JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – Nearly a dozen tenants of a local mobile home park are sharing their concerns over unusually high water bills after the News4JAX I-TEAM reported the case of a disabled veteran who was being threatened with eviction if she didn’t pay a $2,200 water bill.
Several residents at the Three Seasons Mobile Home Park off Collins Road said they have also been forced to pay outrageous water bills in fear of being evicted.
One of the residents, who didn’t want to be identified for fear of retaliation from the property managers, said they have been receiving these high water bills for years. The residents pay their landlord at the mobile home park, who in turn pays JEA.
Now, the tenants are questioning what is going on.
“This is not normal, you don’t have a high school diploma to know something is not right with the water bill,” one of the tenants said.
Three Seasons tenant Kelly O’Neil was the first to bring the issue to the I-TEAM after her bill ballooned from an average of $30 a month to $679 in July, and then $1,796 for water in August.
“Yeah, I can’t buy groceries because of the amount of money that I had to pay for water,” O’Neil said.
O’Neil said both Roto-Rooter and David Gray Plumbing inspected her water lines for leaks and the water meter for a malfunction. The plumbing companies found nothing out of the ordinary with either. O’Neil said she ended up paying Three Seasons Mobile Home Park more than $2,200 because they threatened to evict her.
“I want them to find the leak, resolve the problem and give me my money back,” O’Neil said.
When the property manager saw News4JAX approaching to ask them questions on Tuesday, they slammed the door and locked it, and refused to provide an explanation about the alleged leaks, and they didn’t tell their side of the story again on Wednesday.
But tenants of Three Seasons are flooding the I-TEAM with emails.
“Just last month a very sick and elderly lady and her daughter were basically forced to sell their trailer or lose it to the park, due to an outrageous water bill over $1,000. They tried to work with the park and make payments but the park refused and told them they had to pay in full or get out. They ended up being forced to sell the trailer,” one of them wrote.
“Every time the park has a water issue, and loses tons of water, they turn on the people that live here and try to make them pay for their mistakes instead of paying for it,” another tenant wrote.
JEA issued a statement about mobile home park:
“JEA has reviewed utility records that supplies water to Three Season Mobile Park property and did not find there were any operational issues or breaks on our side of the pipe in the last two years. JEA does not own or operate the water system inside the park community past the master meter. Note, JEA does not individually meter and bill the residents in this complex; our billing goes to Three Seasons.”