Surfside Florida Neighbors Concerned After Building Collapse

Surfside tragedy: impact of climate change warned 1:11

(CNN) -

Salomon Gold hopes to celebrate his 90th birthday next month at his apartment in Champlain Towers North in Florida, where for decades he has enjoyed views of the turquoise blue waves of the Atlantic crashing at Surfside Beach.

"Do you know how much they charge at the hotel next door for one night? A thousand dollars," Gold said, a driver's cap over his bespectacled eyes and sporting a thick white mustache on his balcony, his wife Cila at his side.

"Here I have it for free."

Since the partial collapse of the Champlain Towers South twin towers last month killed at least 100 people across the block, some residents in Gold's building have chosen to evacuate.

But he not.

• Data on the partially collapsed building in Surfside, Florida

Salomon Gold says he will not be leaving his Champlain Towers North apartment.

"I'm sure this building is safe," he said.

"It's like when there are twins. I mean two brothers and the same genetics. But they are not the same. One can be a criminal and the other can be a doctor."

But some of Gold's neighbors and residents who live on other coastal properties in Florida and beyond are not as confident.

They have been anxious and nervous since the tragedy of June 24.

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"All the residents of all the associations, of all the apartments, were taking it personally. All the professionals were taking it personally and it really impressed them in a very emotional way," said Tom Skiba, executive director of the Community Associations Institute, after a brief visit to Surfside after the collapse.

Those concerns are felt outside of South Florida, where emergency re-inspections of other older buildings prompted evacuations in at least four other residential structures deemed unsafe.

"Not just our organization, but all the industry professionals, all the boards, all the managers received a high volume of calls. Just people who asked questions: Could this happen in my community, in my building? Should I be concerned about this? "said Skiba, whose organization advocates for homeowners associations.

"Some people are especially concerned"

While the cause of the Surfside collapse remains under investigation, the disaster has prompted overhauls of high-rise buildings in the area.

"People are concerned," said Surfside Mayor Charles Burkett.

"Some people are especially concerned."

One building in South Florida that has raised the alarm is Crestview Towers, about six miles north of the Surfside building.

The city of North Miami Beach earlier this month ordered its immediate closure and the evacuation of about 300 people after a report determined the structure is unsafe.

"What bothered me the most is that management has known about it since January," Crestview resident Harold Dauphin said of the building's structural and electrical problems.

• Surfside inspectors visited Champlain Towers South dozens of times.

  Now its collapse is sparking calls for reform

North Miami Beach ordered the closure of the Crestview Towers building.

(CNN)

Crestview Towers was deemed structurally and electrically unsafe based on a recertification-past-due report for the nearly 50-year-old building, according to City Manager Arthur H. Sorey III.

Crestview's attorney did not respond to multiple requests for comment from CNN.

The report was dated January 11, 2021 and was filed on July 2, Sorey said.

In it, an engineer hired by the apartment association recounted the building's structural and electrical failures.

"As residents we did not realize the situation," said Estefanía Grajales, who also lives in Crestview.

In fact, Dauphin said she first learned about the evacuations when she was picking up her 7-year-old son from the camp.

When he approached the residence recently, he said he saw helicopters flying overhead and police officers on the premises, going from floor to floor, assisting with the evacuation.

"I understand the call," he said of the evacuation order.

"It's a big decision to find out what happened at Surfside. So it's better to be safe than sorry."

Before its collapse, Champlain Towers South had been regularly visited by officials in recent years.

City of Surfside inspectors conducted permit-related inspections at the apartment tower more than once a week on average in 2018 and 2019, according to a CNN analysis of city records.

But even when an engineer hired by the building's board warned of "major structural damage" to the property, and as residents disputed funding for costly repairs, there is no record of city officials raising red flags.

Their job was to ensure compliance with permits for plumbing improvements, air conditioning repairs, and window installation, not to assess the building's structure.

• 'Shaking all the time': Surfside condo owners complained about luxury tower being built next door in Miami Beach

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The Champlain Towers South Building Association, which has been named in lawsuits accusing it of failing to maintain the building, released a statement earlier this month saying: "Responses will take time as part of a comprehensive investigation and we will continue to work with the city. , state, local and federal officials in their rescue efforts, and to understand the causes of this tragedy. "

"What is the state of our buildings here?"

Concerns about the structural integrity of apartment buildings extend beyond residents of the skyscrapers of Florida's little more than 2,000 kilometers of coastline.

About 30 million people live in high-rise buildings in the United States, according to the Institute of Community Partnerships.

In New York, three state senators are urging the state's Building Codes and Standards Division to strengthen requirements for older high-rise buildings in coastal communities, including the requirement to conduct annual inspections.

Miami Beach reviews more than 500 buildings 0:47

"We share some similarities with the Florida high-rise shoreline," said New York State Senator Todd Kaminsky, a Long Island Democrat.

"We ask ourselves the question: What is the state of our buildings here?"

In a letter earlier this month, Kaminsky and two other state senators also asked the division's code development unit to reassess standards for construction in high-risk coastal areas.

"We are hearing from concerned voters wondering about the structural integrity of their buildings," the letter said.

• Apartment owners in the Surfside building faced appraisals of $ 15 million in repairs

"There may be people who don't like the answer"

Skiba said rules about building reserves, or how much money boards of directors should have to repair a building, vary by state.

But the Surfside collapse highlights the need for a reserve standard to address structural integrity.

"The reserve rules do not address structural issues," he said.

"They address replacement items that are generally treated due to age or wear and tear."

An independent budget review had warned the Champlain Towers South apartment association that its financial reserves were critically underfunded in the face of urgently needed structural repairs just over a year before the building collapsed, according to a document obtained by CNN.

Joel Figueroa-Vallines, a member of the American Society of Civil Engineers, expressed concern about hundreds of aging properties in South Florida.

"We know there may not have been adequate maintenance or quality control," he said of the Surfside apartment building.

"So let's go out. Let's talk to the associations. Let's try to inspect them and then leave."

Allyn Kilsheimer, an 80-year-old structural engineer and veteran of forensic investigations into catastrophes like the Pentagon post-9/11 and the collapse of a pedestrian bridge at Florida International University in Miami, was hired by the city of Surfside.

Kilsheimer has been inspecting the Champlain Towers North building, ordering shingles removed from the pool deck and concrete samples drilled from the walls for a series of tests that he hopes will explain what led to the collapse of Champlain Towers South.

"There is nothing that I know of so far that tells me that this is symptomatic of apartments in the United States of America," he said.

His work is just one part of overlapping investigations involving homicide detectives, local prosecutors and government engineers, and could take years to complete.

"We'll figure it out," Kilsheimer said.

"There may be people who don't like the answer. But we will figure it out."

The north tower, sister to Champlain Towers South, had the same design architect and structural engineer.

"The same construction, the same developer, the same name, probably the same materials," Burkett said.

Gold has lived in the north tower since 1981, the year it was built, and was president of the apartment association for a decade.

He has no plans to leave, although many neighbors have left.

"I don't blame them for moving," he said.

"Everyone has to make their own decisions. It's like flying. Some people are afraid of flying."

Building Collapse Surfside