Their Townhouse Terrace apartment in Southeast Portland had radon nearly six times the level federal authorities say calls for a specialized ventilation system. Maribel Rivas with three of her five children: Itzae, 2 Aries, 8 and Jose, 13. He declined to have Denver follow up on units testing high during the newsroom’s investigation. “We’re not going to comment on those test results,” said Guerrero, whose agency has tested a small percentage of its other public housing units and removed radon when it was found. The Denver Housing Authority’s executive director, Ismael Guerrero, dismissed the results from Flores and other tenants with elevated radon levels because the tests weren’t performed by a professional. “I’m really concerned,” said Flores, who moved into her unit at Westridge Homes 15 years ago after a sickness left her unable to work. Others were home to elderly people who’d breathed the air for years.ĭenver resident Norma Flores, 69, deployed test kits provided by the newsroom and found her apartment had radon at double the level the federal government says should be fixed. In three cities where authorities tested only occasionally, only in the 1990s or not at all, The Oregonian/OregonLive and affiliates of its corporate parent, Advance Local, readily found high levels of radon. Some never told tenants they were living in a potential cancer cloud. Some sat on or forgot about the results without making fixes. Those that have checked for radon often did so in only a tiny percentage of their public housing units. Tens of thousands have done so.īut when it comes to homes the government owns for the benefit of America’s poorest families, officials in radon hot zones commonly choose not to test, according to the newsroom’s reporting on 64 local housing authorities nationwide. As many as half of all tests from private homes in these areas reveal radon concentrations so high that owners are advised to install specialized ventilation systems. More than 400,000 public housing residents live in areas at gravest risk for indoor exposure to the carcinogen, according to an analysis of federal data by The Oregonian/OregonLive. Faison grew up in Northeast Portland, including about seven years in a home owned by the housing authority. Thomas Faison, 37, has late-stage lung cancer that his doctor suspects is from radon exposure. Department of Housing and Urban Development let them, disregarding a decades-old legal mandate from Congress to ensure the problem got fixed. Federal health officials declared indoor radon “a national health problem” more than 30 years ago.īut local housing authorities ignored the danger.Īnd the U.S. Radon seeps in through flooring and is the second-leading cause of lung cancer in the United States, killing an estimated 21,000 Americans each year. Public housing authorities across the country have refused to find and remove radioactive gas from inside tenants’ homes, leaving children, senior citizens and other vulnerable people unnecessarily exposed, an investigation by The Oregonian/OregonLive has found.
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