Legal News

City Controller Finds Filth, Possibly Asbestos in Police Districts

By Brian Harris

By Amaris Elliott-Engel
Of the Legal Staff
 
The city's police districts, including locations where preliminary hearings are held in criminal cases, are in desperate need of repair, according to a City Controller's report released Wednesday.

Among the problems documented by the office's investigation were potential asbestos contamination in floor tiles at the 5th Police District in Northwest Philadelphia; human feces covering the walls and the floor in a jail cell shared by the 2nd and 15th Police Districts in Northeast Philadelphia; and cockroach infestations in the 2nd District, 12th District in Southwest Philadelphia, the 15th District, the 3rd District in South Philadelphia, and the 22nd/23rd District in North Philadelphia.

A review by the office found that in 15 of 23 police districts there were dirty and unsanitary cell conditions because sinks and toilets were either clogged, broken or leaking.

District Attorney Seth Williams and others have expressed interest in moving preliminary hearings out of station houses  for reasons apart from the condition of the police districts' physical plant. But City Controller Alan Butkovitz said he would be "loathe to suggest a Band-Aid approach" and leave unaddressed the poor conditions of police buildings by moving preliminary hearings to venues such as the Criminal Justice Center.

Butkovitz acknowledged that the city is in tight fiscal straits. But the repairs that are needed would address potential violations of the city's codes, which are designed to prevent catastrophic loss of life, Butkovitz said.

Butkovitz recommended that the city appropriate $50,000 per police district for a total of $1.2 million to address immediately any dangerous electrical service conditions and to repair leaking roofs.

The City Controller conducted a review of the city's 23 police district facilities in 2006. Butkovitz said that most of the poor and unsafe conditions identified in 2006 still have not been fixed.
Police facilities are on average 50 years old, according to the office's report.

Full post as published by The Legal Intelligencer Blog on June 02, 2010 (boomark / email).