COLOMBIA, SC – A provision included in the $ 900 billion COVID-19 relief bill, signed by President Donald Trump this week, will require carbon monoxide detectors in all federally subsidized homes.
The new rules come nearly two years after two residents of the Allen Benedict Court housing project in Columbia died of a gas leak there. The application of the city code subsequently found 869 code violations on the property, including missing carbon monoxide detectors.
An investigation by NBC News revealed that at least 13 public housing residents across the country have died of carbon monoxide poisoning since 2013.
The project provides $ 300 million in funding over three years to help place carbon monoxide detectors in all public housing units, as well as private residential units whose owners receive federal subsidies.
United States Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina said he was pleased to see the willingness receive unequivocal support from his colleagues in the House and Senate. Spurred on by the two deaths at Allen Benedict Court, Scott co-drafted an earlier Senate bill that would require detectors.
“Even a life lost due to carbon monoxide poisoning is too much,” said Scott, a Republican. “By requiring carbon monoxide detectors in public housing, we will keep more families safe and sound.”
Scott said the new provision was supported by South Carolina Housing Codes and Recovery Council Officials, the South Carolina Housing Authority Association of Executive Directors, Columbia City and 27 South Carolina Housing Authorities. South.
Ivory Mathews, the current director of the Columbia Housing Authority, said she was grateful for Scott’s dedication to getting the rules passed. Last November, she testified before Congress in support of her co-authored legislation.
In his testimony, Mathews said that Columbia Housing had previously installed carbon monoxide detectors on all of its public housing properties, but that additional funding for such security measures was crucial.
“It is very important for us to have these rules to govern ourselves, to ensure that we make and keep our residents safe and to provide a safe and healthy housing environment for everyone,” she said. “Our hearts, thoughts and prayers are always with the families of the men who died and we will certainly do everything we can to ensure that a tragedy like this never happens again.”
Rebecca Liebson’s story, The State.