Mayor Nutter: Philly Overhauling Demolitions

Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter says the city is changing the way buildings are demolished in response to a demolition gone awry that killed six people and injured 13 more this week.

Speaking to reporters Friday, Nutter said that every active demolition site in the city is being inspected for safety.

All new demolition activities will have new standards for permission, including site safety plans, inspections by engineers and prohibitions on the use of machinery if the site is next to an occupied building.

The move comes in response to the demolition Wednesday in which a four-story building collapsed onto a neighboring Salvation Army thrift store.

A worker at a Salvation Army store adjacent to a building in the process of being torn down was sorting clothes when she heard rumbling and was suddenly buried, a lawyer for her said Friday as a shopper joined the woman in her lawsuit against the demolition contractor.

Nadine White, a 54-year-old mother of three, had worked at the thrift store for about eight months. She was in the back of the store when she "heard a rumble and a wall collapsed on her," attorney Larry Bendesky said.

A second plaintiff, Linda Bell, joined the lawsuit. Bell, a 50-year-old mother of three, was shopping when the collapse happened. She fell into the basement and was covered by rubble for more than an hour.

"She's pretty shook up, in a lot of pain," her attorney Joseph Marrone said.

Their lawsuit against demolition contractor Griffin Campbell gained speed as the rescue operation from Wednesday's collapse wound down.

Robert Mongeluzzi, another of White's attorneys, said Campbell violated several federal safety regulations, while building owner Richard Basciano should have picked a more qualified and competent contractor to do the work.

"This is the most egregious construction accident I think I've ever been involved in," said Mongeluzzi, who has represented hundreds of plaintiffs in construction accidents and is considered a top lawyer in the field.

The lawyers received permission Friday from a judge to bring in experts to videotape and photograph the continuing demolition work by the city from a safe distance. Common Pleas Court Judge Ellen Ceisler ruled that once the site is deemed safe, experts for all parties can inspect the remaining debris.

"From what we can understand, given (Campbell's) checkered past, and what appears to be a total lack of experience and know-how, we believe that was a grossly negligent selection," Mongeluzzi said Thursday.

A man who answered the phone Friday at Campbell's home said he was not home, and Campbell's cellphone voicemail box was full. Peter Greiner, attorney for Basciano, was in a meeting Friday and did not immediately return a call.

Campbell has previously been arrested on charges involving drugs, assault and insurance fraud and has had two bankruptcy filings. His daughter, Dominique Lee, who answered the door at his home, said Thursday that he wasn't there but was "mourning the loss of those people just like everyone else."

The four-story building toppled onto the thrift store on Philadelphia's busy Market Street, killing six people, including a woman working her first day at the store. Thirteen people were injured.

The collapse has brought swift and mounting fallout in a city where demolition contractors are lightly regulated. Officials have begun inspecting hundreds of demolition sites citywide, and a city councilman charged that dangerous, under-the-radar tear-downs are taking place throughout Philadelphia.

The Department of Licenses and Inspections said it had 300 open demolition permits throughout the city; inspectors had visited about 30 of the sites by Thursday afternoon and planned to get to the rest by next week.

The spot inspections included all four construction and demolition sites connected to Campbell. The city found violations at two of the Campbell sites and ordered a halt to the work.

Councilman James Kenney, among others, called for a review of the demolition application and inspection process and demanded a stricter process for demolition companies.

"This is happening all over the city," he said. "I need to know who the workers are who are there, what they know, what they don't know, how they've been trained."

The city does check the condition of buildings to be torn down before demolition can begin — and inspects them again after the tear-down is finished — but does not require an inspection during demolition. A pre-demolition inspection at the site on May 14 turned up no issues, said Carlton Williams, head of the city's Department of Licenses and Inspections.

Pennsylvania does not license demolition contractors, nor does the city. Williams said the city code does not require demolition contractors to show any proficiency in tearing down buildings.

"Buildings get demolished all the time in the city of Philadelphia with active buildings right next to them. ... They're done safely in this city all the time," Mayor Michael Nutter said Thursday. "Something obviously went wrong here yesterday and possibly in the days leading up to it. That's what the investigation is for."

Nutter said he was unaware of any complaints about the demolition work done by Campbell in the days before the tragedy. But the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration said it had gotten a complaint May 15 that workers at the site were at risk of falling. The complaint was still open at the time of the disaster, U.S. Labor Department spokeswoman Leni Uddyback-Fortson said.

OSHA regulates the demolition industry and enforces standards meant to ensure worker safety. Among other things, its regulations forbid any wall section exceeding one story to stand alone without bracing, unless the wall was designed that way. Witnesses have said they saw a 30-foot section of unbraced wall before the collapse.

A video of the demolition taken the Sunday before the collapse showed bricks raining down on the sidewalk as a worker used a backhoe and claw to remove a second-story front wall.

The sidewalk and the staircase leading up from a subway stop appeared open to pedestrians despite the falling bricks. Cars and trucks could also be seen going past, just a few feet away.

Copyright 2013 The Associated Press.