apartment windows problem

[adrian-turtle.livejournal.com]

I am somewhat less thrilled with my new apartment on Winter Hill than I thought I would be. The biggest problem is that the windows don't close properly. I didn't really notice at first. (My new lease started a month before my old one ran out, so I was moving boxes and stuff before I actually moved my bed and started trying to live here. And then we had that nice warm weather.) I still feel like an idiot for not looking up under the blinds to see that closing the bottom part of the window opens up a big gap at the top. I shudder to think what our gas bill is going to be, and some of the rooms are horribly cold now that winter is back.

When I called the landlord, he said, "Oh, you mean the window in the kitchen and the one in the living room? Yes, the contractor told me about those. I was going to send him over to look at them in a few weeks." (It's not just those 2 windows. It's most of the windows in the apartment.)

Is there anything we can do to get the landlord to pay us back for the gas bill? Or part of the rent? Or our inconvenience while he fixes it properly? (We had a friend come in who knows something about these things, and he thinks it's not a matter of new latches and better weatherstripping, but tearing out the frames and installing them properly. For 16 windows.) It just seems like he did not fulfill his part of the bargain we made when we signed the lease in February, when the windows were still being installed. I realize this is a complicated problem and you nice people are not (generally) qualified to give professional advice.

Is there some organization in Somerville that I can turn to? I went to the Health Division (I think that's what it's called. I was at the Dept of Fire Prevention about another problem, and they pointed me across the hall.) They seem like they could be very helpful for pushing the landlord to correct the problem in April. But the person I talked to said that office doesn't deal with past behavior or financial responsibility, just with getting the problem corrected. Is there another office that does that sort of thing?

Restaurant function rooms

[somerfriend.livejournal.com]

Hello, looking for ideas for restaurants that have function rooms available for private events anywhere in Somerville or Cambridge.   Holding 100 people would be ideal, but looking for any ideas.