Tenants Won’t Have to Pay for Asbestos Cleanup
Friday, May 30th, 2008
Public housing tenants in Houston who thought they would have to pay more than $3,000 each to clean up their apartments after a fire were given a reprieve this week when Lone Star Legal Aid intervened on the tenants’ behalf.
According to an article in The Houston Chronicle, tenants were originally told that they’d need to pay $3,400 each for a professional cleaning service to remove asbestos fibers that were dislodged during a fire that affected about 200 apartments in the Bellerive development.
“The housing authority, which owns the property and leases apartments to elderly or disabled tenants at subsidized rents, said clothing and furniture in 61 of the building’s 210 apartments might have been contaminated with cancer-causing asbestos fibers,†the article notes. The agency told tenants that its insurance would not cover the cost of removing the asbestos from the units.
Regina Woolfolk, vice president for external affairs for Houston’s Housing Authority, said the agency has raised about $150,000 from private donors toward the estimated $210,000 cost involved in hiring a private contractor to clean the tenants’ belongings. It’s continuing to seek donations for the balance, she said, but in the meantime the work can now begin.
Woolfolk stated that tenants in apartments with only minor damage should be able to move back into their units by early July.
