Asbestos removal and demolition scheduled in Illinois neighborhood
In Rockford, Illinois, construction crews are getting ready to conduct asbestos abatement and demolish a group of vacant homes in the Churchill Park neighborhood. This neighborhood was badly devastated by flooding two years ago, and the homes have deteriorated. Asbestos abatement must occur in some of these homes prior to demolition; otherwise, the asbestos in the structures could become airborne during the demolition process. Exposure to asbestos can lead to mesothelioma, a rare form of cancer that can lie dormant for years before emerging and rapidly spreading throughout the body.
Local resident Craig Springer is glad that some of the homes are finally coming down, but he says that the process has been too slow, and that further work is still needed. A lifelong neighborhood resident, the 22-year-old has confronted vagrants and drug dealers in the area who took advantage of the vacant buildings. “I figured the city would be on it a lot quicker,” he said. “It’s past time for these houses to come down. They should have come down a long time ago.”
Rockford Local Development Corp. used a $10 million line of credit backed by the city last year to acquire 102 of the 128 flood-damaged homes in the area, says storm water manager Brian Eber. Additional help came in the form of a $3 million Hazard Mitigation Flood Grant awarded in June by the Federal Emergency Management Agency. This was enough to deal with 36 of the properties.
“We didn’t make the citizens wait until FEMA gave us the grant,” Eber said. “If we had done that and forced them to wait, then more of the homes would have been foreclosed on and walked away from and ruined their credit. The city took unusual steps to try to salvage the situation for people who sustained significant damage a number of times.”