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CNN Live Saturday

Interview With Mark Scherzer, Peter Davies

Aired September 07, 2002 - 18:21   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

CAROL LIN, CNN ANCHOR: Imagine if something happened and you were suddenly not able to get back into your home for an entire year. That is happening to some New Yorker City residents who's apartment buildings were damaged during the attacks on the World Trade Center. CNN's Brian Palmer visited a couple in New York four months ago, as they were fighting for government aid to make their home livable again.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BRIAN PALMER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Artists Pat Moore and Andrew Jurinko called Cedar Street home for 25 years.

PALMER (on camera): When was the last time you were here?

ANDREW JURINKO, NEW YORK RESIDENT: Yesterday.

PAT MOORE, NEW YORK RESIDENT: Yesterday.

JURINKO: Everyday.

PALMER (voice-over): Their building was across the street from the World Trade Center. When the towers fell, tons of debris blasted through their windows burying their belongings. Jurinko and Moore say leaving for good is out of the question, even though they've spent the last year living somewhere else.

MOORE: At this point, we're still fighting to come back home. I can't tell you that when we get back in here. You know, it's kind of it's been 11 months of fighting, why give up now? If we were going to give up we should have given up to -- the first time we walked in actually.

JURINKO: I mean, we met here, spent our whole life together here. We've worked here. Our whole New York careers have been centered in this spot. We love the neighborhood. We'd like to try to fight to bring it back.

MOORE: Ready?

PALMER: They have been cleaning off and on ever since. But it's a job they couldn't finish themselves.

They spend months prodding the government to help. Now, clean up is scheduled to start in their building just a day or two before the September 11 anniversary. MOORE: This is garbage. This is stuff -- my mannequin, you know, now it's going to have to be dumped, because it's textiles. Anything that fabric has to be dumped. I -- this is my jewelry studio and my knitting studio. My machines are under there, my machines are in Andrew's studio, machines are back there. They're going to attempt to clean the machines. I don't know that they'll be successful.

PALMER: Jurinko and Moore were not alone in their fight. Mark Scherzer and Peter Davies were among the dozens who fought for federal clean up of potentially toxic dust in their building.

PALMER (on camera) The tower, it was so close you could touch it.

MARK SCHERZER, NEW YORK RESIDENT: Well, not quite as that close, but close enough that we got the full impact.

PALMER: Why not just give up and move on?

SCHERZER: Because, I don't think there's a rational answer to that, it's not a rational -- the need for home is not a rational need. It's a basic human need. And this, after all this time, is home.

PALMER: Davies had fought for his home before, as a child.

PETER DAVIES, NEW YORK RESIDENT: We grew up during the war, saying we will never give up. We will fight on the battlefields. We will fight, whatever. And I think, you know, I have that sense. That I'm not going to be blown out of my own neighborhood and house.

PALMER: Their fight isn't over quite yet. Officials have promised to clean, but still haven't started. After months of delays, Davies and his neighbors, need to hold out a little longer, to get back home.

BRIAN PALMER, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LIN: Joining us from New York are Mark Scherzer and Peter Davies.

Thanks so much, both of you, for joining us tonight.

Mark, let me start with you. Where are you guys living now?

SCHERZER: Oh, we're living about eight blocks away, in South Street Seaport. In a place that we found after four months of living with friends and people who opened their apartments to us.

LIN: It sounds like a really tough way to make ends meet, when you're living in New York and trying to sustain two places?

SCHERZER: We have had a lot of help in terms of rent from FEMA. We haven't had to sustain both places. The greater difficulty has been the process of trying to get back. From the initial day of trying to find each other, to finding how to get our selves housed and clothed, to then hauling out all our belongings and cleaning them. Then negotiating with the landlord. Negotiating with government agencies, and still not being home and not knowing now what the future holds in terms of the redevelopment. That's been far more difficult than the day-to-day problem of keeping ourselves under a roof.

LIN: Peter, what has been the process of -- what was the process like of trying to recover so many of you're belongings in that apartment?

DAVIES: It was extremely difficult. For one, it took eight days for us to find out whether the building still stood. And almost two weeks before we were allowed to enter. And then, only for 15 minutes to gather very personal possessions. And then it took weeks of bundling up tons of material. I had a gallery and getting it down 13 flights of stairs with no working elevators, no electricity and what have you.

LIN: And no security, right?

DAVIES: And no security. All the building was wide open for a full month, the street doors were broken open, as well as all the doors to our apartment.

LIN: Yes, we heard that, yes, that several apartments were looted?

DAVIES: Quite a number and still are being looted, each time.

LIN: Mark, what have you learned -- for people who find themselves in a situation like this, I mean, what have you learned about the process of recovery and what sort of recourse you have with the federal government?

SCHERZER: The federal government is not as responsive as you might hope in a situation like this, unless you have advocates working for you. We were very fortunate in our situation to have elected representatives, particularly Congressman Nadler who fought very hard to get the EPA involved in the clean up. And after nine months they did decide to get involved in the clean up. So, we didn't have to rely on our landlord to do what might be an inadequate job.

And then other elected representatives who have gone to bat for us, to help us preserve our homes going forward.

LIN: And there was some sort -- we had a piece of information here, that I find a little bit confusing. Maybe you can clarify. That even if the clean up does go forward and you guys are allowed to move back in, that there is still a threat that the building may be torn down. Is that right?

DAVIES: That's right. And that's almost more horrific than what we've gone through. I mean, you have a whole group of families who have been living for a year in limbo, living in temporary quarters, hoping to be allowed to return. And just as we're at the point where we think we're getting close to it, we learn that the rebuilding of the district may involve condemning and pulling our buildings down. So that we have our own government agencies completing the work of Osama bin Laden, as far as we're concerned. Destroying our building where we lived for 25 years.

LIN: Well, Peter Davies, Mark Scherzer, we wish you the best of luck. I know times are very tough, but I really admire your fortitude in sticking it through and trying to reclaim your home. Good luck.

SCHERZER: We'll get back. Thank you.

DAVIES: Well, we're going to get back.

LIN: And when you do, we'll be talking to you again, with a happy story.

DAVIES: Thank you.

LIN: Thanks so much, Mark Scherzer and Peter Davies.

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