Toxic trouble at Henness Flats?

[Guest guest]

Toxic trouble at Henness Flats?

Former Henness Flats residents complain of illnesses they say are

related to mold and formaldehyde, while building management and

current residents say the units are just fine

Sierra Sun - Truckee,CA,USA

By Slabaugh

Sierra Sun

http://www.sierrasun.com/article/20090116/NEWS/901169985/1066 & ParentP

rofile=1051 & title=Toxic%20Trouble%20at%20Henness%20Flats%3F

TRUCKEE — On Labor Day weekend in 2008, Penner felt a scratch

in the back of her throat, one of those incurable itches, like a

feather on an earlobe.

Penner, a Truckee resident who practices in-home care, thought the

scratch was just a side effect of eating fish she had caught and

filleted herself. An experienced angler, Penner had cut the filets

like she had a dozen times before. Except this time, she messed up.

She accidentally allowed some of the smaller bones into the meat

which, other than being a nuisance, did not ruin her dinner.

The mother of two figured she had a small fish bone lodged in her

esophagus.

" It felt like an oversized popcorn kernel, " she explained, but she

assumed a good night's sleep might just solve the problem.

It didn't. She woke up the next morning with a sore throat, and the

popcorn kernel had grown into a golf ball. Penner, a mother of two,

checked into the emergency room, where they prescribed what she

already tried — a half bagel and some Coke.

She left, hoping it would go away. Ten days later, still feeling the

fish bone in the back of her throat, she returned to the emergency

room. There, they gave her a numbing agent, but that didn't solve

the problem. Doctors, unsure of what was causing the itch, scheduled

an indioscopy, where they could take pictures inside her throat.

" That's when it all changed, " Penner said. " The pathologist found a

lot of fungal organisms growing from my stomach through my throat. "

Penner believes the illness was triggered by a few months spent

living at Henness Flats in Truckee, where residents, a mold expert

and an attorney are convinced the living conditions have contributed

to a number of sicknesses and possibly a death, something building

managers refute.

An attorney investigates

In December, Truckee attorney Marsh-Linde sat at her kitchen

table and thumbed through piles of paperwork bound in manilla

folders and rubber bands. Her home is where she spends a lot of her

time, and why not. For one, it's warm.

For another, it's where she runs her law practice, what she

calls, " The extension of my days as a hippy at Berkeley. "

With an excited dog yipping in the corner of her living room, she

dropped a paper pile on the table with a thud, then another, then

another, before saying in the voice of an overwhelmed

mother, " There's so much more. "

Penner's files are just a small fraction of the paperwork

inside Marsh-Linde's folders. The collection started last spring

when a baby died at Henness Flats, and continued over the summer

when residents began to suspect the death was more than just an

anomaly.

Another mother lost her baby just two weeks before the due date. One

resident began to have seizures. Another began having chronic

headaches and nose bleeds. Two unrelated high-school students

checked into the emergency room with unusual u-shaped pains across

their stomachs. Another high school student complained of stomach

pain, and doctors found fungus-like growths on his stomach and

throat.

According to the Tahoe Forest Hospital System, a list of emergency

room diagnosis between March and October from residents at the

housing complex runs two pages in length, and describes maladies

ranging from nausea to stomach pain to nose bleeds to chronic

fatigue.

In order to see if living conditions could be linked to health

concerns, Marsh-Linde brought in expert Jack Goshow, who works on

mold and other home contamination issues in Nevada County. Goshow

found high levels of mold throughout the units, and little to no

barriers between humid areas like crawl spaces and where tenants

slept.

" These were certainly health hazards, " Goshow said. " They were

filthy. We found toxic mold in three of the 11 units we tested, and

found elevated airborne levels in seven. "

Those conditions led Goshow and Marsh-Linde to report their findings

to the Nevada County Environmental Health Department, which decided

against any large-scale clean-up because Environmental Health

Director Wesley Nicks was advised that there were no alarming levels.

" We took this very seriously, " Nicks said. " We lined up experts at

the state level to listen to these concerns, and again they came

back and told us the levels they found would usually not be harmful. "

That's what has Goshow and Marsh-Linde so upset. " It's not about

most people, " Goshow said. " It might not affect you and me. I was in

the crawl space crawling around for two to three hours, but I'm

healthy, and I eat right. I don't have any diseases that compromise

the immune system, but people who do could be impacted. ... It might

not affect everybody, and in most cases, it doesn't. "

As Goshow hinted, many of the former or current Henness Flats

residents who have complained about ongoing health defects have

other, more serious ongoing health issues. One example was a

resident who credits a recent pattern of seizures to living in the

units, but admits her brother died of seizures when she was a child.

Penner's case is no exception.

