Heather Detrixhe
Managing Editor
With finals looming, residents of Cougar Place are worried that plumbing work will interfere with their studies.
Since January, University of Houston maintenance crews have been working on the plumbing at Cougar Place. This work requires the water to be shut off for several hours a day, a fact that has some residents upset.
"(I) don't want to be dealing with this so late in the game. With finals (coming), it is just one more hassle. I don't need this," said Mindy Apel, a graduate student in education.
The rooms were originally constructed with extra water lines coming out of the walls so that kitchenettes could be added later. Because of problems with flooding, the pipes are now being recessed into the walls with added valves.
"The pipes are plastic and they stick out, so when students move furniture or hang pictures, they sometimes get torn off and, because there are no shut off valves, the rooms get flooded," said lead plumber for UH maintenance Craig Brodd.
Brodd, who has worked for UH for eight years, noted that several thousands of dollars worth of damage have occurred because of the flooding. "The main reason we're doing this is for the protection of students and their property," he said. "It's not something that we wanted to do, but it's necessary."
Still, some students say they are not pleased with the inconvenience." They let us know a week beforehand at the most," Apel said.
Brodd disagreed. He said residents were notified by telephone and notices were posted around the complex and in their mailboxes one month before the work began. "We did our best to give everyone warning," he said. "If students didn't know, they must not have looked in their mailboxes or been answering their phones."
The construction will continue until May 4, when it will stop until finals are over and most students have moved out for the summer, Brodd said. Until then, work will continue in one building a week, for two weeks each. The water will be shut off between 10 a.m. and 4 p.m. Schedules of what buildings will be affected and when are posted at the Cougar Place commons.