Employment Dept. to Reoccupy Offices This Week

PORTLAND-Oregon Employment Department says it won’t know until Wednesday when it will be able to reoccupy downtown offices it vacated in late March due to a mold problem. Building owner Harsch Investment Properties, meanwhile, says the state never needed to vacate the building, the mold in the ceiling tiles was cleaned up long before they did move out and a permanent fix was completed Friday.

OED vacated the building at 1433 SW Sixth Ave. on March 29, but Harsch Investment’s Kathleen Schultz says her company was notified of the problem on Friday, March 2, and removed the offending ceiling tiles the same day. The following Monday, the company had a environmental hygienist come in and take sample back to the lab for analysis, and then the entire office cleaned.

The analysis that came back a couple of weeks later showed the mold spores were confined to a small portion of the building, says Schultz. The solution suggested was to remove the moldy tiles, which Harsch already had accomplished, and to fix a leaky HVAC duct that Harsch had since determined was the culprit and had already begun repairing.