TAMPA, Fla. (WFLA) – Ashley Weber has been living in a home on MacDill Air Force Base since April of 2018 with her three small children.
Her husband is active duty in the military and for the last year, he’s been away on a military mandated remote tour.
Not long after moving into her newly assigned base housing, Weber noticed problems.
“My son was born in May and a couple of months later he started having a cough, constant cough, watery eyes, runny nose, and my other children started having that also. As time went on, my boys started saying, every morning when they would wake up that their bodies were achy and headaches. It was constant headaches for myself and my older children,” said Weber.
As she spoke, her young daughter said “I have a lot of headaches,” to add emphasis to what her mother just said.
Weber strongly suspects mold contamination inside the home is creating health problems for the family. Many families assigned to base housing at MacDill have complained of mold contamination and health problems.
The base housing is managed by the private company Harbor Bay. The company did not respond to requests for information for this report.
Weber says she is concerned about the long term health impact on her children. She brushed away tears when she spoke about how difficult it’s been to deal with the problem while her husband has been away on military assignment.
“It’s unfortunate, sorry I don’t want to get emotional. It was really hard. Of all the times for us to be moved into a home where I had to worry about my kids health, like we all had to sit here and suffer and every single month my husband has to be there and he’s not able to come here and help and obviously he has to do his job, we shouldn’t have to worry about these things,” said Weber.
Attorney Natalie Khawam is representing Weber and other families with mold problems at MacDill and she says it hasn’t been easy for the families to get repairs done to their homes.
“Everybody is pointing fingers at everyone here and unfortunately these families are just getting sicker and sicker,” said Khawam.