Andy Dwyer has an apartment on one of the upper floors of the Lefcourt Newark Building at 1180 Raymond Boulevard, with an east-facing terrace. The views of Manhattan are one of the reasons he continues to pay $3,600 a month to live in downtown Newark’s best-known Art Deco building, despite all the problems that are happening within it.
But his patience is wearing thin.
“Would you like a glass of water?” asks Dwyer sarcastically, who is holding up a cup with brown-colored liquid inside. “I bathe in this water.”
The water quality is only the tip of the iceberg. The discovery of mold in his unit was so severe that the owner offered him a rent abatement. Leaks and plumbing issues are frequent complaints among neighbors. The basement bowling alley, though it sounds quite luxurious, hasn’t worked for the past five years. Perhaps worst of all, the locks on the front doors of the building’s main entrance don’t work, nor do the security cameras or the buzzer. Last year, a security guard was stabbed while on duty, but the building’s management never alerted tenants or fixed the front door…