2023-06-01 20:31:53
In early May, a man committed suicide because he was troubled by the water seepage problem in his unit for a long time, which aroused social concern. A To Kwa Wan resident suffered from water seepage upstairs, and the walls and ceilings of the toilet and kitchen were all peeled off. However, the Joint Office for Water Seepage Complaints and Investigations of the Government has not confirmed the source of the seepage for a year. The problem has spread to the outer wall, forcing her to give up her job and deal with it first. question. Lin Bo, deputy secretary-general of the Kowloon District Residents’ Association, said that the Water Seepage Office is slow to follow up and only accepts cases with a humidity of 35% or above, which has troubled the neighborhood. He suggested that the Water Seepage Office lower the investigation threshold and set up a special water seepage arbitration office Follow up to expedite handling of incidents.
Text: Tsang Wai-lung
Ms. Li (pseudonym), the owner of a 50-year-old building in To Kwa Wan, said that she found dust on the kitchen ceiling of her unit since July 2009, and then the toilet ceiling bricks burst, and there was even a 1-square-foot water seepage in the kitchen in May last year. The toilet and the kitchen were almost completely “scarred”, and there were even cracks in the beams spanning the kitchen from the toilet. She had sought help from the Water Seepage Office in May last year, but the upstairs tenant was not the owner. The Water Seepage Office did not test the water pipes of the upstairs unit until early September, but failed to find the source of the water seepage. The unit has water seepage.
Water seepage not only affects the decoration, but also damages the structure of the building. Ms. Li pointed out that there were cracks on the outer wall of the building near her unit. After discovering the problem in February, the Buildings Department sent a letter to ask the building corporation to repair it. She estimated that the crack was caused by water seepage from the upstairs unit, and then flowed into her unit through the outer wall. The cause of the water seepage has not yet been resolved, and now all the owners are required to share the relevant maintenance costs, which bothers her. As a result, she temporarily put down her work to concentrate on dealing with the incident, and lost a lot of money and time.
Group pushes for establishment of arbitration board to simplify procedures
Lin Bo, deputy secretary-general of the Kowloon District Residents’ Association, said that there are many old buildings in old areas such as To Kwa Wan. He receives an average of four or five water seepage complaints every day in summer, but the investigation by the Water Seepage Office is slow, and can last up to three to four years. He continued to point out that many residents of flats that did not reach the threshold of 35% humidity investigation have only worsened their problems. He hopes to follow up when the humidity reaches 5% or 10%. He also suggested that the government establish a water seepage arbitration office to simplify the investigation process and mediation function.
Kowloon City Councilor Yang Yongjie, who is concerned regarding water seepage in old buildings, said that the buildings in the district are seriously aging. His office has received more than 10 complaints in the past month, and none of them have been resolved following complaining to the government. He criticized that the JO’s current use of color water testing is too backward, and new technologies such as infrared analysis and microwave tomography should be used more widely.
Lawyer Liang Yongkeng said that if the owner pursues the claim through legal channels, he needs to prove that the water seepage was caused by the unit above. If the Water Seepage Office cannot prove it, the owner may have to hire a notary firm or surveyor to verify it.
The JO responded that the JO received regarding 120,000 reports from 2020 to 2022, and as of February 8 this year, there were still 10,604 investigations that had not been completed. The JO has tried infrared thermal imaging analysis and microwave tomography in 12 areas since June 2018 to improve the success rate of finding the source of water seepage, and explained that it is effective to set the humidity level at the location of water seepage at 35% or above as the standard for investigation Use resources.
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