NFPA Journal - Summer 2024 - 38

ABOUT A
DECADE AGO,
Meredith Hawes, then a public educator at Grand
Traverse (Michigan) Metro Fire Department, was
approached by a man who told her that he was
deeply concerned for his brother's safety. Every room
and hallway in his sibling's house, he said, was chock
full of boxes, newspapers, and other possessions-
items that many people might consider junk, but
that his brother refused to part with.
" Since it was in our jurisdiction, he wanted me
to go to his brother's house and tell him he was
hoarding, and that he needed to stop hoarding, "
said Hawes, now NFPA's field director for the midwestern
region. It was clear to her from the man's
description that, not only was the situation inside
the house a hazard for his brother, but the maze of
debris and the house's huge fuel load would also
imperil responding firefighters in the event of a fire
or other emergency.
" I talked to my fire chief about it, but we came to
the conclusion that we had no ability to go to somebody's
domicile and tell them that they need to clean
up, " she said. " We had no oversight on that, and so
I just kept telling this man there's really nothing I
could do. It was really a helpless feeling. "
Back then, many fire departments would have
shared Hawes's feeling of helplessness when it
came to hoarding, a psychological condition where
sufferers form strong attachments to possessions-
newspapers, returnable bottles and cans, clothing,
animals, food, and a galaxy of other items. People
with a hoarding disorder find it very difficult to
throw anything away; in severe cases, possessions
accumulate to fill every room from floor to ceiling to
the point where a person may have trouble simply
moving through their home or taking care of basic
upkeep, such as maintaining heating systems or
smoke alarms. Numerous hoarders have died when
space heaters or stoves ignited nearby combustibles,
and they were unable to escape the fire due
to blocked exits and egress paths. In many cases,
responders are unable to get into a residence to perform
rescue or knock down a fire (see " Death Traps "
on the following spread).
Since the risks associated with hoarding generally
fell under the domain of fire departments, in many
jurisdictions hoarding was seen as an enforcement
issue for firefighters and fire marshals. But as Hawes
learned, traditional enforcement tools such as fines
or forced removal are not always an option in private
dwellings. And the interventions that research
has found to be effective-mainly therapy-can take
many months and can require specialized resources
to achieve.
38 | NFPA JOURNAL * SUMMER 2024
The result was that firefighters were spending
considerable time trying to fix a problem without
the proper tools to address it. " A few years back
we were taking on this authoritative-I would say
egotistical-role as enforcement officers in hoarding
cases. Even though we had the right to do so, we had
nothing but abject failure, " said Tony Sabatini, the
chief fire prevention officer at the Guelph (Ontario)
Fire Department, near Toronto. Even in cases where
the department invested significant time conducting
inspections and site visits, the gains were modest
and usually fleeting, Sabatini said. If there was
follow up, fire officials often found that the hoarding
would continue as soon as they left. If the case
ended with eviction, the hoarder would simply start
collecting again at a new house or apartment, and
the cycle would repeat.
But in recent years, new opportunities to address
hoarding have emerged, driven in large part by the
fire service's gradual shift to more collaborative and
community-based approaches for dealing with risk.
Building on experience working with local agencies
on other risk reduction programs, a growing number
of departments now have a variety of resources and
NFPA.ORG/HOARDING
Read more about how
empathy and motivation are
key success strategies for
hoarding task forces.
GUTTER CREDIT
http://www.NFPA.ORG/HOARDING
NFPA Journal - Summer 2024

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of NFPA Journal - Summer 2024
