Durham council members aren’t going to Costa Rica amid McDougald Terrace fiasco
Two Durham City Council members aren’t going to a sister city in Costa Rica after residents criticized them for planning to be out of the country while hundreds of people are displaced from their homes at McDougald Terrace.
The trip, which other members of the Sister Cities program are still going on, to Tilaran, Costa Rica, was discussed at a Jan. 23 City Council meeting where residents of McDougald Terrace weren’t initially allowed to speak. Some members of the community were critical of council member Javiera Caballero and Mayor Pro Tempore Jillian Johnson for planning the trip while about 280 families remain displaced from McDougald Terrace, the city’s largest and oldest public housing complex.
The Durham Housing Authority complex, which scored a 31 out of 100 in its 2019 federal inspection, was evacuated in early January because of carbon monoxide exposure, mold and other deteriorating conditions. The nearly 900 displaced residents are staying in hotels through Feb. 21 at the least, until repairs are finished at McDougald Terrace.
Ashley Canady, president of the McDougald Terrace residents council, called the news of the trip “disgusting” in a CBS 17 report on Jan. 22.
“That is the most disgusting thing I’ve heard of in all my life,” Canady said in the CBS 17 report. “When they’re over there in Costa Rica, they are having a good time. But we are still living over here in poverty, we are still living with mold, and we are still living with carbon monoxide issues. That is unacceptable.”
The two City Council members were scheduled to attend part of the trip that is still being taken by Durham’s sister cities delegation in February.
Johnson, the City Council liaison on the DHA board of commissioners, and Caballero were scheduled to go to Costa Rica from Feb. 7 to Feb. 13.
Caballero said her expenses for the trip would have been about $1,000. The money would have come out of her travel budget. Each City Council member is allotted funding for conferences and other city-related travel, she said.
“There was nothing unscrupulous about it, “ Caballero said. She said the money for the trip comes from a different area of the city budget than will likely be used to help McDougald Terrace, but “we wanted to be sensitive during this time.”
Johnson wrote in a text message the decision to not go was because they “didn’t want to be insensitive to the situation at McDougald Terrace.”
New CO Detectors
The Mebane-based Kidde company has donated 500 carbon monoxide detectors to be given out across Durham, the Durham Fire Department announced Friday. Kidde sells fire safety products like smoke alarms, CO detectors and fire extinguishers. The donation is valued at $12,495, or $24.99 per detector.
The fire department said the CO alarms will be installed over the next year in homes of people who cannot afford to purchase them and during “Safety in Our City” canvassing events.
The Consumer Product Safety Commission calls carbon monoxide, also known as CO, the “Invisible Killer” because it’s a colorless, odorless, poisonous gas, according to the CPSC website.
More than 10 McDougald Terrace residents had to be treated for CO exposure before evacuations began. DHA is spending millions on new stoves and repairs to heating systems that were leaking the hazardous gas at the complex.
Every year an average of 430 people die in the United States from accidental CO poisoning linked to faulty, improperly used or incorrectly vented furnaces, stoves, water heaters and fireplaces, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
This story was originally published January 31, 2020 at 12:41 PM with the headline "Durham council members aren’t going to Costa Rica amid McDougald Terrace fiasco."
