Blackfeet housing leans on crumbling foundation

[Guest guest]

http://www.indiancountry.com/?1018625957

Blackfeet housing leans on crumbling foundation

Posted: April 16, 2002 - 11:00AM EST

by: Ron Selden / Indian Country Today

This photograph was originally published in Serle Chapman's book " We the

People. " The bowed roof and warped framing of the home shown here on the

Blackfeet Reservation are evidence of the shoddy materials and poor

craftsmanship used in their construction.

BROWNING, Mont. -- Leaders of the Glacier Homes Committee, organized last

year to find help for families living in 153 Blackfeet Indian Reservation

homes built with inadequate wooden foundations, say tribal leaders have

known for years there were problems with the structures.

Now residents allege that some of the houses, paid for by the U.S.

Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), are causing health

problems because of toxic mold and mildew triggered by leaky basements and

poorly insulated walls that trap and hold moisture.

The wooden foundations are also treated with green-colored chromated copper

arsenate, or CCA, a toxic substance that the U.S. Environmental Protection

Agency decided earlier this year should be removed from commercial sale.

Many of the homes, built in the late 1970s and early 1980s, are falling

apart, despite a " guarantee " that they would last at least 50 years.

" We were in essence forced to take these homes from HUD, " said

Marceau, a committee leader. " Right from the beginning we've had structural

problems. They're not only toxic, but substandard. A lot of us quit paying

our rent because nobody would listen to us. We believe there's too many

illnesses and deaths to be a coincidence. For 24 years they never made

reasonable movement toward correcting these problems. In fact, the tribe and

housing just tried to cover it up. "

" We have no reason to sweep any dirt under the rug, " countered Blackfeet

Housing Authority Director Ray . He says his office is working closely

with the committee to get the problems fixed, whatever it takes. " If you

start blaming people, it throws up the walls, and then it takes you longer

to get anything done, " said.

HUD maintains that the agency is not responsible for the problems, and that

it's up to the housing authority to allocate funding to replace the worst

homes and renovate the rest. At the time the homes were built, HUD only

reviewed housing architectural and engineering plans " to ensure the tribes

were meeting basic public safety standards, " said an agency spokeswoman who

refused to have her name used for attribution because of public affairs

office policy.

" HUD does not prescribe particular building standards, " the spokeswoman

said. " HUD gives tribes the flexibility to work with materials and design

that is feasible for the tribe's environment. The regulations used then and

now, offered Indian housing authorities broad parameters on the design and

construction of the housing. While HUD had to approve the plan, the agency

did not dictate specifics on design and materials. These were left up to the

Indian housing authorities. "

But Jeff Simkovic, a Billings attorney, who is advising the citizens'

committee, maintains the federal agency was calling the shots, and that the

inadequate foundations would not have been built if HUD hadn't allowed them.

" HUD did have a contract of adhesion with the housing authority, and they

told them what to do, " he said.

" You can't consider them HUD homes, " the spokeswoman countered. " It's not up

to HUD to upkeep these homes. They've had the opportunity to apply for more

money from HUD to fix these homes. I'm not aware of any specific funding

requests to do so. "

According to the spokeswoman, funding was available to repair or modernize

" HUD-assisted " housing through competitive grants prior to passage of the

1996 Native American Housing Assistance and Self-determination Act

(NAHASDA). Now tribes receive annual formula grants that they can earmark

for specific projects. The Blackfeet Tribe currently receives about million

a year under the formula, she said.

Money for housing rehabilitation is also available though the agency's

Indian Community Development Block Grant program, she added.

Decades of controversy

Blackfeet officials say they were never keen about having wood instead of

more expensive concrete used for foundations. In fact, housing authority

records show the tribal housing board as early as 1977 rejected some of the

homes.

" We questioned it when HUD first talked about the wood foundations, " said

Blackfeet Chairman Earl Old Person, who lived in one of the homes. His wife,

for whatever reason, now suffers from cancer and kidney disease.

