Lawsuit filed against Community Within the Corridor developers as residents stare down deadline

MILWAUKEE (CBS 58) -- The developers of the embattled Community Within the Corridor are now facing a lawsuit filed on behalf of one of the residents that was forced to leave.

In total, more than 100 people were forced out in March when environmental conditions made the building unsafe.

Residents are now faced with a choice: take a $5,000 payment to leave their homes for good or fight a legal battle to try and stay. At least one so far is choosing to fight, arguing the developers knowingly put her and others in danger when they let her move into the building when it was still unsafe.

The deadline to make that choice is Friday.

Attorney Michael Cerjak spoke about resident Tiffany Bowen, saying, "She felt like she didn't have any options, there was no choice."

Bowen is one of more than 100 people who were forced to leave their homes in March when officials discovered high levels of the carcinogen TCE in the building, or trichloroethylene.

The 33-page lawsuit calls their experiences an "existential crisis", and a "tragedy" that has gone from "bad to worse".

Cerjak said, "They hadn't yet been moving on with their lives. They were living in a somewhat transitory sense, from hotel to hotel."

The property's developers -- Roer Companies and Scott Crawford, Inc.-- paid for the residents' hotel stays for the past 11 weeks.

But those payments end June 27, so the developers offered residents a one-time, $5,000 payment to end their leases and move out.

CWC leases state tenants must give two months' notice if they're ending their lease, but Cerjak said, "Folks only had seven days to decide whether they wanted to enter into what was characterized as a voluntary lease termination agreement."

There are also concerns about potential health issues.

Cerjak said, "They got very little time to decide whether they want to give up their rights to pursue a claim at any time."

By taking that money, residents forfeit the right to file claims in the future if they develop health issues related to exposure to the dangerous chemicals.

The developers declined to give an interview about the lawsuit but provided this brief statement, saying "We’ve received and are reviewing the filing. We do not comment on active litigation."

Cerjak said another major concern is the availability of subsidized housing. He said many CWC residents qualify for housing assistance, but there are just not a lot of similar housing options right now.