Death of tenant worries LaSalle seniors

By Tracey Arial, August 29th, 2012

Tenants have questions and concerns after the death of Tess Chodakoska, a 62-year-old woman who lived in apartment 107 at 760 Gamelin. How did she die? Why didn't their landlord verify the situation when tenants initially complained? Why does the hallway next to the apartment still smell? “We started calling on the Monday because of the smell,” a neighbour said. “The city said they would send someone to check, but no one came. They don't care. Finally, a lady in the building from the second floor called the fire department and the police. If it wasn't for the firemen and the police, she would still be there.”Police say that they found Mme. Chodakoska's body on Thursday, Aug. 16 at 2:10 in the afternoon after they were called in by firefighters. The woman died of natural causes. Her body was sent to the coroner at 6 p.m. that night.
A week later, tenants were calling The Suburban complaining that they could still smell something despite the back doors of the building being jammed open during the day and a fan blowing in the apartment day and night.
Louise Hebert, the spokesperson for the Office municipal d'habitation de Montreal, which owns the building, said that tenants may smell odours in the building, but they don't come from apartment 107. “We have an ozone machine running; we have to stop it at the beginning of next week. Perhaps there are smells, but they aren't due to that situation.”Tenants don't buy it. They say that their landlord often takes short-cuts to save money even repairs are needed to protect tenants' physical or mental health. They complain that broken pipes are left leaking, mice and bed bug exterminations are done apartment by apartment instead of section by section, and moldy smells aren't investigated at all.
A shooting in front of their building in July has stressed them out even more than usual, especially since a bullet hole graced their front door until Aug. 9, when the glass was finally repaired. Since the shooting, one tenant has moved, another is in the hospital after trying to commit suicide and several others won't leave their apartments. To find out what should be been done to clean the apartment properly now, The Suburban contacted Walter Cigana, vice-president of Cleanmatik Plus. He says that his company has a two-step process that can cost $1,500 or more, but it works quickly. “If the source of the smell isn't taken care of, it isn't going to go away,” he said. “We have special products to clean these kinds of bodily fluids. We rip out carpets and throw away any textiles. For the odour, we have an ozone machine that we put it in for 24 hours or 36 hours tops. When we leave, the smells are gone.”n