FL Condo Collapse Spurs Jersey City Mayor To Examine Local Policy

JERSEY CITY, NJ — The Florida condo collapse that gripped headlines and captured the nation's attention for the past two weeks has prompted Jersey City Mayor Steven Fulop to re-examine the city's policies around building inspections and condo associations.

On June 24, a 12-story condo in Surfside, FL partially collapsed. The sudden tragedy has left rescuers digging through rubble for weeks — as of July 6, a total of 32 people have been found dead. Another 191 people have been accounted for.

The exact cause of the Surfside building collapse is unclear, but the Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava has started to put together a team of experts in building safety to assess other buildings in the area.

Jersey City Mayor Fulop announced on Tuesday in a tweet that he would introduce new local policies around inspections and building safety at the next City Council meeting.

"Since the sad news from Florida, we’ve had residents in several buildings in JC reach out that they know their condo boards were delaying work because of the potential cost to residents," Fulop said in a tweet thread.

Fulop highlighted a lack of protections on the state level as the reason for an introduction of protections at the local level.