While wood foundations are still common in some parts of the country, they

are generally unsuitable for the Blackfeet Reservation's climate, said Tom

McKay, the housing authority's general manager.

" Everybody knows it was wrong to use wood foundations here in Blackfeet

Country, especially being so close to the mountains, " he said. But details

are sketchy when it comes to determining exactly how the houses were

eventually cleared for occupancy.

Even as early as 1980, records show that the housing authority and HUD knew

about other structural and drainage problems. At one point, HUD gave the

Blackfeet a grant to fix homes where the foundations were already bowing.

But the correction work was merely cosmetic, said Carl Kipp, who served on

the housing board at that time.

McKay said that in 1993, when he was director of the now-defunct Blackfeet

Resident Organization, his group was encouraged to apply for million in HUD

funding that could have been used to repair or replace at least some of the

homes. But he says the housing board at the time wouldn't recognize the

citizens' group as a legitimate entity, and the application was never

submitted.

According to Glacier Homes Committee co-founder Grant, housing

officials at one point suggested giving at least some of the homes, which

are being purchased under HUD's " mutual help " program, to residents for only

apiece. Inspection records show one severely damaged house was only worth

,000, but the housing authority determined it would cost about ,000 to

replace it.

" We said, 'No way, that's letting you off the hook,' " Grant said.

Don , an Indian Health Service environmental health officer in

Browning, said the " path to illness " is extremely difficult to quantify.

Nonetheless, he feels it's certainly possible that the homes could be making

people sick.

" The conditions in some cases are pretty deplorable, " he said. " Some of

these houses have mold everywhere, and some of the molds are known to be

dangerous. " He added that there are also many more questions that need to be

answered about the treated wood.

" Whether these people have a case, I wouldn't want to make that judgment, "

said. " It would take an extensive epidemiological study to determine

exactly what's going on. "

" Before all that is done, I don't know how you could begin to make a

connection, " added Rod Gaither, the IHS infection control officer for the

reservation. " Right now, we're getting this litany of symptomology that

seems to have no consistency. In the absence of an epidemiological study, we

're just going on self-reported anecdotes. "

Potential help coming

According to Dudley, aide to U.S. Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., the

Senator on March 22 submitted a million congressional budget request to pay

for assessments and repair or replacement of the Blackfeet homes. Baucus,

chairman of the powerful Senate Finance Committee, also requested million

for the Crow Reservation, where other mold problems are affecting several

dozen houses.

Real Bird, a Crow housing official, said there are no HUD houses with

wooden foundations on his reservation. He says the mold infestation there

may be linked to an irrigation ditch that runs above at least some of the

structures.

Dudley added that Baucus is working through the Senate Indian Affairs

Committee to get a million boost in a HUD " Healthy Homes " fund that covers

lead-based paint testing and remediation, mold assessment and abatement, and

other related projects. Some of that money, if approved, could potentially

be directed to the Crow and Blackfeet reservations in the forms of grants,

she said.

" Obviously, the structural issues are what's leading to the environmental

health issues, " said Dudley. She added that she's become extremely

frustrated trying to work with the federal housing agency.

" HUD and Montana HUD have been so unhelpful, it's unbelievable, " she said.

Also working on the issue is U.S. Rep. Denny Rehberg, R-Mont., who recently

sent staff members to the Blackfeet Reservation to meet with residents and

tour some of the homes. Spokesman Dallas Lawrence says Rehberg has

personally contacted HUD, as well as Interior Secretary Gale Norton.

" The congressman is fully engaged in the concerns being raised up there, "

Lawrence said. " We're just waiting for the administration to give us

direction what the next step should be on our end. "

" As soon as we got a lawyer and the congressional folks, the tribe started

listening, " Marceau said while checking off a laundry list of problems at

his home.

" They thought we were just another group that would get frustrated and go

away, " added Grant. " We're not. "