Justyne Arreola was rushing to class from her Palo Verde apartment when the elevator she was in suddenly dropped – trapping her and another person inside as it fell three stories, then rose again.

When the doors finally opened, she found herself on the sixth floor.

“We all kind of looked at each other, like, … ‘What are we going to do?’” said Arreola, a fourth-year psychology student. “I was shaking; my heart was racing.”

The riders that February day were not hurt but shaken, she said, adding that the elevator’s problems did not end there. Residents of the Palo Verde university apartments said both of their elevators have been out of service for weeks during March and April after reports of drops, unresponsive buttons and water pooling in an elevator shaft.

These incidents followed repeated gas and water shut-offs that affected residents across the building and sometimes recurred for days at a time.

Esha Johal, a third-year political science student and Palo Verde resident, said she learned about the elevator outage when she returned from spring break with her luggage. Her previous knee injury made climbing the six flights of stairs to her floor uncomfortable and discouraged her from leaving her apartment altogether, she added.

“I definitely feel some pain,” Johal said. “But it’s what I have to do to get anywhere.”

Arreola, a former cheerleader, said a lasting knee injury made descending and climbing stairs more difficult – adding that she delayed grocery shopping and laundry runs to avoid carrying items to and from her eighth-floor apartment. Arreola said she also worried that the lack of elevator service could slow down first responders in the event of an emergency in the eight-story building.

A UCLA Housing spokesperson said in an emailed statement that Palo Verde follows the same maintenance protocols as all university-owned apartments, which involves regular inspections, preventative maintenance and urgent repairs if necessary. The statement added that the building stood out because of the “complexity and duration of the elevator repair,” but individualized accommodations – including alternate housing and moving support – had been offered to residents with mobility-related needs.

Monse Flores, a third-year psychology student and Palo Verde resident, said the building has repeatedly shut off elevator, water and gas services since January. She added that residents were given inaccurate repair timeframes from building maintenance and described taking a shower so cold her skin was “literally turning purple” at 9 p.m. the day of a shut-off – even though residents had been told hot water would return by 7:30 p.m.

Johal also said the water in her apartment’s shower had run brown, even after building maintenance had given residents clearance to turn on their taps. A video Johal said she took last month shows tinted water spraying from a handheld showerhead and pooling near the drain of a shower.

Carly Wilson, a fourth-year biology student and Palo Verde resident, said she had reached out to housing staff after noticing her Brita filter was unable to filter out cloudy water in her apartment. Wilson said she believed Housing had dismissed residents who raised concerns instead of communicating with them about construction and repairs.

“He (a Housing staffer) says that that’s just what happens after construction, and if you run the tap, it goes away,” Wilson added. “But we run it for hours and it doesn’t go away.”

Arreola said a water shut-off had prevented her from showering the morning of a job interview and that frequent gas shut-offs made it difficult for her and her roommates to cook in their apartment. She added that it was not financially feasible to buy meals out each time their stove stopped working or water turned off on short notice.

Becca Jeremias, a third-year psychology student and Palo Verde resident, added that the building had smelled like sewage since winter after water had pooled inside elevator shafts and needed to be drained.

Johal said she and her roommates had been given $150 each from UCLA for the elevator outages, but Arreola said residents had not received any compensation for water or gas shut-offs.

Wilson added that she was told by Housing staff to reach out to an outside repair company if she had questions about elevator repairs instead of contacting the apartment’s management team directly.

“They just told us that they were trying their best and that, unfortunately, it needed to be an outside fix,” Arreola said. “They’re like, ‘Oh, it’s their high priority.’ But they never showed up.”

The UCLA Housing spokesperson said in the statement that although the elevator repairs required “specialized external vendor support,” they expected service to be fully restored in early May. While temporary water and gas shut-offs may continue to occur because of maintenance, UCLA Housing is prioritizing communication and support for apartment residents, according to the statement.

Johal said watching how UCLA handled problems in Palo Verde had encouraged her to consider moving out of her apartment. She added that she was looking at different off-campus apartments for next year and didn’t plan to continue living in university-owned housing.

“I’m one of the (people) that’s on financial aid, so this housing was at a discounted price for me but even that, I don’t think it’s worth it,” Johal said. “I understand there are people that have to go with this option. I feel bad that these are the living conditions they have to be in.”