People in SC from Fairfield Co. to Governor's Mansion dealing with mold

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(Winnsboro) Sept. 20, 2004 - Five weeks ago eight classrooms inside

Fairfield Primary School had mold on the carpet and on books. The

rooms have been cleaned and tested since then.

Cook still doesn't want his son back in the classroom until a

public health agency has checked it out, " That's their job. They

worry about the restaurants, grocery stores to take care of the

public. Public health is their job, what's more public than our

children. "

McCutcheon has worked in mold remediation for 15 years. He says

there just aren't any federal or state guidelines in South Carolina

that regulate mold, " It could be dangerous in high enough levels. " He

says it's about time standards and licensing were put into place, " It

would give something to provide us a goal to reach. "

No one can agree on the goals. wonders, for example, how much

mold makes a child sick, " One company says this works for me and one

company could say this doesn't work for me? It could be yes, there's

nothing out there that puts it at a specific number. "

says standards will likely take time and that mold has become a

hot issue in the past five years. It's time says he doesn't

have. He points to the Governor's Mansion as an example, " If it's not

good enough for the governor to live in an area with mold. Why are

children being sent to a school with that problem? "

After three months, First Lady Sanford is looking forward to

moving back into the Governor's Mansion, " It's been a long, long

road. "

One that started, she says, back in August of last year when her

family came home from a vacation to find their home infected with a

fungus, " All of our clothes upstairs were covered with mold. Every

tie of my husband's had to wiped down, every shoe, every suit had

mold on it. "

She says the State Budget and Control Board, which owns the house,

responded with a short-term solution which was to bring down the

humidity levels. That removed the visible mold, " In the meantime, I

kept telling them, we should investigate this. They said no. "

Frustrated, she hired her own engineer who told her in March there

was a problem. She says the state ignored his report as she and her

staff became sicker, " We had clogged sinuses, we had a rash, we had

hives. I always had a rash on my stomach whenever I was in this

house. "

The mold started to reappear two months later, " That's when we knew

they knew they had a problem and started testing. "

Mrs. Sanford says they tested twice, but didn't tell her the results

of the second test right away, " They neglected to inform me. In the

meantime, my kids were getting sicker. "

That day, she says she had enough and moved her family to their home

in Sullivan's Island. Work on the air conditioning system started not

long after. In retrospect, Mrs. Sanford says she wished she had been

tougher with the state earlier, " Here we were in the Governor's

Mansion with kids getting sick and staff getting sick and at the end

of the day, I wish I had followed my instinct and been a little

louder and screamed a little more. "

She now recommends to the many parents who call her about mold to be

vigilant, " My advice would be to trust your instinct. If you think

your child is getting sick. Do everything you can. If that means camp

out on the local school board, that's what you need to do. "

Her family is scheduled to move back in Thursday.

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By Brown

Updated 9:21pm by BrettWitt