Posts Tagged ‘ chinese drywall ’
Drywall Victim Insurance Protection Act: Prayer in H*ll?
November 18th, 2009. By AbiK
While we’re waiting on the Chinese drywall trials to get going in 2010, there’s no shortage of activity on the subject. Just yesterday, a federal bill was filed called the Drywall Victim Insurance Protection Act (sponsored by Rep. Charlie Melancon, D-La). Now, if you’re sitting in a home sniffing the sulfuric fumes, that might sound like good news, right? A bill that would prohibit insurers from canceling or altering coverage of homes that contain Chinese drywall sounds like a nice safety net for folks wondering if they’re about to be dropped from their homeowners’ policies. Ah, but there’s a rub…
The issue is that the insurance industry isn’t regulated at the federal level; it’s regulated at the state level. So, as quoted at BradentonHerald.com (11/18/09), Michael Barry, a spokesman for the Insurance Information Institute, stated the proposed bill “would have little or no effect” if passed.
Clearly that’s not what homeowners want to hear.
So why submit a federal bill that will, in effect, be meaningless?
Well, take the case of Citizens Property Insurance Corporation. They recently felt the effects of some bad press when they told a Colorado couple with a home in Punta Gorda (with, of course, Chinese drywall) that they weren’t renewing their policy. The news hit the media airwaves bigtime and wouldn’t you know it, Citizens Property reversed the decision to not renew. Translation: the more press, the more results—or so the theory would go.
And clearly that must be the thinking shared by U.S. Senator Bill Nelson, D-Fl, who was quoted via a spokesman, Bryan Gulley, in the BradentonHerald.com article as stating, “While homeowner insurance largely is governed by state laws, it doesn’t hurt to press wherever possible, and Nelson certainly supports Rep. Melancon’s effort.”
Week Adjourned: 10.9.09
October 9th, 2009. By LucyC
Top Class Actions
Giving new meaning to Renaissance architecture? Hundreds more people in Florida may be onboard with a new Chinese Drywall class action filed this week. The suit names Coastal Condominiums and Precision Drywall as defendants, and alleges that the toxic drywall used in the construction of Renaissance Commons (at right) is emitting toxic gases into people’s homes.
During the Florida building boom hundreds of millions of pounds of drywall was shipped to ports around the United States from China. While 25 states have reported issues, problems were first noted in Florida, likely because the defective drywall seems to react strongly in humid conditions.
Apparently, some 600 Floridians in 30 counties have reported symptoms such as irritated eyes, bloody noses, rashes and insomnia. This certainly puts a new twist on that old expression— ‘there’s no place like home…’
Mario Aliano is one pissed off beer drinker (bad pun, I know). In fact he’s so angry
Why Doesn’t US Take a Harder Stand on Sub-Standard Chinese Exports?
September 15th, 2009. By Hunter West
Anyone who wonders why the US doesn’t clamp down harder on China and some of the sorry, dangerous, unsafe crap they export into this country need only remember that the People’s Republic of China owns 24.07 percent of all the US Treasury Securities held by foreigners (as of January, 2009 source: The US Treasury).
That’s $739.6 billion dollars. And thus, one might speculate, 739.6 billion reasons why Americans have had to put up with substandard tires, lead in painted toys, counterfeit substances in heparin, anti-freeze in toothpaste, and God-knows-what in toxic Chinese drywall.
It’s criminal, what some families are going through. Especially in this economy, which is still in the doldrums with far too many people out of work, it’s that much harder to realize the great American Dream of home ownership. And once you separate the wheat from the chaff and ferret out those who accepted choking mortgages for palaces and estates their income levels suggest they have no business of
Chinese Drywall: Here doggy, doggy!
September 11th, 2009. By AbiK
There was an article in the Palm Beach Post earlier in the week about…what else? Chinese drywall! Well, you can’t blame the folks in Palm Beach and Broward Counties—it’s a daily nuisance (or worse) they have to live with. But, they might be getting some help—from dogs.
If you’ve ever had the pleasure of getting “frisked” by some gnarling, ferocious dogs as you’re tooling through customs in Miami International Airport, you know what dogs are capable of sniffing out. So I’m all for this one.
According to the Palm Beach Post article, defective Chinese drywall can be difficult to locate with real accuracy—and air quality tests don’t necessarily register high levels of sulfur. That one stopped me cold: all the hoopla about “professional” testing of homes for Chinese drywall to date has pretty much focused on air quality tests—and they may not necessarily detect it?
Give it to the dogs!
The article goes on to quote American K-9 president, Mark Mahler, as saying “The more I read about Chinese drywall, the more I’m committed to getting some dogs trained and get them out there to help.” He also noted that dog training could begin in a matter of weeks.
Another little tidbit from Mahler: Dogs’ sense of smell is up to 40x stronger than humans. While humans have about 5 million olfactory cells, dogs average 220 to 250.
Chinese Drywall: Happy New Year!
September 6th, 2009. By AbiK
You can either choose to look at it as glass half-full, or glass half-empty. I’m betting that folks who’ve been living in the hell known as Chinese drywall have been looking at it as glass all-the-way empty and are somewhat numb by now to any developments in this story.
The latest is that now we have a target date for the inaugural Chinese drywall case going to court: January 2010.
U.S. District Judge Eldon Fallon told lawyers this week that he’s looking for them to select six plaintiffs whose cases will begin to be heard early next year. For anyone who’s been keeping
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