Mold gone, man returns to problem-plagued Line

[Guest guest]

Mold gone, man returns to problem-plagued Line

Defect in the Deer Valley Drive project blamed for the disgusting

growth

Park Record, Park City, UT

by Jay Hamburger OF THE RECORD STAFF

http://www.parkrecord.com/ci_5929644?source=rss

McKendry is sleeping in his own bed, hanging out in his living

room and eating in his kitchen.

About a month after he had to abandon his unit in the Line

Condominiums, as mold overtook the one-bedroom, he returned to the

Deer Valley Drive affordable-housing project, his forced relocation

giving cleanup and fix-it crews the time to get rid of the mold and

make sure it does not return.

He says there have not been problems in the two weeks he's been back

and he is pleased Mountainlands Community Housing Trust, the not-for-

profit that built the Line, repaid him for some of the bills he

amassed during the move.

" It's been relaxing. I'm happy to be in, " McKendry says.

His experience, though, is the most dramatic in a series of

complaints at the problem-plagued Line, which was envisioned as a

showcase project for affordable housing in Park City but, as delays,

cost increases and bickering between City Hall and Mountainlands

took hold, instead is seen by some as an eyesore and an example of

not-for-profit bumbling.

Most recently, the local government, which financially backed the

project, and Mountainlands engaged in a dispute about $20,000 of the

nonprofit's money. City Hall seized the money after, according to

the government, Mountainlands failed to appropriately reconstruct

historic houses on the property.

McKendry, a 29-year-old from Buffalo, N.Y., who moved to Park City

in 2002 for the Winter Olympics, once living in a walk-in closet for

three months on Park Avenue, works at the Main Street steakhouse

Butcher's and Wild Oats Natural Marketplace at Redstone, earning

enough to buy one of the Line units. They were generally priced

between $107,000 and $196,000.

He moved into his place in July 2006, noticing problems with

fixtures and hinges, chemicals leaking from pipes in a utility

closet and leaks from a neighbor's gutter spilling into his shower's

fan.

November, as damp weather set in, though, he found green-colored

mold growing in a corner of the living room. Soon, more mold, a

patch about 2 1/2 feet in diameter, grew on the kitchen ceiling and

down a wall. He discovered mold above the shower in the bathroom,

along the baseboard of a storage closet where the hot-water heater

sits and in a kitchen corner behind cabinets.

" Issues don't go like they've gone in these units, " he says,

claiming that the mold in his place is a result of design flaws.

McKendry says Mountainlands sent a crew into his unit to gut the

place. The back wall of the kitchen was torn open, vinyl flooring

was removed and the carpet in the living room and bedroom was ripped

up because of dampness, he says. He had to store his possessions,

including his refrigerator and dishwasher, in his garage.

Mountainlands, he says, told him the work would take two or three

weeks but he was out of the place, staying in a unit Mountainlands

provided him in Prospector, for almost double that time.

" It ticked me off, " he says. " It disrupted everything. "

Ron Ivie, City Hall's chief building official, investigated and says

people in three of the Line units reported mold. The other two cases

were not as serious as McKendry's, Ivie says. He claims design flaws

allowed the mold. Ivie says the project lacked the necessary

insulation when it was built. He says a Mountainlands architect has

designed a repair using watertight foam insulation.

He says environmental investigators found 15 types of mold and four

varieties were deemed to be in a high concentration. He says there

was not believed to be a health risk.

" I wasn't simply willing to take a chance so we cleaned it up, " Ivie

says.

The $20,000 that City Hall seized, which Mountainlands had posted as

a guarantee related to the historic houses, could be put toward

fighting the mold's cause or other improvements at the Line, Park

City Manager Tom Bakaly says.

At Mountainlands, Loomis, the executive director, acknowledges

there was a design defect and says the nonprofit, at a " substantial "

cost, fixed the unit.

" All the walls and insulation came out. The mold had gotten in

there, " Loomis says. " It was literally ripped to the bones. It's

like building a new unit inside. "

For McKendry, though, last winter was frustrating and he wonders if

the mold made him sick. He says he usually is healthy but he got the

flu and his sinuses became infected. He is considering having a

doctor check his lungs.

Still, buying the Line unit provided him the opportunity to own a

home, his first, in Park City. Without Mountainlands, he says, he

would have remained a renter.

" I wouldn't be able to afford anything else in Park City, " McKendry

says. " Realistically, I wouldn't be able to. "