KEVON FELMINE

Se­nior Re­porter

kevon.felmine@guardian.co.tt

A life­time of over­com­ing cere­bral pal­sy has taught Ar­lene Alexan­der re­silience, but the 56-year-old now fears a re­cur­ring leak in her Hous­ing De­vel­op­ment Cor­po­ra­tion (HDC) apart­ment could one day rob her of the in­de­pen­dence she fought so hard to achieve.

For the past three years, Alexan­der has been wak­ing up to wa­ter seep­ing through her ceil­ing in her ground-floor apart­ment at Ol­era Heights, San Fer­nan­do. The re­cur­ring leak has dam­aged ceil­ing and floor tiles, cup­boards, and ap­pli­ances, while cre­at­ing slip­pery con­di­tions in the kitchen of the home she has oc­cu­pied since 2009.

Born with cere­bral pal­sy, Alexan­der un­der­went mul­ti­ple surg­eries through­out her life to im­prove her mo­bil­i­ty and use of her hands and legs. To­day, she walks with the aid of a walk­er and lives in­de­pen­dent­ly on a dis­abil­i­ty grant.

Dur­ing a vis­it by Guardian Me­dia, wa­ter dam­age was vis­i­ble through­out the apart­ment. Floor tiles had lift­ed, the re­frig­er­a­tor had been pulled away from the wall, and mats were placed across sec­tions of the kitchen floor to ab­sorb wa­ter and pro­vide trac­tion.

Al­though the leak did not cause the foot she broke two years ago, Alexan­der fears the per­sis­tent wa­ter in­tru­sion could lead to an­oth­er se­ri­ous fall.

Cloves were placed at the door­way. Alexan­der said two snakes had en­tered the apart­ment on sep­a­rate oc­ca­sions from the di­rec­tion of San Fer­nan­do Hill, and she was told one was a coral snake. Be­cause of her lim­it­ed mo­bil­i­ty, she re­lies on neigh­bours for as­sis­tance.

Alexan­der said she sur­vives on a dis­abil­i­ty grant and re­ceives no ad­di­tion­al food sup­port. She said much of what she owns was ac­quired through years of sac­ri­fice and care­ful spend­ing.

She said the HDC has re­peat­ed­ly sent plumbers to in­ves­ti­gate the prob­lem af­ter she re­port­ed it. Ac­cord­ing to Alexan­der, they de­ter­mined the wa­ter was com­ing from the apart­ment above hers, but have been un­able to iden­ti­fy the ex­act source of the leak.

“I wasn’t re­al­ly aware of it un­til the plumbers start­ed to come and they looked, think­ing it was a plumb­ing prob­lem in my sink,” she said.

“When I get up in the morn­ing, the place is wet, and I no­ticed that the tiles start­ed to get soft. So I say, I didn’t throw any wa­ter down. So how could the wa­ter just ap­pear?”

Alexan­der said the is­sue re­mains un­re­solved de­spite nu­mer­ous vis­its over the years. She said that af­ter re­port­ing it again last month, she was told she would be ad­vised on the cause of the leak and the pro­posed rem­e­dy, but has not re­ceived an up­date.

“But this is very un­bear­able. Peo­ple come here and see this and ask me how come I’m liv­ing in a con­di­tion like this.”

The prospect of los­ing the in­de­pen­dence she fought to achieve weighs heav­i­ly on her.

“I was born with cere­bral pal­sy. I had a lot of surg­eries, but I still did not let this keep me back. I tried my best to live in­de­pen­dent­ly. It was a very, very tough strug­gle for me to reach this far.”

Alexan­der al­so wor­ries about what pro­longed ex­po­sure to wa­ter could mean for her health and safe­ty. While she has not seen mould, she fears it could even­tu­al­ly de­vel­op.

“Right now, it is haz­ardous.”

“If I don’t put a mat, I am stand­ing up in the wa­ter.”

She said the dan­ger is es­pe­cial­ly con­cern­ing be­cause she re­lies on a walk­er to move around her apart­ment.

“And this is a fear of mine too, be­cause one day I could get up and be mov­ing in the kitchen and be un­aware. I could slip and fall again and dam­age my back.”

“For some­body in my con­di­tion, some­one like me is not sup­posed to have to un­der­go this.”

Alexan­der said the HDC was aware of her dis­abil­i­ty when she was al­lo­cat­ed the ground-floor apart­ment.

She said she feels aban­doned by the lack of progress and be­lieves peo­ple liv­ing with dis­abil­i­ties de­serve greater ur­gency when safe­ty con­cerns arise.

De­spite her frus­tra­tion, Alexan­der said she does not want to move. In­stead, she wants the leak re­paired so she can con­tin­ue liv­ing com­fort­ably in the home she has spent years build­ing.

She al­so be­lieves ad­dress­ing the prob­lem now would be more cost-ef­fec­tive than al­low­ing it to per­sist and po­ten­tial­ly cause more ex­ten­sive dam­age.