ST. LOUIS – An 80-year-old woman has been forced to take drastic measures after water main breaks left her with no working toilets.
“It’s horrible, horrible for me to have to live like this,” Gwendolyn Langston said. “I have to sit on a bucket at 80 years old cause I can’t sit on the toilet.”
Langston has been stuck in this situation for weeks now. The city has been called time and time again, but with no solution.
“(The) water line outside burst when it was cold; it took them three days to come and fix it,” Langston’s son, Jason, said. “They dug a hole in one spot but it was the wrong spot, (so) they made the spot bigger and the street caved down into it.”
Jason said he’s upset that it’s been two weeks dealing with the water when it’s a 10-minute fix.
As FOX 2 reached out to the St. Louis Mayor’s Office, they said in a statement that a contractor is scheduled to start on the repair.
Gwendolyn found it hard to believe, though.
“They don’t care,” she said.
The public utilities crew claims that a collapsed sewer lateral line was the cause of the problem in an update from the mayor’s communications director. They remain unsure if it was due to a water main break or a pre-existing issue.
There are arrangements for the repair, but there is no specific timeline for the project.
“(I feel) hurt at my age; I have to sit on a bucket and that’s bugging me more than anything,” Gwendolyn said.
In an update from the city, the toilets are working again at Langston’s household. She said the job isn’t complete yet but progress has been made.
