[Congressional Record Volume 168, Number 12 (Wednesday, January 19, 2022)]
[House]
[Pages H246-H247]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




            MOURNING THE LIVES LOST AT TWIN PARKS NORTH WEST

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 4, 2021, the gentleman from New York (Mr. Torres) is recognized 
for 60 minutes as the designee of the majority leader.


                             General Leave

  Mr. TORRES of New York. Madam Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that 
all Members have 5 legislative days to revise and extend their remarks 
and include extraneous material on the subject of my Special Order.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentleman from New York?
  There was no objection.
  Mr. TORRES of New York. Madam Speaker, I come here with the heaviest 
heart. My beloved Bronx saw the deadliest fire in the history of New 
York City in more than three decades; a fire that has left a death 
count of 17 residents, including 8 children.
  A malfunctioning space heater was the immediate cause of the fire in 
a duplex on the third floor of a 19-story building known as Twin Parks 
North West. And even though the fire was largely limited to the third 
floor, both the apartment door and the nearby stairwell door were left 
open, causing the smoke to spread rapidly and widely throughout the 19-
story building.
  Since the building has no fire escapes and since the stairwells were 
full of black, toxic smoke, the tenants had no means of escape. The 
smoke spread so widely that victims were found on every floor. The 
fatalities were tenants who died from severe smoke inhalation from 
cardiac and respiratory arrest.
  Almost all of the victims came from a single town in Gambia. The 
Gambian community has had roots in Twin Parks North West that date back 
more than half a century. It is hard to imagine a more closely knit 
community, a community more tied by the bonds of faith and family and 
fellowship than the Gambian community of Twin Parks North West, and so 
the loss is deeply felt.
  The victims were as young as 2, and no older than 50. These were 
victims who had their whole lives ahead of them. Ousmane Konteh was 
only 2 years old.
  Muhammed Drammeh celebrated his twelfth birthday.
  Sera Janneh was a student at Lehman College. She had dreams of 
becoming a social worker of aiding those afflicted by trauma.
  My heart aches for the father who lost his wife, two daughters, and a 
son; for the mother who lost her toddler; for the children who lost 
their parents; for the Drammeh family who lost four members; and the 
Dukureh family who lost five.
  The fire at Twin Parks North West was as preventable as it was 
tragic. If the space heater had shut off automatically, the fire would 
have been prevented.
  If the apartment door and the stairwell doors had closed 
automatically, the spread of the smoke would have been contained and 
countless lives would have been saved.
  If the building had a sprinkler system, the fire would have been 
extinguished.
  If the building had a two-way intercom system, the tenants would have 
been advised by the fire department to remain in their homes instead of 
fleeing to a smoke-filled stairwell that had become a death trap.
  And if the tenants had sufficient heat and hot water in their homes, 
there would have been no need to use dangerous space heaters in the 
first place.
  The use of space heaters is often a cry for help and a cry for heat. 
It is often an act of desperation for decent and dignified housing.
  Madam Speaker, the Bronx is no stranger to deadly fires. New York 
City's four worst fires in the past 30 years have all been in the 
Bronx, have all been in my district of south Bronx.
  The prevalence of deadly fires in south Bronx is no accident. It is a 
consequence of systemic disinvestment from the lowest income 
communities of color, from places like the south Bronx, from the safety 
and quality of affordable housing.
  When it comes to fire safety, America is a tale of two countries and 
New York is a tale of two cities. If you live in a luxury development 
in Manhattan, then fire safety can be taken for granted. But if you 
live in an affordable housing complex in the south Bronx, there is no 
guarantee that your building will have a sprinkler system; in fact, it 
is unlikely to have one.
  There is no guarantee that your building will have self-closing 
doors. There is no guarantee that your building will have what experts 
would consider anything resembling modern standards of fire safety.
  In America, poor people of color are left to live in conditions that 
put them at greater risk of losing everything, including their own 
homes, their own families, their own lives from a catastrophic fire.
  If that is not cruel and callous, I am not sure what would be. We are 
reminded that safe and decent affordable housing is not a privilege but 
a right; not a luxury but a moral necessity; not an abstraction but a 
matter of life and death. Building back better should and must mean 
building back safer for communities long forgotten.
  On January 9, the world bore witness to one of the fire department's 
finest hours of public service. It took the Herculean efforts of more 
than 200 firefighters to extinguish the fires at Twin Parks North West. 
Firefighters who had ran out of oxygen in their tanks ran into burning 
buildings, saving lives at great risk to their own.

[[Page H247]]

  There are no words that can convey more powerfully the heroism shown 
than the image beside me; the image of Matt Zimpfer, a proud member of 
the FDNY carrying a baby, a visibly traumatized baby that he had 
rescued from the fire at Twin Parks North West. It is as much an image 
of our common humanity as it is of the FDNY's uncommon bravery.
  For the south Bronx, January 9 is a day that will live in infamy, but 
the image beside me reminds me that even in a moment of despair, there 
was cause for hope. Even in a moment of tragedy and a day of infamy, 
heroes can and do emerge.
  The overwhelming sense of sorrow that weighs so heavily on my heart 
is rivaled only by the overwhelming gratitude that I feel for our 
heroes at the FDNY, a gratitude that will remain with me for as long as 
I live.
  May God bless the heroic souls of the FDNY, New York City's bravest, 
and may God bless the resilient and resourceful souls of the Gambian 
community of Twin Parks North West.
  Madam Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

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