And Clay McReynolds, speaking on behalf of the owners, Cambridge

West Communities, said there is no evidence to prove that any of the

illnesses were related to the living conditions at Henness Flats.

" Is there a problem? " McReynolds said. " The answer has been no. That

is not to say that closes the book, but any new allegations will be

investigated the way former ones were. We take the safety of our

residents very seriously and that will continue to be the case. "

An alarmed community

Last spring, Penner sat in the emergency room, unable to stop the

nausea and breathing difficulties that had been plaguing her for

weeks. But this time was different.

This was months before the fish bone, before the mold, but she could

tell something was not right. Her breath stank. She was always

tired. And now, she could barely get out of bed.

Then, her youngest son began wandering away from school, and

teachers sent notes home telling her he couldn't remember anything.

" That's when I knew I had to move out of there, " she said. Penner

did move out in April 2008, despite paying through June. " When I

left to go to work for two or three days, I always felt immediately

better. I began to wonder about where I lived. "

Before she had moved out, she ran into a neighbor after returning

from work. Her neighbor, Cambria , asked her if she had been

feeling OK. It was a leading question.

" It turns out, Cambria had been sick, getting nosebleeds and having

stomach problems too, " Penner said. " Cambria told me about

formaldehyde. "

As they researched the toxic effect of formaldehyde, they learned

two important facts:

1) They lived in pre-built units, which traditional use materials

that leaked chemicals that could cause cancer or birth defects,

although the property owners say that all materials passed state

regulations; and 2) Formaldehyde poisoning causes symptoms exactly

like they were experiencing.

For , one of the first residents to move into Henness Flats in

September 2006, it became a mission. She contacted state and local

agencies, and even testified at an eviction trial for another

resident that she felt the units were inhospitable. A Sierra Club

representative working on formaldehyde poisoning cases in FEMA

trailers used for Katrina victims supplied kits for air testing, and

when the tests showed very high levels in Penner's unit, they

became alarmed.

" We did find a lower level in Henness units than in FEMA trailers, "

said Becky Gillette, National Formaldehyde Campaign Director for

Sierra Club in Eureka Springs, Ark.

" What we found was just an unusual amount of illness in a small

population of people. Something was going on. "

then took the issue to the Henness Flats neighborhood, holding

a meeting she videotaped that showed a number of concerned

residents. Shortly after, the building's management sent a note to

all the residents assuring them that they, and the Nevada County

Environmental Health Department, had monitored independent tests

done by the property owners. Those tests discovered unalarming

levels, and they concluded there was not a widespread health

concern.

The management company did send residents a question and answer

sheet regarding reports of the toxic air.

On that sheet, they admitted that building materials could produce

formaldehyde, but after testing 14 units, they only found low

levels. They also provided tips residents could use to help

ventilate their units.

They also noted the levels discovered by Sierra Club were " screening

levels, " and said those tests found levels found in " most any single-

family home throughout California and are well within levels

acceptable to the Environmental Protection Agency and the California

Air Resources Board. "

Experts cite lack of research into mold, formaldehyde

To Marsh-Linde, the fact that officials are denying any health issue

with Henness Flats is unbearable. Spending thousands of her own

dollars, she took on the pro-bono cases of two residents who had

been evicted from Henness Flats and became homeless. Since then,

Marsh-Linde has found very little traction in the courts or public

health departments.

With Marsh-Linde's ear in full attention, more residents stepped

forward. They complained about strong smells of formaldehyde, a

known carcinogen, and of toxic molds growing in crawl spaces,

beneath the carpet and, in some cases, through the paint in the

walls.

The homes, above average in size for public housing and which won

national awards for design in 2007, were constructed in Boise,

Idaho, in 2007, shipped in the fall and stored all winter in a

plastic seal. According to professional mold investigator Jack

Goshow, the stored homes became saturated with condensation and

provided an ideal habitat for mold to flourish.

Yet in an independent survey of two dozen residents living in the

units done by the Sierra Sun, all of them said they thought Henness

Flats was a good place to live, and three-quarters of the residents

said they would be extending their lease.

" I did extend my lease, " said Henness Flats resident Coire,

who has lived there since September 2007, and said building

management had helped her with any issues she had faced. " I feel

that our community, being how it is set up with a lot of seasonal

workers and housing and real estate pricing, affordable housing is

extremely valuable to our community. "

Marsh-Linde said she recognized not all the residents were

experiencing issues.

" It's just in three of the buildings, from what I can tell, " said

Marsh-Linde. " But even if it was one unit, should we not do anything

about it? It's pretty clear we have a problem that nobody wants to

care about. "

Goshow, who spent years dodging threats during the asbestos-removal

craze of the 80s, has spent hours and thousands of his company's

dollars looking into the units, testing the air samples, and

providing data to Marsh-Linde and the Nevada County Environmental

Health Department.

