WSAZ Investigates | “Pandora’s box”: City plans to reinspect fraternities

HUNTINGTON, W.Va. (WSAZ) - Several Marshall students have living situations that are still in limbo, weeks into the school year, nearly a week after dozens were evicted from their off-campus housing.

Last Tuesday, six properties two blocks from campus, including three fraternities, failed safety inspections, and the fire marshal put up eviction notices until they were fixed. Then, the property owner Dennis Johnson changed the occupancy classification so that the state fire code no longer applied - and the eviction notices came down.

Under the new rules, four students can now live in the properties, but some students tell WSAZ they’re all moving out, especially with the uncertainty surrounding an upcoming reinspection from the City.

The properties now fall under the jurisdiction of the City, whose Chief Building Inspector Todd Darst told WSAZ he plans to inspect the properties again this week.

The original inspection reports, obtained last week from WSAZ, each property had dozens of violations, including missing carbon monoxide detectors and fire extinguishers, as well as broken fire alarms in every single one. Johnson said in a statement last Thursday he had resolved the largest safety issues.

Darst told WSAZ that he and Huntington Fire Marshal Lt. Alan Roby had no idea they would find so many dangerous violations when they first inspected the six properties as a result of a complaint.

“Typically we go on these, there’s a few minor infractions. We say, ‘hey, work on this, work on this.’ They’ll give us a plan of correction and we move on,” Darst said. “We didn’t realize we were going to walk in places that had absolutely no sprinklers, you know, multiple non-compliant issues with the NFPA, as well as the IBC.”

“We opened Pandora’s box,” he said. “We saw it, therefore we have to do something about it.”

Students say they’re aware Darst has the authority to re-evict them from the properties, should the violations not be fixed to the City’s standards, so they’re wary of moving back in. Some are looking to rent at other properties near campus, while others who can are moving back home and commuting.

Darst said he understands the timing has been “unfortunate” for the students, but they needed to act quickly. He said he’d do it again.

“Once the violations were noted, we have a due responsibility to address them,” he told WSAZ. “And there was unfortunate incidents that happened after that, but [Roby] and I both knew that what occurred had to occur. I’d rather have a hundred people complaining and one person saying, ‘thank you, you saved my child’s life.’”

Darst said he plans to inspect not only the six original properties, but several others along Fifth Avenue and around campus - both those owned by Johnson and by other landlords - after he says complaints have spiked.

“As you can imagine, I’ve received a whole lot of complaints on different homes, not necessarily all owned by Dennis, but just various landlords,” he said. “That’s just one of the things we do. We have one goal, and it’s safe, sanitary, and habitable housing for everyone.”