STEUBENVILLE — Attorneys representing residents of the Heritage Place affordable living complex in downtown Steubenville said gas and electric service in common areas has been fully restored, though questions remain about why it was out in the first place.

Legal Aid of Southeastern Ohio Attorneys Kristen Lewis and Alexandra Vance said they were told during a private, 30-minute meeting with Heritage Place’s legal counsel, Kristopher Haught, and Jefferson Common Pleas Judge Joseph Bruzzese that the outage was due to bills that weren’t paid after the owner, WG-Heritage Place Ohio, switched property management companies several months ago after coming under fire for the same residents not having heat in their apartments since at least the first of December.

Each tenant has their own electrical account, so the lights still worked in their individual apartments. Common areas, however, were dark, which meant that required “exit” lighting to guide residents out in the event of an emergency were out as well.

“Somebody didn’t get the bill, somebody didn’t pay the bill until tenants brought it to their attention,” Lewis said. “That’s the explanation we were given, that when management was transferred (to the new company) the bills did not transfer. But if you’re dealing `with a professional management company that does this kind of thing routinely, it begs reason that they wouldn’t ask for the bills to transfer, too. Whether that was actually the reason we don’t know.”

Lewis said she can’t explain why service in the other two Heritage Place buildings was restored within hours while residents living in the two buildings in question had to wait until Thursday afternoon.

“It sounds like there may have been multiple accounts for the electric and the gas service,” she said. “It may be dependent on the building. But…that is not fully explained with the information that we have so far.”

But she also pointed out it’s not the first time bills at Heritage Place have gone unpaid: In prior court filings, tenants had complained that over the past two years the complex lost water and trash service several times “because the landlord forgot to pay the bill.”

Lewis said over the years the owners have a “history…of failure to pay their bills.”

“They keep changing management companies and then blaming it on the management companies,” she said. “But the one constant is the owner.”

Lewis said they plan to file a motion no later than Monday asking Judge Joseph Bruzzese to put the complex into receivership to ensure it doesn’t happen again.

“If the court grants our motion, a receiver would be appointed to be in charge of the funds and make sure the bills are all paid and the property is maintained,” she said.