said that wasn't ideal.
"I couldn't go anywhere to get something to eat because everywhere, there was no sidewalks," Beam said.
She could, at least, go to her community center because the van could pull up to the door. So, seven weeks after the elevator broke, it's nice to be back home.
In the meantime, Beam told me, she's looking for an assisted living home because she's worried about the elevator breaking again.
One thing I learned through my reporting is that it's not unusual for it to take a long time to repair an old elevator in a historic building like the Bennet.
