Public housing administrator pushes back on HUD report

Juan A. Rosario Hernández, head of Puerto Rico’s Public Housing Administration (Facebook via Departamento de Vivienda)

Says lead mitigation is well underway

By THE STAR STAFF

Juan A. Rosario Hernández, head of the Public Housing Administration (AVP by its initials in Spanish), insisted Monday that federal findings about the agency’s handling of lead‑based paint risks do not reflect the full scope of its work, asserting that more than half of public housing complexes have already undergone mitigation.

“The report is wrong, the report is wrong in that aspect,” Rosario Hernández said when asked about a recent U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Office of Inspector General (OIG) report detailing deficiencies in the AVP’s evaluation of structures with lead‑based paint between 2022 and 2023. “What happens is the report is wrong because they didn’t have the information. They went directly to the managing agents, and the managing agents did not have the data compiled. However, it was in the environmental division.”

The AVP administrator said mitigation efforts are ongoing across the island’s 328 public housing complexes. He said 55% of all sites have been addressed, along with more than 82% of the projects that specifically require mitigation, using removal, encapsulation, or a combination of both.

Rosario Hernández also said the agency has protocols in place for identifying and tracking cases of childhood lead exposure. “The child presents symptoms, goes to a hospital, and it is the Department of Health that informs us,” he said. “As I mentioned, anyone entering one of the public housing complexes with the presence of lead is notified through the contract. So parents already know from the beginning that the residential complex may be in a mitigation process.”

The HUD OIG report concluded that the AVP failed to properly assess and communicate lead hazards, which allegedly resulted in families being exposed to the toxic metal and at least 12 minors showing elevated blood‑lead levels. The investigation covered January 2022 to December 2023.

Rosario Hernández acknowledged that one of HUD’s main criticisms centered on communication with residents -- not on the mitigation work itself.

“The report is more focused on the fact that the information was not delivered in a coherent and correct way to the residents,” he said.

To address that issue, the AVP plans to launch an information campaign between March and April aimed at 40 public housing complexes with known lead presence.

“Everyone who goes to live in these residences signs a contract stating they know about the presence of lead,” he said. “We are going to reinforce that information along with the Department of Health.”

As part of a required action plan due at the end of this year, the AVP will also coordinate more closely with the Health Department, which Rosario Hernández said has the specialized expertise needed to standardize guidance across all housing communities.