4OYS investigation reveals shoddy repairs
Posted at: 11/14/2012 7:00 PM
By: Chris Ramirez, KOB Eyewitness News 4
A couple already faced with mental and physical challenges are bracing for another winter in a house that is miserable to live in.
Michael Candelaria has Posttraumatic Stress Disorder and his wife Rebecca has a brain tumor. Michael applied for a $40,000 grant with Bernalillo County. The grant covered home repair projects for qualifying low-income families to rehabilitate their home.
Private contractors bid on the project. According to documents discovered by 4 On Your Side, Mountain Edge Construction won this job.
The couple thinks think the contractor short changed them. For example, the contract called for new flooring, and it appeared it didn't happen.
the Candelarias said their home is on worse shape than before the construction started. 4OYS took this information to the county.
"There are some people that we are not going to satisfy," Irene Serna of the Bernalillo County Housing Department said.
Serna said the county put in an additional $4,000 worth of repairs above the grant to help the Candelarias. She also said the work passed two inspections; one by the county and one by the New Mexico Finance Authority.
Serna worried that the Candelarias thought they were going to get a home makeover, not a rehabilitation.
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