Warsaw. A problem with vermin in a block on Gibalskiego, a plot twist

The residents of the block on Gibalskiego had been struggling with the problem for a year. Ever since a new tenant moved in. He was given a social housing unit, where he started storing rubbish. First, the smell appeared, and six months later, the bugs. – Our house smells like a garbage dump. We can't open the window, breathe fresh air, eat, it's impossible – Julia told us. She also described the problem with vermin. Cockroaches and bedbugs, as she indicated, had already appeared in the next door stairwell.

When asked about the problem, officials admitted: it is very difficult to make a person who turns his apartment into a dump. A situation in which cockroaches from a neighbor crawl on their walls can last for years. Disinfection of common areas will not help if the apartment of a troublesome tenant is not cleaned, and he had to agree to this.

Now there has been a breakthrough in the case.

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– Our MOPS social workers convinced the tenant to agree to help himself. He accepted the offer of help, which included cleaning the premises. Before this could happen, four disinfections had to be carried out – Marcin Jakubik, spokesman for the Wola district, told us.

He added that the cleaning was done by a company specializing in the disposal of such waste. After the work is completed, as indicated by the district representative, the building manager – ZGN – will decide what to do with the apartment and “what other actions will be necessary to end the nuisance for the neighbors.”

– The tenant of this apartment is under the care of MOPS all the time. I cannot reveal the details of this assistance, due to the well-being of this person, but he is currently staying outside the premises – says Marcin Jakubik.

Will he return to his apartment? Officials do not know yet. – We will be able to determine the costs of cleaning the premises only after we finish these activities. Perhaps further pest control will be necessary. We are conducting the current activities at the request of MOPS Wola in cooperation with the property manager, i.e. the Property Management Plant of the Wola District – he replied when asked about the costs of such an undertaking.

He added: – I would like to emphasize that all these actions would not have been possible without the systematic work of social workers, who managed to persuade you to accept help and agree to voluntarily clean up the premises. Otherwise, it requires action on the part of the court, takes much longer and does not always end in success.

It's a story that's not lacking in cities. Usually an older person, usually very lonely. They can no longer cope with everyday life, and then – or maybe that's why – they start to collect everything they can get their hands on. At first they don't throw it away, but eventually they start to put up with it. The situation lasts for years, until the neighbors – initially unaware – start to notice the problem. Although sometimes it's not the smell that first strikes.

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– Sometimes, a downstairs neighbor sees liquids leaking from a chandelier into his apartment. Or vermin come out and only then do the neighbors get interested – says Łukasz Macander from Vector, a company that specializes in cleaning run-down apartments.

He has seen more than one thing. – An apartment in Warsaw. We worked for two days. Full of cans, alcohol, bottles of urine. The garbage was waist-deep, plus feces, bedbugs – he describes. And he tells us what his team's work looks like: – We disinfect so as not to get infected. We put on masks, suits, sometimes oxygen tanks with masks, because otherwise it is unbearable. When you uncover the first layer, everything starts to boil. The garbage generates heat, it ferments and creates a stench. We put containers under it and load it all up, clean it. We tear up the floors to zero, because everything is already soaked in these liquids, decomposition. We disinfect and remove the smell.

The cost of such an operation? Even a few thousand złoty. The cleaning can take a week. Sometimes 12 containers leave a three-room apartment. – Garbage, clothes, wood, furniture, some knick-knacks. Everything at hand. When it's hot, you can't stand it. The stench is comparable to being locked in a garbage bin on a hot day – adds Macander. He doesn't hide the fact that there are even worse discoveries. – Dead cats, dogs, rotting under a pile of garbage.

However, he looks at the perpetrators of these problems not with disgust, but with compassion. – These are people who need help. These are apartments of single people who have no help from their family. Although sometimes the family wants to help. We had cases where they helped, we cleaned the premises, but after two years the problem started again – he throws up his hands. And he notes: – In Poland, there are no regulations that would regulate the situation of a troublesome tenant. If it is a private apartment, the only option is to go to court. But it is a long way.