INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — The Marion County Health Department has issued an emergency notice violation to the Turtle Creek Apartments for a broken elevator.

One woman living with a disability says she hasn’t left her unit in 18 days because of the issue.

The northside apartment complex is a section eight housing facility. The woman, who chose to remain anonymous out of fear of retaliation, said she chose it because of its emphasis on accessibility.

“There needs to be a way to be able to leave your home and not feel trapped all of the time,” the woman said.

She lives upstairs and relies on a wheelchair to get around. She says her disability already leaves her isolated and the issue is only making it worse.

“I’m missing a doctor’s appointment today because the elevator is broken that I really needed to go to,” she said.

Her husband, who takes care of her, first told her the elevator was broken on March 2. She waited a week to reach out for help, hoping it would be fixed. With a sign still hanging on the elevator’s door, she reached out to the complex for help.

“They said ‘we’re waiting on these parts and these parts are not easy to access, so we’re going to be having to wait at least two weeks for the parts to come in,’” she said.

The Fair Housing Center of Central Indiana says a landlord must either fix the issue impacting a person with a disability or provide other accommodations, like alternative housing or a hotel, even possibly providing delivery service.

The apartment’s parent company told me they’ve been in contact with the company repairing the elevator since it broke down and are working to get the parts as fast as possible.

“We are aware of the inoperable elevator at our community and are working diligently with the elevator company to get the necessary repairs completed as quickly as possible,” the company said. “Our elevator provider sent a technician out to assess for damages the same day it was discovered to be nonfunctioning, and the replacement parts were ordered following that visit. With an estimated 2-3 week lead time on replacement parts, our team has remained in contact with impacted residents and has communicated all known timelines for repairs to a representative of the local fire department. We understand the frustration and impact this situation is having on our residents and are doing all we can to get this resolved immediately.”

“Two weeks rolled around, I didn’t hear anything and I waited until two and a half weeks and I emailed them again, they still never responded to my email about an update,” she said.

She also has safety concerns.

“With the elevator down, I can’t get down the stairs and I’m not going to be, most likely, according to statistics, I’m not going to be seen as even a priority to get me downstairs,” she said.

She tells I-Team 8 when she first emailed the complex several days ago, they said the Indianapolis Fire Department knew about the issue.

The fire department told I-Team 8 Thursday morning they had not been notified yet. A fire marshal came to the complex a few hours later.

In an emergency, it’s important for IFD to know about anyone that isn’t able to get out of the building on their own.

“Last night, there’s tornado warnings, but I couldn’t get down to the ground floor,” she said. “What if there was a tornado? What would I have done?”