State Agency Testing Sample Of Trailers For Formaldehyde

Wednesday, August 22nd 2007, 3:08 pm

By: News On 6

TULSA, Okla. (AP) -- A state agency is testing a batch of surplus Federal Emergency Management Agency-issued travel trailers for high levels of formaldehyde, a week after a Tahlequah man said he became ill after staying in one for less than a half-hour.

Tests were done Friday and Monday for the carcinogen -- which is found in building supplies, such as plywood and carpet -- on five of 15 trailers stored at a federal surplus property site in Oklahoma City.

"If it comes back and it's high, we'll address that," said Jerry Holland of the state's Department of Central Services Property Distribution Division, the coordinating agency for state and local groups wanting to acquire excess federal property.

Holland expects test results in a week to 10 days, but says he doesn't think they will show anything.

The trailers in Oklahoma City came from several states, including Alabama, Arkansas and Texas, and are among the thousands left over after hurricanes Katrina and Rita ravaged the Gulf Coast in 2005. In Oklahoma, various agencies have received 300 surplus FEMA trailers for temporary housing, offices or storage.

"Our trailers are not for long-term occupancy," Holland said Wednesday.

Some of the travel trailers have been linked to health problems. A federal lawsuit recently filed on behalf of 500 Louisiana residents included claims that hurricane survivors were exposed to dangerous levels of formaldehyde in some of the 120,000 FEMA-issued trailers.

This month, the federal agency announced it would no longer sell or ship travel trailers for hurricane evacuees while it probed the health-related concerns. FEMA also said it would move thousands of hurricane victims out of the trailers.

Across the country, nearly 19,500 travel trailers have been sold at government auctions, donated or disbursed through states' surplus property programs, according to FEMA figures through late July.

Tahlequah resident Don Sellman got his surplus trailer through the Cookson Hills Community Action Foundation Inc., a nonprofit agency that acquired 84 travel trailers and mobile homes through the state.

The agency says it has distributed 29 units so far, and Sellman's has been the only one that has drawn a complaint.

"If (the formaldehyde) is in one, it will probably be in others," said Cleon Harrell, executive director of the agency. "If this is a problem, we'd like to know about it."

Sellman, fresh out of welding school and looking for a place he and his family could stay until he found work, received his trailer through the agency's Bridges Out of Poverty program.

Sellman pays $175 a month for the trailer and was to own it in four years under the program.

But he said last week he can't spend more than 25 minutes inside because he gets sick to his stomach and his eyes water and turn bloodshot. His wife won't let their infant daughters sleep in the trailer's bunk beds for fear they may become sick.

The property manager of the mobile home park is allowing them to use an empty spare trailer while she awaits results of a formaldehyde test she ordered.

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7/20/2007 On Heels Of Formaldehyde Complaints, FEMA Announces Plans To Test Trailer Air Quality

7/22/2007 - Officials Delay Lending FEMA Trailers To Displaced Miami Residents

7/23/2007 Formaldehyde Concerns Delay Distribution Of FEMA Trailers

8/2/2007 FEMA Says No To Trailers For Miami

8/3/2007 The Truth Of Formaldehyde And FEMA Trailers

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