Dozens of households are suing Balfour Beatty Communities, alleging poisonous residing situations and accusing the corporate of “shoddy upkeep practices and company indifference or ineptitude” at its privatized army housing neighborhood at Naval Air Station Key West, Florida.
Forty-four of the 56 households within the grievance are army households. The remaining plaintiffs, civilian households, have been permitted to dwell locally when house was obtainable. Many youngsters are among the many 192 present and former residents named within the lawsuit, which was filed in state court docket in Monroe County, Florida, on March 27.
Households reported points similar to collapsing ceilings due to water harm, mould, insect infestation, structural defects, HVAC and plumbing points, electrical issues and the presence of lead paint and asbestos, in keeping with the lawsuit. Balfour Beatty leases and manages greater than 43,000 properties throughout 55 Military, Navy and Air Pressure installations, together with 700 housing items at NAS Key West.
“Balfour hid the horrific situations from unsuspecting service women and men and their households,” the 175-page grievance alleges. “When these situations have been found and reported, Balfour systematically didn’t correctly restore and remediate vital issues within the properties,” the plaintiffs declare, and “Balfour misled the households into believing that repairs have been made, understanding that households residing within the properties would doubtless undergo critical well being issues on account of the situations.”
The lawsuit alleges the households suffered from extreme bodily, emotional and monetary hurt due to the situation of the homes and Balfour’s actions.
“We’re conscious of the grievance and intend to defend ourselves vigorously,” Balfour Beatty Communities officers mentioned in an e mail assertion to Army Occasions.
The households allege they’ve skilled exposure-related medical issues on account of the housing situations, similar to bronchial asthma and different respiratory points, sinusitis, migraines, reminiscence loss, mind fog, blurred imaginative and prescient, compromised immune techniques and rashes. Among the households acknowledged that after they would go away the home for a time, their signs would disappear, however would begin once more after they returned to the home.
The households accuse Balfour Beatty of gross negligence, fraud, breach of contract, negligent infliction of emotional misery and breach of guarantee of habitability. They ask for an unspecified quantity of compensatory damages and punitive damages.
Plaintiff Virginia Guess mentioned her youngsters developed persistent respiratory points and different well being issues inside months of transferring into their residence at NAS Key West in June 2022. They developed the “Sigsbee cough,” a label utilized by neighbors and academics to explain a cough in youngsters who lived in Key West’s army housing. The Sigsbee Park housing consists of greater than 500 townhouse items, lots of which have been constructed between 1962 and 1965, in keeping with the grievance.
Guess, a development supervisor who began working for Balfour Beatty in August 2023 as a service heart coordinator, “rapidly acknowledged alarming patterns of negligence in housing upkeep,” in keeping with the lawsuit. It hit residence when the Guess’s ceiling began to crack in February 2024. However Balfour Beatty delayed wanted repairs, the grievance alleges, and by June of that yr, there was water intrusion and mould progress. An impartial moisture studying inspection discovered extreme mould contamination.
“But Balfour administration tried to shift blame, attributing the mould to ‘canine hair’ and extreme ‘pasta boiling,’” the lawsuit states.
Different relations who labored for Balfour Beatty alleged they witnessed firm workers partaking in “fraudulent and misleading practices.” Plaintiff Lyric Seaton alleges workers have been “instructed to mislead Navy housing inspectors, block seen harm, and choose solely ‘good’ information for audits.”
Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, D-Fla., requested Grasp Chief Petty Officer of the Navy James Honea about among the allegations in opposition to Balfour Beatty throughout a congressional listening to on service members’ quality-of-life challenges on April 8.
“This lawsuit even claims that Balfour Beatty officers blocked Navy personnel from inspecting homes in some circumstances,” Wasserman Shultz mentioned.
Honea mentioned he didn’t have details about particular allegations.
“I do know that each the set up commander and their groups did undergo all of the housing down there at Key West,” Honea mentioned, noting that Naval Installations Command officers inspected among the properties. “We did a full stock of all these properties and decided a sure portion of them to be uninhabitable. Balfour Beatty paid for these members to be moved and positioned in different properties or momentary housing as essential.”
Mould infestation was a typical grievance among the many households. Sections of the McCarthy household’s storage ceiling collapsed on two events in 2023 and 2024, revealing mould, water harm, decaying trusses and intensive termite tunnels. When the army household moved to momentary housing in Could 2024, they awakened in the course of their first night time lined in bugs, in keeping with the grievance. So that they returned to their unique home, the place 5 months later, water started pouring from their kitchen’s lighting fixtures, saturating the ceiling, dripping down partitions and seeping by cupboards.
When Balfour upkeep seemed on the kitchen’s situation, they claimed every thing seemed regular, the go well with alleges.
“The Balfour report notes that, ‘The mould appears good,’” the lawsuit states.
Lots of the households within the lawsuit mentioned they’d no alternative however to remain in harmful situations. The Moody household moved out in October 2024 after two years, paying for greater than $5,000 in transferring bills. The energetic obligation household mentioned they skilled water leaks within the roof, ceiling, partitions and electrical shops and protracted mould infestation. They are saying their toddler son suffered persistent well being issues. His mom fears publicity to mould and different hazards throughout his early growth may result in lung issues or different issues later in life, in keeping with the grievance.
“The guilt that she had no alternative however to convey her new child residence to a harmful and unsafe home is overwhelming,” the lawsuit states.
Balfour Beatty has beforehand come beneath scrutiny for subpar residing situations in army housing. The corporate pleaded responsible in 2021 to committing fraud in opposition to the U.S. and was ordered to pay $65 million in fines and restitution for misconduct regarding its army housing practices in federal contracts. The corporate additionally agreed to pay $35 million to resolve a False Claims Act civil go well with introduced by the federal government.
Karen has lined army households, high quality of life and client points for Army Occasions for greater than 30 years, and is co-author of a chapter on media protection of army households within the guide “A Battle Plan for Supporting Army Households.” She beforehand labored for newspapers in Guam, Norfolk, Jacksonville, Fla., and Athens, Ga.
