Dan Gels explain the problems they have had in their Ross Bridge home they attriubte to drywall manufactured in China.(The Birmingham News / Michelle Campbell)A growing number of metro Birmingham homeowners are speaking out about the property damage and health problems they trace to Chinese drywall, the defective wallboard that's been linked to similar troubles across the nation.
While Alabama hasn't been a hotspot for the issue -- millions of dollars of damage has been reported in hard-hit Florida and Louisiana -- local homeowners dealing with it are looking to raise awareness.
A town hall meeting is scheduled Tuesday at 6:30 p.m. at Discovery United Methodist Church in Hoover. It's an event aimed at sharing more information about Chinese drywall and pressing state and local leaders for action.
"We need the Alabama politicians to get involved and get us some help," said Michelle Gels, a Hoover resident whose Ross Bridge home contains the problematic drywall. "We need them to step up for their constituents, and that hasn't happened here."
Gels and her husband, Dan, moved their family out of their home and into a nearby apartment last year while they grappled with the effects of the drywall, which they blame for the failure of numerous appliances, as well as developmental delays in their young children.
There's a lack of studies on long-term exposure to the suspect drywall, which was imported during the U.S. housing boom of the mid-2000s and is believed to be tainted with sulfuric compounds.
"We didn't want to find out five years from now that we made a mistake," Dan Gels said of the decision to move out, taking on additional living expenses while continuing to pay the upkeep for his house.
Since leaving the home, the couple says their family's health problems have cleared up.
Nationwide, it's difficult to get a handle on the extent of the Chinese drywall problem, amid scores of lawsuits filed by homeowners. But the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, which has been investigating the issue, cites more than 3,700 complaints from residents in 41 states.
Complaints from Alabama number 213, or about 6 percent of that total. But area lawyers say they represent at least several hundred clients scattered across metro Birmingham who have experienced drywall problems.
Bart Fletcher, executive officer of the Greater Birmingham Association of Homebuilders, said he is aware of individual builders who are affected by the issue, but is not aware of it being a widespread problem.
Across the Birmingham area, homeowners who have already gone public tell similar stories: a rotten-egg smell, failed air conditioning coils, broken-down refrigerators, tarnished silver and faulty smoke detectors.
Experts say the toxins in the drywall combine with moisture in the air to corrode all types of metal, including the wires in household appliances.
In addition, homeowners report headaches, respiratory problems, fatigue and nosebleeds.
For the Gelses, air conditioner problems were the first sign of trouble after they moved in 2006 into Ross Bridge's Bellevue neighborhood, where homes are priced at about $400,000 and up.
They weren't alarmed at having nine service calls for their air conditioner during the first year in their home, thinking there was a problem with the installation. But oddities began piling up.
A television failed, along with a washing machine and several small appliances. Dan Gels, an insurance litigation lawyer, developed sleep apnea, and the couple's three preschool and school-aged children developed rashes and other maladies.
"Every morning they would get up and sit at the breakfast table and just cough," said Michelle Gels, who works in marketing.
By August 2009, the Gelses started investigating whether they had the problem drywall after being alerted to the possibility by a friend in Florida. They determined that the drywall in their home is stamped with the name of a manufacturer, Knauf, that has been linked to the issue.
Their builder, Vintage Homes, went out of business in 2007 amid the construction industry slowdown, but the Gelses have filed a lawsuit against Knauf, part of a group of similar claims filed on behalf of thousands of homeowners. The cases have been consolidated, and Knauf and other defendants have agreed to pay for repairs in 200 homes across the Southeast, including nine in Alabama.
Brian Collins, the Birmingham lawyer representing those homeowners, as well as the Gelses, said that pilot program is expected to be expanded to all of the plaintiffs.
However, the issue isn't over for homeowners like the Gelses, who are not a part of the pilot program and say they don't know when their home might be repaired. There's also the issue of homeowners who aren't involved in a lawsuit or may not be aware that they have the problem drywall.
Tuesday's town hall meeting is the result of a grassroots effort among metro Birmingham homeowners who have been dealing with the effects of the drywall, including others living in Ross Bridge, Michelle Gels said.
Expected at the meeting are local mayors, as well as representatives from the offices of Sens. Richard Shelby and Jeff Sessions. There also will be a tutorial on Chinese drywall and the status of the federal investigation.
The Gelses say they want state and local leaders to become involved on the national stage, like their peers in Florida and Louisiana.
"I knew the toll this had taken on my family from a health standpoint and from a financial standpoint," Michelle Gels said of the push behind next week's meeting. "I wanted to see if there was anything I could do to bring people together, and then we would have more strength as a group than as an individual."
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