Residents of the Jacob Riis Houses in the East Village want answers.

On Monday, 72 hours after they had been notified that arsenic had been detected in the tap water, they were still being told to not drink from the tap.

Instead, they're using water bottles and taking water out of fire hydrants because that is what is safe for them to drink.

The mayor’s office said testing on Sunday and Monday showed no arsenic in the water. But a city spokesperson on Monday night said they’re awaiting the results of more tests before giving the all clear for residents to drink the tap water.

The 2,600 people who live at the Jacob Riis apartment complex have been dealing with this crisis since Friday.

“I’m so scared,” said Monique Morsi, who lives in the complex with her two kids. “My kids, they said we can’t trust. They said, ‘Mom, we can’t trust now. How can we use the water later?’”

Drinking a lot of water with arsenic can cause nausea and dehydration. And over a long period of time, it can even cause cancer.

“We was washing up in this water. We was cooking in this water. It was a lot of stuff we was doing in this water,” resident Tashaka Owens said.

Owens said she drank the tap water before they knew it was contaminated. That’s why she said when she wasn’t feeling well Sunday, she went straight to the emergency room.

“I was scared because I was throwing up a lot,” Owens told NY1. She said the doctors couldn’t pinpoint why she was sick and what caused it.

The city has provided over 8,000 bottles of water on site. Some residents say they appreciate the effort, but they just want their water to be safe again.

Many are untrusting of NYCHA after a report on Friday from our editorial partner “The City” said NYCHA knew of the contaminated water for two weeks, but failed to alert residents right away.

NYCHA denied the reporting, saying residents were notified when they found out this past Friday.