Carbon monoxide kills social housing residents, but HUD does not require detectors

Social housing in ruins and obsolete may pose an even greater risk to the poorest families in the country. Allen Benedict is among thousands of decrepit and dangerous properties of HUD with a backlog of maintenance that he badly needs; Some 10,000 units are lost each year due to an advanced state of disrepair, says HUD. Although the exact cause of the January incident is still under investigation, defective appliances and insufficient ventilation are among the most common causes of fatal carbon monoxide build-up. Even before the tragedy in January, Allen Benedict Court – one of South Carolina's oldest social housing complexes, located less than two miles from the state capitol – was already to be bulldozed and redeveloped, although the project was delayed by a lack of funds.

The rehabilitation of social housing across the country is a gigantic and expensive task. In New York City alone, housing authorities estimated last year that it needed $ 25 billion to fix boiler, elevator, plumbing and other problems. other. But some solutions are much cheaper and simpler: a battery-powered carbon monoxide detector costs only $ 20 and could save lives, public health experts said.

HUD spokesman Brian Sullivan described the deaths of Allen Benedict as a tragedy and said the agency was planning to change the entire building inspection process of the building. HUD, particularly with regard to the new requirements for carbon monoxide. He suggested, however, that focusing on the role of HUD was not wise.

"It's easier to queue up at the federal donkey than to hold housing providers accountable for what's happening in the buildings," he said.

As the owner of Allen Benedict Court, the Columbia Housing Authority had primary responsibility for ensuring the security of the property. In South Carolina, as well as in the city of Columbia, the housing code requires carbon monoxide detectors in bedrooms equipped with fuel burning appliances, including heaters.

After the death in January, Columbia Housing Authority chief Gil Walker announced that he would retire. "Walker made it clear that he was responsible," said Cynthia Hardy, a spokeswoman for the Housing Authority, but Hardy noted that the Housing Authority was working "in partnership with HUD," which gave many times the high rating of property in terms of health and safety.

"The HUD went into our units in 2017 and the carbon monoxide detectors have never been mentioned," Walker said in early February. He said he was not aware that the properties of the authority, including Allen Benedict, were required to have carbon monoxide detectors under local law.

Local surveillance is limited: Colombian officials do not conduct regular health and safety inspections of social housing, which is funded by the federal government. Instead, it is up to the HUD to regularly inspect the properties and does not need carbon monoxide detectors.

HUD "should lead the charge, they should set the standard," said Emily Benfer, a law professor associated with the clinic at Columbia University in New York, who conducts research on health risks related to # 39; environment. "But they are careless and they put people in danger."

How Allen Benedict fell to the water

Johnson and other residents claim to be complaining for months, if not years, of heat-related malfunctions, furnaces, and kilns of the aging Allen Benedict property, built in the 1930s and operating at the same time. natural gas. But without carbon monoxide detectors, residents had no immediate way of knowing that their life was in danger.

Known as the "silent killer", carbon monoxide is colorless, tasteless and odorless. Every year, about 50,000 people in the United States travel to the emergency room due to accidental carbon monoxide poisoning and 430 die from it, according to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention. People exposed to high doses may experience dizziness, nausea, and confusion, but the symptoms may be difficult to recognize and easily misdiagnosed. HUD itself recommends the general public to install carbon monoxide detectors near bedrooms.

HUD says that all properties must comply with national and local laws. But only about half of the states need carbon monoxide detectors, and some only need them when selling the property. And states rely primarily on local governments to enforce housing codes. South Carolina, for example, has updated its fire code in 2016 to require carbon monoxide detectors in homes, but says "it's up to the local law enforcement in the most local buildings, "said Lesia Shannon Kudelka, spokesman for the state government.

In Colombia, as in many other cities, local officials said they had neither the funds nor the staff to conduct regular health and safety inspections.

"Because they're under the auspices of the HUD, we will not inspect them unless they have complaints," said Tameika Isaac Devine, Columbia City Council member and mayor of the city. "We do not have enough code inspectors."

The last time HUD inspected Allen Benedict in September 2017, the complex was brilliantly adopted: 86 points out of 100, a score so high that the property would be two years before the next inspection. The property also received pass marks during the 2011, 2012, 2014 and 2016 HUD inspections. These scores meant that the federal government did not see a problem of sufficient importance to impose immediate coercive measures against Columbia Housing. Authority, a public company.