When describing what he has seen in these units, he said his job is

not to hand out blame, but just to tell the residents what he found

in their carpet, crawl spaces and air conditioner filters. Like

Marsh-Linde, he is donating his time, and again like the attorney,

he said he has not seen anything like this in his three decades of

work.

" I don't care how well these units were sealed, " Goshow explained,

like he has to hundreds of homeowners, rich and poor, through the

years. " They're going to get wet. They had traveled so far and came

here, where we get 400 inches of snow a year. When () explained

the history of the property, just based on the symptoms, and she

told me there were things sitting still all winter, I knew there

could be toxic mold. "

His instincts proved correct. A dozen air quality tests ordered by

Goshow and performed by an independent testing lab in Reno have

proved that.

While some mold is normal in almost every kitchen floor and carpet

sample, in the bedroom where one of the babies died, reports

showed " extremely high levels " of mold, including penicillium,

stachybochys and aspergillus, which can cause severe and invasive

infections in respiratory symptoms, especially among babies.

Stachybochys (pron. sta-chew-bawk-us) has proven to cause brain

damage in babies, according to a number of independent studies.

Autopsies performed by Nevada County showed that the baby died due

to Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. Marsh-Linde said she has consulted

with the baby's family, who she said were torn on the issue of

testing the baby further. She admits exhuming the baby could be a

futile act and injure the family even more.

In fact, due to the immature science involving toxic molds, very

little can be proven. Tests done by Cambridge West Communities, the

building owners, showed only citrus mold, which is caused by old

trash and rotting fruit, something the property management group

said would have been caused by the tenants.

" In medicine, if it walks like a duck, looks like a duck and swims

like a duck, we need to see about 40 years worth of ducks to

determine if it really is a duck, " said Dr. Ed Heneveld, an

emergency room physician at Tahoe Forest Health System in Truckee.

A 30-year veteran of medicine, Heneveld said the only word to

describe the relationship between mold and negative health effects

is " Maybe, " and compares the science of formaldehyde and mold

poisoning to that of cigarette smoking in the 1950s, when those

outside the tobacco industry were just beginning to detect a

negative health pattern.

" It's wishy-washy in a way, but I am a scientist. When I read these

mold reports, and I look at the toxic effects of mold, these people

are not crazy, " said Heneveld, who went as far as to write a

doctor's note telling one resident she needed to move out of her

home. " They're not trying to make up symptoms. They are not trying

to make up stories. I have talked with some of the residents, and I

encouraged those people to pursue those concerns. "

In June, health officials tested the units for formaldehyde

poisoning and found high levels in some, nearly zero in others.

But the testing was in vain if the hope was to spur a large-scale

response, said Heneveld, because there is no formal baseline for

formaldehyde or mold, meaning even if they found " huge amounts, "

there would be no requisite to respond.

" The reports said that the levels were high, but even that's

inaccurate to me, " Dr. Heneveld said. " There is no normal, so how

can it be high? "

The Environmental Protection Agency offers guidelines, but nothing

that would stand up in court. Take one formaldehyde exposure for

example:

In Penner's apartment, health officials found an average of

0.075 parts per million, and Sierra Club tests measured it at .177

ppm, both of which were hundreds of times more exposure than the EPA

recommendations of .008.

The California Air Resources Board, which plans to elevate

formaldehyde alerts in 2012, goes a step farther, stating in a

report that formaldehyde has " no safe level of exposure. "

Mold regulations are even more vague. The EPA and OSHA have

standards for work environments, but nothing for rental units. In

2001, California passed the Toxic Mold Protection Act, which is far

less useful than its title sounds, but it does acknowledge that some

mold can be toxic. The Act asked for the creation of an independent

commission to investigate and set baselines. Yet, in 2005, the

independent commission reached a dead end.

For one, the commission's report said, they state's budget crunch

kept them from doing the necessary lab samples, and for another, it

would be unethical to put human subjects into controlled mold

experiments to see what effects toxic mold could cause.

In turn, no baseline was ever set, and weak language was written

into the act mandating that building owners only disclose toxic mold

issues to " unaffected parties. "

There are other problems that could lead officials to doubt that

mold, or formaldehyde, is the cause of the maladies from which

tenants are suffering. Many afflicted residents admitted to

suffering from depression, which is consistent with the

Environmental Protection Agency's research in the 1970s that led to

the term, " Sick Building Syndrome. "

This ailment, which can be identified through common symptoms found

among people when they are in a building, supports dozens of

theories that factors like humidity, other air contaminants like car

exhaust that are not related to the building, poor lighting,

temperature extremes and noise can cause both individual and group

effects.

