A luxury senior living and hotel operator in California has been hit with a $1.6 million fine for failing to comply with asbestos laws during its renovation and demolition activities.
Pacifica Senior Living Management and Pacifica Hosts, based in San Diego, reached a settlement with the Monterey County District Attorney’s Environmental Protection Unit, along with 10 other district and city attorney offices throughout the state, for asbestos-related violations that occurred at its properties.
A warning to providers
The news is no surprise to Derrick Denis, senior vice president at Phoenix-based Clark Seif Clark, an environmental health and safety company. Denis told McKnight’s Senior Living that senior living communities and other long-term care facilities, municipalities and businesses regularly violate the same 40-plus-year-old federal asbestos regulation and pay huge fines — and it’s completely avoidable.
Although most US manufacturers pulled asbestos out of their building material in the 1970s and 1980s due to litigation concerns, asbestos is not banned and still could be bought and installed in new buildings. That means that regardless of the age of a structure, building owners should not proceed with any demolition or remodeling project without checking building materials for asbestos.
“You can’t look at a material or read a safety data sheet and learn if it contains asbestos,” Denis said. “You have to sample it.”
Denis recommends that long-term care facilities test materials they touch regularly — ceiling tiles, floor tiles and drywall — so they know how to proceed if they are doing something as simple as a plumbing repair, changing a light fixture or adding a wall socket. And that testing must be completed by an Asbestos Hazard Emergency Response Act-trained certified consultant.
Asbestos is only a hazard if it is eaten or inhaled, but Denis said that it is important to know what’s in a building, to prevent anyone from being exposed when renovation, repair and demolition work is performed.
Too often, he said, building owners and managers don’t follow asbestos protocols and find themselves on the receiving end of multiple fines and citations. And those citations and fines trickle down to everyone who has command and control of a building — owners, property managers, general contractors and subcontractors.
“They all have a duty not necessarily to test, but to verify that testing has occurred,” Denis said, adding that long-term care operators should build a clause into their contracts holding the general contractor responsible for asbestos testing and liable for any associated fines if they incorrectly handle asbestos.
And most importantly, he advised, get a copy of those asbestos testing results.
“If you don’t handle asbestos correctly, people could die,” Denis said, adding that exposure can lead to asbestosis, mesothelioma and other cancers.
Testing, abating failure
A complaint to the Monterey Bay Air Resources District alerted the state of California to unpermitted work being conducted at The Park Lane, a Pacifica senior living community in Monterey, CA. Investigators reported that contractors conducted renovation and demolition activities without inspecting for asbestos and without proper notification prior to demolition, as required by the federal asbestos National Emission Standards for Hazardous Air Pollutants.
Contractors also reportedly disturbed asbestos-containing fireproofing material during their work, without taking proper safety precautions to prevent asbestos emissions. The investigation also found other asbestos-related renovation and demotion violations at other Pacifica locations throughout California, according to the county district attorney’s office.
Pacifica cooperated with prosecutors and agreed to pay $1.575 million to settle the case, which includes $1.1 million in civil penalties, $150,000 for supplemental environmental projects to benefit local air pollution control initiatives and senior services, and $200,000 in additional costs. The agreement also includes a permanent injunction requiring the company to comply with asbestos-related laws and regulations.
Pacifica had not responded to a request for comment from McKnight’s Senior Living as of the production deadline.
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