As temperatures plunged deep into winter territory, thousands of New Yorkers found themselves fighting the cold inside their own homes — and flooding the city with desperate pleas for help.
According to the New York Post, in January 2026 alone, residents placed roughly 80,000 calls to the city’s 311 system reporting a lack of heat or hot water, the highest monthly total ever recorded.
The surge came during a brutal cold snap and has fueled mounting anger from tenants who say city leadership, including Mayor Zohran Mamdani, failed to respond with urgency.
Across neighborhoods from Brooklyn to Queens and inside public housing developments, tenants described days — and in some cases weeks — without reliable heat, forcing them into extreme measures just to stay warm.
In Williamsburg, tenant Alex Hughes said conditions in his building deteriorated to the point that he temporarily moved out.
“We’ve had over 40 days of no hot water over the last 11 months. And we’re now on day eight or nine straight of no hot water,” Hughes told The Post. “I had to walk 15 minutes in the snow and ice to a friend’s house so I could shower.”
In Astoria, Queens, city planner Nicole Pavez said her building’s unreliable heating system collapsed entirely during the cold snap.
“For the last week, the heat has been going out almost every night,” Pavez said. “You wake up in the middle of the night freezing, and there’s nothing you can do except layer up and wait.”
Pavez said the outages often happen overnight, when enforcement is weakest.
“They’ll turn the heat on sporadically during the day, but then it shuts off at night,” she said. “The last several nights, it’s gone off around midnight and doesn’t come back until morning.”
She added that she relies on blankets and space heaters despite safety concerns.
“Sometimes I turn the space heater on even though it stresses me out,” Pavez said. “You’re constantly weighing staying warm against the risk.”
Public housing residents say the crisis has been just as severe. Malik Williams, 27, who lives at the Lehman Houses, said his apartment went most of January without heat.
“Last month, we didn’t have any heat,” Williams told The Post. “We had to boil water on the stove just to keep the house warm. We also bought portable heaters.”
Heat was restored late in the month, with officials blaming a blizzard. “They just reimbursed us by turning the heat back on,” Williams said.
Citywide data shows about 215,045 heat-related complaints have been logged since Oct. 1, already surpassing last winter’s total. The spike comes as Mamdani has promoted new tenant protection initiatives and appointed housing activist Cea Weaver as tenant protection czar.
But critics argue enforcement gaps remain glaring, especially overnight. Pavez said those gaps make accountability nearly impossible.
“The unfortunate thing with HPD is that they’re not available to do checks in the middle of the night,” she said.
City officials say enforcement is ongoing. A Housing Preservation and Development source said roughly 12,000 complaints have been closed since Jan. 22, a fraction of January’s total.
For many tenants, moving is not an option.
“My rent is $3,600, but equal apartments are $5,500, $6,000, $6,500,” Hughes said. “I can’t afford to move.”
As freezing conditions persist, tenants across the city say the record-breaking complaints reflect not just weather, but a system failing when New Yorkers need it most.
