A problem at the Rossland Seniors Hall
Last Thursday morning, Les Anderson went into the Rossland Seniors Hall and found a mess in the back room. The ceiling had partially collapsed from water dripping down and soaking the insulation over the drop ceiling panels. Insulation and panels askew and water, all on the floor and furniture — a discouraging sight to one of the seniors who have worked hard to repair and renovate the building as a facility for seniors.
Anderson said that he had first reported some leakage in the back room of the City-owned building in January, and that Rossland’s Manager of Public Works, Darrin Albo, had repaired a drain-pipe leak very promptly. But then, said Anderson, water kept dripping down through the ceiling, and finally parts of it collapsed into a soggy mess in the room below.
Anderson says that the building has been there since around 1904, and that the Seniors group paid $24,000 to have the roof re-tarred in 2013. The roof does not appear to be the problem; rather, it may be that leakage from the pipe, before it was repaired, had soaked the insulation with such a weight of water that it eventually collapsed parts of the ceiling. Another possibility is that the drop ceiling lacked any effective vapour barrier, and that condensation gathered as ice on the underside of the roof during the cold weather, then melted during the recent thaw and dripped down onto the insulation over the drop ceiling panels, soaking the insulation and causing the ceiling’s collapse. If proper vapour barrier is installed with the repair job, it may prevent a recurrence — at least of condensation accumulation.
Meanwhile, springtime approaches, when the historic façade of the building is scheduled to be replaced, and groups of seniors continue to meet in the main part of the building.