Another EPA study reported two-thirds of tenants complaining about

air quality had cases of clinical depression or anxiety disorders,

which doctors determined to be heightened by community gossip or

news reports about pollutants like smog, formaldehyde, ozone

depletion and asbestos.

Marsh-Linde acknowledges the difficulties in having to trust her

clients are telling the truth. The pure number of similar stories

and lack of appropriate reaction, she explains, has her believing in

a cover up.

" We aren't getting any other support, from doctors or the town or

the health department, " she said. " Nobody seems to want to listen to

these people, because they're poor, and everyone wants to be proud

that we're finally building affordable housing. "

Town officials dismiss the criticism, citing the Nevada County

health reports that showed little need for concern. The Town and

County have both said, however, that if credible evidence exists to

prove the units are uninhabitable, then they would react.

To Jack Goshow, the mold expert, that evidence exists. And Dr.

Heneveld agrees that something isn't right, but says the community

must be careful to overreact to a problem that is not supported by

science or case studies.

To explain, he gets technical for a minute. He says science rarely

proves absolutes in mold cases, citing a 1993 case where, depending

on the reports, children in Cleveland were thought to have died

from " black mold poisoning, " but little was proven by the Center for

Disease Control.

With only a handful of similar cases, the medical community cannot

make the definitive leap that " A causes B, " Dr. Heneveld said.

Further complicating the matter in Truckee, the patients from

Henness Flats are suffering from a variety of symptoms. Some are

showing up at the emergency room with neurological symptoms, while

others are complaining about respiratory symptoms.

No resolution but to move

Less than a mile away from Marsh-Linde's home, an apartment sits

vacant. Sharon Burton and her three sons moved out in December with

the help of fellow residents Maggie Deto and her son, the high

school student with similar fungal growths on his stomach. On moving

day, as Sharon swept up the kitchen, her three sons carried a large

storage dresser out to the lawn where a neighbor, Margaret Deto,

parked a borrowed pick-up truck on the curb.

Sharon refused to take a stack of mattresses, a magazine cover and a

few magnets on the refrigerator. But Sharon and Margaret see more

than just that. They left their home — now Sharon lives in and out

of area hotels, and Maggie lives in a borrowed RV in a church

parking lot.

Meanwhile, Penner has found a new home, but is worried about a

$4,000 bill she received to pay for back rent. Cambria has a

new home, and through state services and a generous court decision,

she has but a $200 bill to the Henness Flats managers. Sharon and

Margaret were also sued for thousands after they left the units, but

a recent court decision significantly cut what they owed — still in

the thousands of dollars, which includes attorney fees for those

representing the builders and property managers.

All this puts Marsh-Linde in a pickle, as she tries to bring

inhability claims in eviction hearings. Simply put, she explains,

the California Health and Safety Code and national health department

statutes are strict on homeowners but lax on landlords.

With no illegal activities uncovered from Marsh-Linde's

investigation, and no law stating air quality standards for rental

units regarding formaldehyde or mold, little can be done to recover

money or time the residents say they lost due to illness.

" (The residents) need all the help they can get just to find a home,

not to mention to make things right with their evictions, " Marsh-

Linde said. " They will stay homeless until they find someone

credible enough to vouch for them. "

Ultimately, whether there is a relationship between the findings of

toxic mold and elevated formaldehyde levels at Henness Flats and the

illnesses of former residents, or if the " Sick Building Syndrome "

paranoia triggered symptoms that could be related to inhospitable

air quality, the fear is enough to get a doctor's recommendation.

" If you think your building is toxic, then you should move out, " Dr.

Heneveld said. " I'm happy writing a note saying you should move out

of your building. You're living in stress. If you're fearful, even

if it's not toxic, it's going to be what you think about all the

time. "

But to attorney Marsh-Linde, the fight continues. She hopes to

have an outside clinic study the fungal growths in Cambria ,

Penner and the high school student, and if they come back as

the same strain, it could lead to a tort case that could hold

builders, property managers and even doctors accountable.

In the meantime, she just wants someone locally to listen and take

the cases seriously.

" I talked with the toxicologists at UC , and he told me that he

didn't care to know what caused the illnesses, " Marsh-Linde

said. " He believes that the fact there's an isolated population

suffering from something the general population isn't suffering

from, then it shows the problem is with the building. That is also

what I believe. "

About our investigation

The Sierra Sun spent more than five weeks interviewing nearly 40

residents, attorneys, town representatives, county officials, and

air contaminant experts in hopes of finding out if Henness Flats has

a widespread air quality problem.

While we found several cases of illnesses that were nearly

identical, and hundreds of pages of evidence of mold and

formaldehyde contamination, very few local medical or environmental

health professionals are willing to say living conditions were the

cause.