HUD's inspection reports for Allen Benedict revealed only a small number of health and safety violations on the property, the vast majority of them having been judged to be "not life threatening". During three HUD inspections – in 2014, 2016 and 2017 – the property revealed, among other problems, peeling paint, clogged drains and vegetation overgrown, according to HUD documents obtained through 39, a request under the Freedom of Information Act.

There were few deductions for serious violations – and there was nothing to compensate for the missing carbon monoxide detectors in the building where the two men had died, or elsewhere in the institution, because the HUD did not not needed in the first place.

Multiple deaths, little change

Deaths in Colombia are not an isolated incident. In 2013, a 77-year-old woman died in Greensburg, Pennsylvania, of carbon monoxide poisoning in her HUD-funded studio, which did not have a detector. In 2008, three residents died in a social housing complex in Oklahoma City that did not have detectors either. At least seven other residents of social housing or private housing subsidized by the HUD have died since 2003, including a married couple in McKeesport Pennsylvania and a 61-year-old man in Indiana.

In some cases, deaths from carbon monoxide in low-income housing have resulted in fines or settlements with local housing authorities, but they have also resulted in legislative action: Maryland passed legislation in 2007 requiring CO alarms in newly constructed properties, and then take another step. in April 2018, in all rental units.

At the federal level, however, efforts to strengthen health and safety standards in social housing have been slow. Few concrete steps have been taken in the last two years, according to housing experts and observers.

At present, federal inspectors are looking for damage to water heaters or ventilation systems that can cause carbon monoxide buildup. But federal standards for carbon monoxide are the lowest for public housing owned buildings, such as Allen Benedict: HUD does not require carbon monoxide detector or control of their good functioning in these properties sheltering 1.2 million families. HUD is now considering strengthening CO standards as part of a broader overhaul of a faulty inspection system. But the agency has not made any specific changes to reduce the risks of carbon monoxide.

Section 8 apartments, subsidized by HUD but owned by private owners, are subject to somewhat stricter rules. A 2016 Housing Law passed by Congress states that an "unusable or missing carbon monoxide detector, if any" in the units of Section 8, would be considered a deadly disease that must be resolved immediately .

Industry groups and public health experts claim that the language is complex and incomplete because it does not explicitly require the installation of detectors. "It's so vague," said Arlene Conn, policy analyst at the Public Housing Authorities Directors Association. "If you have to have a CO detector, state it more clearly, otherwise there is confusion."

"Every program is subject to a different program standard, and there are big differences," said Benfer, a law professor at Columbia. "Our country is based on the idea that every life is equal."

But pressure to impose carbon monoxide detectors in all public housing without further investment in improvements would be met by resistance from industry groups, including the Public Housing Authorities Directors Association, which are not in the same position. Oppose the new requirements unless Congress grants more funds. For housing authorities, "it could be if you spent that money and put it in every home, you can not solve a plumbing problem that means they do not have water," he said. Conn. "You may be making horrible choices."

HUD recognizes that its health and safety standards need to be updated to better protect residents: Carbon monoxide detectors are currently required as part of a pilot program for a small percentage of units. section 8.

"We know that carbon monoxide can kill – we know he killed it," HUD spokesman Sullivan said of the deaths in Columbia. "Our examination of this question predates this horrible tragedy."

When asked why the agency was not going faster on the issue, given the potentially fatal consequences, HUD said the pace of change was typical of the agency.

"Things are progressively happening on every topic we've worked on," Sullivan said.

"He does not wake up"

Derrick Roper, 30, lived in a one-storey brick building at Allen Benedict Court, behind one of the property's many swings. He was just a few steps from his apartment at Benedict College, the historically black school where he worked as a housekeeper.

Toddrica Smith, a resident, spoke gently, but was always ready to help his neighbors. "He helped people with their classes, he watched the children." He grew up with so many nephews and nieces that his family nickname was "Brother / Uncle," said his family.

In mid-January, Roper suddenly stopped going to work. The campus police arrived home on January 17 and, when the facility manager opened the door, they found his body on the floor outside the bathroom, according to a report. police report obtained by an affiliate of NBC News.

