Indiana Apartment Buildings Contaminated with Asbestos

October 5, 2006 - As many as 18 buildings at the Timber Ridge apartment complex in Marion County, Indiana, may be contaminated with asbestos, county officials have announced. 

So far, nine families have been displaced from their homes and are now living in temporary housing, having been evacuated for “safety reasons.”  The Marion County Health Department told WTHR-Eyewitness News that "accumulations of asbestos- containing materials were observed in the interiors of the lower levels."

Health officials have maintained that those living on the second and third floors of the buildings in question are not in danger.  "If we find there are asbestos fibers or asbestos containing materials on the second and third floors we will request that they are relocated," said Dana Reed Wise, Marion County Health Department.

Nevertheless, the situation has frightened many of the residents of the Timber Ridge complex, who fear they may be at risk of asbestos exposure, despite the findings of county inspectors.  "They should take everybody out of the building right now to make it safer. There are just a couple of people in the building besides me and my friend and another woman with a baby," said Dequan Wilson, who lives in a third floor apartment with her elderly mother.

The county has now hired an environmental company, licensed in asbestos abatement, to remedy the situation.  Nine of the buildings in question are currently occupied while the other nine are closed for renovations.  All are undergoing the abatement procedure and apartment owners expect that the job will be completed by year’s end.