FRANKLIN COUNTY, Ohio — Residents at yet another central Ohio apartment complex are being forced out because of dangerous living conditions. This time, it's the Galloway Village Apartments in Prairie Township, just west of Columbus.
Prairie Township spent more than $100,000 last year to have trash hauled from the apartment complex because the owners stopped paying for trash removal. Additionally, the sheriff's office was called to the complex more than 400 times last year. Those are just a few of the reasons this complex has been considered a nuisance.
“Now, they don't do anything. You walk out into the hallway, there's garbage in the hallways, there's mold in the hallways. There's homeless people coming in,” said resident Michael Hill Jr.
Hill has lived at Galloway Village Apartments for two years and can't wait to move out.
“It's become an unsafe and unsanitized complex,” he said.
For more than a year, Prairie Township has tried working with the owners on repairs and cleaning up overflowing dumpsters but hasn't had much luck.
“Recently all the certified mail that we send over there gets returned and just says rejected on it,” said Prairie Township Administrator James Jewell.
10TV reached out to the apartment's management but did not hear back.
“When our crews are cleaning the trash up there's lice, there are bedbugs, there are needles, rodents. Even though our crews wear the proper PPE, there's still, anything can happen,” Jewell said.
For the residents of the 350 apartments, the township has tried to maintain some of the property. Jewell said the empty apartments are continuously broken into, causing more issues for legally paying residents.
“Everything from exposed wires, holes through the walls. Fire conditions are ridiculous. There's drug paraphernalia everywhere and human feces,” Jewell said.
With help from the county, Prairie Township is now stepping in and closing the complex down and helping current residents, like Hill, find new places to live.
Hill is thankful for the help.
“I'm very happy that they are because I was to the point where I don't even want to be there,” Hill said.
Once they are served, the complex owners will have 20 days to ask for a public hearing. If they don't respond, in 30 days the board of trustees will vote on what happens next with the complex.