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  • 2018-04-11 (xsd:date)
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  • Did Donald Trump Once Fight Against Installing Sprinklers in New York Apartment Buildings? (en)
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  • In April 2018, a fire in an apartment on the fiftieth floor of the Trump Tower in midtown Manhattan killed 67-year-old Todd Brassner. President Donald Trump tweeted about the fire only to inform his followers that it had been put out, praising fire fighters and describing the building where he has offices and a residence as well built. Trump has not publicly mentioned the death of Brassner: The deadly fire prompted scrutiny of the president's own record on safety measures for apartment residents in New York, as well as claims that as an influential real estate developer during the 1990s he lobbied against a legislative measure that would have forced landlords to retrofit most larger residential buildings in the city with sprinklers. Trump Tower, which opened in 1983, does not have sprinklers. Emergency services were alerted to the fire at Brassner's apartment by a silent alarm, according to CNN. On 8 April, the left-leaning Facebook page Proud Snowflakes posted a widely-shared meme which read: The meme accurately describes Trump's opposition to 1999 regulations on mandatory sprinkler installation, but also leaves out what appears to have been a change of mind by the future president, who later voluntarily installed the safety devices in another of his buildings despite the absence of a legal obligation. In 1998 and 1999, a spate of deadly apartment fires in New York City prompted then Mayor Rudy Giuliani to establish a panel to examine fire safety proposals as a matter of urgency. In 1998, 92 out of 107 deaths caused by fires took place in buildings without sprinklers (as reported by the New York Times at the time) and inadequate inspections of sprinklers in a Brooklyn apartment led to a fire that killed three firefighters that December. Fire safety advocates and victims' relatives joined in appealing to New York City Council members to make sprinklers mandatory in apartment buildings, but some real estate developers — including Trump — voiced opposition to that proposed law. On 30 December 1998, the Times reported: However, within a few months, reports appeared that Trump had adjusted his stance slightly and in March 1999, the New York City Council passed a compromise law that required new residential buildings with four or more units to have sprinklers in every apartment and hallway, and any renovation of an existing building which cost more than half the building's value must also involve the installation of sprinklers. Older buildings like the Trump Tower do not fall under the scope of the regulations unless they undergo major renovations. The March 1999 law (Local Law 10-1999) also exempted buildings like the Trump World Tower, where excavation had already begun by that time: The fact that Trump softened his stance on the installation of sprinklers and voluntarily invested in them for one of his buildings does not erase his earlier public opposition to them, but any discussion of his record on sprinklers in residential buildings is incomplete without mention of all these facts. (en)
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