As investigations continue at the charred Minneapolis duplex where three University of Minnesota students died of smoke inhalation Saturday, students, university officials and neighbors question whether substandard housing contributed to the fatal fire.
Though officials have not yet determined the cause of the fire, they said they think the fire began on the porch at approximately 5 a.m.
The students' house had a gas leak when they moved in on Sept. 1 and whether the house's fire alarms worked has been debated.
\I know that there had been complaints about that particular house in the past from other tenants who lived there before,"" said Ed Kerscher, a U of Minn. sophomore who was in the house before the fire started. ""There's been several complaints with this landlord in general.""
Since the incident, many U of Minn. students reported their fire alarms do not work properly, Kerscher said.
Additionally, Kerscher said he thinks the house's design was unsafe.
""The way that particular house was designed ... the only entrance to both the bottom and top floors was through the front door, which you had to walk through the porch to get [to],"" he said. ""If a fire were to break out ... [on] the porch, you'd have to go out a window.""
Such sub-par housing situations are not foreign to UW-Madison students.
Samantha Slonim, a UW-Madison sophomore who rents a house on West Washington Street said she experienced problems Friday when a Madison Property Management employee set her oven on self-clean. She said her fire alarm did not sound until the entire apartment filled with smoke.
However, private property managers are not the only ones criticized for not taking safety issues seriously.
Last spring, when a fire broke out in The Towers, 502 N. Frances St., a private residence hall, many students merely covered their ears with pillows, thinking the incident was a false alarm.
""We didn't go down until our R.A. was banging on our door saying there actually is a fire,"" said Kristin Kronberg, a UW-Madison sophomore who lived in The Towers.
Dwight McMillan, a resident advisor in The Towers, said many residents thought the fire alarm was a prank.
""I think the reason why no one left was because previous to that I think we had 18 to 20 ... false alarms,"" he said. ""There could have been some fatalities.""
Complaints arose last spring in public university housing when then- UW-Madison sophomores Melissa Pol and Gwendolyn Wotowa fell ill as the result of mold growing in their Sellery Hall bedroom.
""[Housing officials] didn't see there was a leak and say 'Oh, what if there's mold,'"" Pol said. ""I had to tell them that it was against housing codes to have a leak in the room at all.""
However, University Housing's policy calls for officials to inspect problems within 24 hours.
While Director of University Housing Paul Evans said the policy works well, Pol said a lack of communication exists between inspectors and residents.
""[Officials] would do something and then they never asked us if [the problem] stopped,"" she said.
