My husband, I and my 10-month old boy live in a rent stabalized apartment. We have pigeons nesting, a dead, rotting pigeon, and feces in our back windows. We can not open any of the windows in the rear of the apartment. I sent the LL a certified letter 6/17/02 stating that we wanted the area cleaned. He did nothing so we filed a formal complaint with DHCR. DHCR sent back our complaint stating that this matter should be handled by the Department of Health, not DHCR (even though they said differently before we filed the complaint). Anyway, I have contacted the Department of Health and hope that they will send someone here. Can we/should we be withholding our rent at this point? My feeling is that we should but we are also trying to find a place to move to (can't take it any more) and I am concerned that if we withhold rent we will have problems with our credit report (which is sqeaky clean). Thanks for your help.
Lori