On leaving Roper's apartment, the building manager learned that Roper's 61-year-old neighbor had also not been seen for several days, police report said. . When the police entered Calvin Witherspoon Jr.'s apartment, two doors from Roper, they found his body on the bed.

The fire department reacted and found in the building dangerous amounts of carbon monoxide, hydrogen and cyanide, mainly coming from the apartment located between Roper and Witherspoon, according to the report. police. This apartment belonged to Robert Ballard, who had called emergency responders twice the day before, according to Ballard 's lawyer, Ron Stanley.

Ballard made his first call in the middle of the night on Jan. 16, after his cousin, who was staying with him, fell into his bedroom and collapsed, Stanley said. "He does not wake up," Ballard told 911, according to a recording obtained at the request of NBC News via FOIA. "He's bleeding ears. … the Lord has mercy. "

A few hours later, Ballard again called 911 – for himself. "My eyes are floating and I'm bleeding," he told the responders. Ballard and his cousin were seen in a hospital, said his lawyer, but no one suspected carbon monoxide poisoning until the next day, when his two neighbors were found dead.

Ballard could have died too, said Stanley: "If the cousin had not stumbled into his room, he would have slept all night and would probably never have woken up."

Ballard is now suing the Columbia Housing Authority, along with Roper's family and five other residents, all alleging that management had not maintained the property and exposed them to unsafe conditions.

Witherspoon's daughter, Dani Washington, also plans to take legal action against the housing authority "and all others" for the death of his father, said his lawyer, Douglas Desjardins.

"Everyone has taken the shortest route, and that's what happened," said 27-year-old Washington. "I want justice done to my father."

Nicknamed "Big Man", Witherspoon loved fishing, building model cars and loving his 12 grandchildren, Washington said. In the early 2000s, his father suffered a stroke that forced him to leave his job in construction, but he never lost his composure. "He would not talk to anyone," she says.

More than a dozen residents who spoke to NBC News said Allen Benedict's basic health and safety risks had not been addressed for years – in contrast to HUD's high score for 2017 for the property. In 2018, emergency responders responded to seven calls on the property about the presence of suspicious odors, according to Columbia Fire Chief Aubrey Jenkins. "It did not happen overnight," he said. (Although gas leaks are distinct from carbon monoxide leaks, faulty appliances can produce both, said fire prevention agents.)

Although the Fire Department is not mandated to conduct routine inspections of federally funded public housing, recent deaths have prompted it to inspect all multi-family multi-family dwellings in the city, despite limited resources. . Local authorities decided that they could not rely on HUD's own inspections to protect residents.

The fire officials will inform the city of local code violations and will impose fines if the dangers are not resolved, according to Devine, a city council member, who describes the lack of federal requirements for monoxide detectors. of carbon: on behalf of HUD. "

"It is very necessary for us to make sure that we intervene," said Jenkins. But additional local monitoring will come at a cost, he said: "It will certainly put us to the test."

"I did not know it was a gas that could kill us"

Allen Benedict has been vacant for over a month now, overrun by wildcats, cockroaches and the smell of rotting meat from disconnected freezers. Children's toys, wheelchairs and caddies filled with cans lit the residents' yards. Flowers and a blue candle are still on the doorstep of Witherspoon.

Toddrica Smith, 29, recently returned for other clothes for herself and her 10-year-old son. She pointed out the lingering problems: the ceiling collapsed, the walls of the bathroom were covered with black mold and water was leaking from the electrical outlets of the kitchen. One of the smoke detectors has been down since his move in 2012, despite visits by federal housing inspectors.

The Inspector General of HUD conducts his own investigation into Allen Benedict to determine what is wrong and what the federal government's responsibility could have been.

"All this points to one thing: the backlog of unmet capital needs that has grown exponentially in recent decades," said Tim Kaiser, executive director of the Public Housing Authorities Directors Association, referring to the risks related to carbon monoxide in HUD dwellings.

For years, local officials have been trying to redevelop Allen Benedict, who was "at the top of the list for demolition" in 2017, according to council member Ed McDowell. That year, however, the Columbia Housing Authority chose to scrap another aging HUD property and did not have the funds to demolish and rebuild Allen Benedict as well. Last year, local officials asked HUD for a $ 30 million grant for the project. Despite a personal call from the mayor to HUD Secretary Ben Carson, the agency rejected the city's request in early February, two weeks after the death of Roper and Witherspoon.