Porch Safety: Chicago says it's up to you
In May of this year, Carolina Landeros, 20 and Atit Mansuria, 27, were on the landing of a porch on a building in Chicago. The two were talking when the railing broke apart sending both of them falling to the concrete alley 20 feet below. The porch had not been inspected since it was constructed in the mid 1980'2.
Landeros suffered a fracture neck, but is recovering. Mansuria, suffered traumatic head injuries and is still in the hospital.
Their accident is one of 700 complaints which were called into Chicago's 311 system in 2009 alone. It is the Department of Building's best assessment of the dangers lurking beneath porch cookouts and deck parties.
It has been six years since the collapse of a porch on a Lincoln Park building which caused the deaths of 13 people and forced Chicago to crackdown on landlords for having dangerous porches. However, because of what city officials say is a shortage of "inspection manpower," many of the cities dangerous porches and decks go un-inpsected.
Often times they are discovered when it is too late, like in the case of Mansuria and Landeros.
After the Lincoln Park porch collapse, the city inspected and indentified about 500 hazardous porches. The city put together a task force of inpsectors. But after most of the inital porches identified as being hazardous, were fixed, the unit was disbanded.
The city maintains a team of "conservation" inpsectors who have been trained in porch inspections. However, they also must check on rodent infestations, structural damage and other safey hazards together with inspecting, annually, any porch on an apartment building higher than three stories.
Inspections are conducted on about 5000 porches out of approximately 680,2000 residential properties. All other inspections take place when the city receives a complaint on the 311 line.
The city is depending on the vigilance of tenants and homeowners to report a dangerous porch or deck. Unfortunately, if a porch complaint is phoned in, the porch may not get inspected for up to several weeks after the complaint is made.
Sometime the warnings are too late.
Tonya Laramore, watched as her granddaughter, Jermarih Cook, then 2, lay crying on the concrete below the porch landing at her West Town apartment. A rotted step collapsed under the 2 year old's weight and sent her falling 6 feet to the ground. "Here tooth went up through the top of her lip and left a big hole," Laramore said. Laramore contacted the city's 311 line to file a complaint, but nothing was done.
City inspectors finally arrived several days after the accident, but a new porch was not installed on the building until last month.
In May, Douglas Ames was taking out the trash when a plank on the landing of his porch gave way. Ames fell partially through the landing. He sustained a torn leg ligament and was unable to work for a month. He is suing his landlord for his medical bills and his lost income.
Jeff Bravo, Ames' landlord said he didn't realize that the porch was in such bad shape.
