Parkway Apartments tenant Kayla Moore said she has been complaining of the raw sewage around that Sulphur property since September.

The city of Sulphur and the Department of Environmental Quality began investigating Parkway Apartments, 210 N. Beglis Parkway, earlier this week after Mayor Chris Duncan received a complaint from a tenant that the complex was surrounded by raw sewage.

Duncan said the tenant informed him that raw sewage had been discharged on the grounds around the complex for about five months.

On Monday, city officials gave the complex management 48 hours to resolve the issue. The situation was not fixed by Thursday afternoon and the city issued a citation to the complex that will multiply every day that the issue remains.

Residents were notified Friday morning by a notice on their door that if the problem persisted they would be fined, Moore said.

The notice that tenants received stated that “each time (management has to) call someone to clean our the grease traps or drain line operating costs go up and in-turn will cause rent to increase. As we continue to find excessive grease in the sewer lines we will be forced to issue lease violations to all tenants in the building, which could result in damage charges or lease termination.”

Moore, who has lived in the complex for almost a year, said she has complained to management several times about the sewage around the complex, but nothing was ever done about it.

“Every time we would complain they would say they were going to fix it, but apparently it was never getting fixed,” she said. “Sometimes the smell is worse than others, some days it’s terrible and you can’t walk outside. It’s a health hazard to even walk outside, and our kids have to find somewhere else to play.”

Moore said since moving into the complex finding a manager on the property has been a problem.

“We have a lot of issues with management … it’s hard to get maintenance out here,” she said. “It’s gotten to the point where my husband has to fix things because we can’t get maintenance or management out here.”

Moore said this week is the first week “in a while” that a manager has been on site.

Veronica Allison, District 3 councilwoman, said she’s never received any complaints from Parkway tenants.

“The first I heard about the situation going on out there was when the mayor contacted me about the complaint he got,” she said. “I went out there with the mayor to check it out and see what was going on out there.”

Allison said she plans to keep watch on that area now and if tenants have any other issues they should contact her immediately so city officials can take action.

The DEQ’s investigation is ongoing.

Attempts to contact the property manager were unsuccessful.

The city of Sulphur and the state Department of Environmental Quality are investigating an apartment complex for the illegal discharge of raw sewage. Mayor Chris Duncan said the city was informed by a tenant at Parkway Apartments

210 N. Beglis Parkway