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Asbestos presence was detected when debris from a third-floor ceiling in the Newark Municipal Building was tested.
Asbestos was present in the ceiling of two adult probation offices where vents were being replaced. This was revealed in the preliminary results received Friday and the final results Monday by the city administration.
The fourth floor was added in 1977 to the building which had been built 10 years before that. The areas completed after 1981 were found asbestos free.
The area was cleaned Saturday by the North American Environmental Ltd., Columbus. They took five air samples after the cleaning found no asbestos remaining in the area.
The adult probation offices were closed Monday for additional air sampling
Asbestos presence will be checked and tested in the entire building, especially in offices having a plaster ceiling and no drop ceiling.
As a part of the contract with the city to improve heating, Honeywell is working in the city building and they are upgrading ventilation air diffusers for about six weeks. Some employees are very much concerned about the dust created during the process. One of the employees had raised concerns last week about dust on the third floor. After this, the company was asked to test for asbestos.
"One employee who used to be a paralegal for Owens Corning litigation happened to walk into another employee's office, and she said this looks like a lot of the pictures in that litigation process," said Michael Higgins, the Municipal Court Judge.
Chris Hess, Service Director Dave Calhoun and Citizen Services Director Marti Kolb met with department heads late Monday as representatives of Honeywell to say about the finding.
Kolb said that the company was willing to conduct employee meetings.
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