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FOR
IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Thursday, March 18, 2004
| Contact: |
Dr.
Diana Yu, Thurston County Health Officer, 360-786-5581 ext 6951 |
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Karen Daniels, Corrections Chief, 360-786-5505 |
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Jim Wilcox, Central Services Director, 360-786-5420, Ext.
6454 |
County
Officials Move Quickly After Mold Found in County Jail
OLYMPIA -- Thurston County Commissioners on
Monday will be asked to adopt an emergency resolution to enable a quicker
response to a mold problem detected in the Thurston County Jail.
The mold was discovered in Post-6 of the jail
when repair work was done recently on toilets in the unit. Water from the showers and toilets in the area has leaked
underneath walls, causing mold to grow inside.
Testing done on the walls and the air last week confirmed the presence
of the toxic mold. Thurston
County Health Officer Doctor Diana Yu says there is no immediate health threat
from the situation. “There is
no urgency in this instance except to move out inmates who have chronic lung
ailments or who are immune compromised. It
is important however, to move out all inmates when repair work is undertaken
on the walls, as that process will release mold spores into the air.”
Thurston County Corrections Chief Karen Daniels
says they are moving immediately to evacuate the 48 or so inmates in Post-6 as
a precaution. “Even though we
could leave some inmates in the post by sealing off the affected toilet and
shower area, it becomes an operational necessity to evacuate the unit.
Logistically it’s impossible to move that many inmates up and down
stairs to another unit for showers or to use the toilet.
It would compromise security to move dozens of inmates on a regular
basis.” The evacuation decision
means a difficult process of identifying inmates who may be eligible for
incarceration in other jails, those who can be moved to alternative programs
like electronic home monitoring and to find minimum-security misdemeanor
inmates who might be released early, according to Daniels.
“A special group of Jail Administrators, Judges, Pre-trial and
Probations Staff, Prosecutors, Defense Attorneys and others is working on
identifying inmates who can be moved or released in order to free up the space
in Post-6 so repair work on the walls can be expedited.”
The cleaning of the mold is a somewhat
complicated process according to Central Services Director Jim Wilcox.
“We had planned late next week to begin repair of the floor of the
jail kitchen which is right above Post-6.
There is some indication that mold may be entering the post from leaks
in the floor above, but we won’t know that until the floor work begins.
The good news is that the heating, ventilation and air conditioning
system for Post-6 is isolated from the rest of Building Three, so there is no
spread of the mold to other areas. “
If commissioners adopt the emergency resolution
on Monday, that will allow the suspension of some bidding process rules so a
contractor can be hired quickly to work on Post-6, according to Wilcox.
“We will have a contractor remove the affected parts of the walls and
then get rid of the mold. We must
then rebuild the walls and ensure that the moisture that caused the problem in
the first place, cannot leak back in again.”
The entire process of ridding Post-6 of mold,
repairing the walls and rebuilding the kitchen floor, could take as long as
six weeks.
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