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Urgent: Lead Remediation of Home for My Great Nieces
0% complete
$1,855 raised of
31 donations
Please help remediate lead paint that's poisoning my great nieces!
My niece and her family are currently struggling with a situation no young parents should ever be put in. They purchased the house they are in for their family because they had to vacate the house they had been renting and were out of time, so they bought the only they could get in time so as to not end up displaced. They knew the exterior was likely lead, but they were unaware that almost every surface inside the house was going to test positive for lead as well. They made that unfortunate discovery when the baby tested high on a routine lead check and the State came in and tested the entire house.
At this time, my youngest great niece has an extremely high lead level as you can see in the picture. She's walking now, and the walls and old sealed-off mantle also are positive for lead and they have no way to cover those other than paint. Unfortunately, due to them being a young family who recently started out, they are not financially prepared to address the entire house at once, which unfortunately they need to do in order to protect the girls.
They are a very private couple and are very much determined to make it on their own, but sometimes it takes a village for a young family to make it to a healthy, happy place and I'm asking my village to help in any way you can, even if it's just sharing this post for us please! I'll be the first to admit my niece did not want me to make this for her but honestly? Pride be damned, let's help these young parents help their girls!!! (Help me make it worth incurring her wrath for doing this despite her privacy wishes!! )
Realistically, $10,000 won't even do it. I'm just hoping that we can crowdsource enough to take care of the inside. All surfaces inside need to be painted with lead encapsulating paint (to the tune of $80 a gallon for primer only), windows and doors have to be replaced, and all floors need to be covered over (the person they're working with from the State Lead Remediation Program is unsure if it's just lead dust sealed into the floors or if the original sealant had lead in it).
And that's just the inside! The wrap-around porch, exterior of the house, and garage are all lead as well, but that's a problem for later.
At this point, they've resorted to using duct tape (at the instruction of the Lead Remediation person) on trim that the baby can touch and have put carpets and peel-and-stick tiles on the floors, but her lead levels recently shot up to over 30 (even 5 is too high!) so they have to attack the whole house correctly because obviously the stop-gap measures aren't enough. The grant and loan program the State offers to help remediate these homes does not cover enough to remediate the interior completely, and they won't even allow you to access it without agreeing to do the whole house. Mom is home with the kiddos handling all the appointments and therapies related to the lead poisoning and the delays it causes, and with one income they can't afford to take on what would essentially be another mortgage payment.
Please share, and any amount of money you can spare would be put to good use. It only takes 8 donations of $10 to buy a gallon of primer!!!!!
And yes, they know they're going to be living in a completely primer white, institutional-looking place when it's done until they can afford to splurge on pretty paint, but all they care about is getting the house safe for the girls! Thanks for any help! ♥️
Organizer and beneficiary
Taressa Morrill
Beneficiary




