Engineers, local and state officials gathered Thursday at the Ryefield Condominiums in Vernon for a live drilling and core sampling to test for crumbling concrete foundations.
The goal of the testing is to identify at-risk foundations with pyrrhotite, and to understand the true scope of the crumbling foundations crisis.
Researchers tested two condos and both came back negative.
"The main advantage of this testing is that it’s faster, it’s more reliable where able to get a larger sample size and we’re going to be able to do it at a much lower cost," said James Mahoney, associate director of the Connecticut Transportation Institute.
Mahoney said that as a part of the research his team plans to test a hundred houses but a set price hasn't made official for the actual testing. Engineers said that federal dollars will cover the hundred houses tested.
According to Congressman Joe Courtney, a $768,000 grant was awarded from National Institute of Standards and Technology to support testing from Uconn and a federal grant worth $1.5 million was secured for research. But the congressman added there will be assistance for residents in the future.
"Community Development Block Grant money, which comes in every year to the state of Connecticut, is available not just for testing but for home reconstruction and remediation," said Courtney.
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Debbie Maccoy’s condo complex has crumbling foundations – she has been pushing for testing for years and said this is a necessity.
"I’m happy about what’s transpiring today," she said. "It’s important for the homeowner, it’s important for the town. Once we learn what the percent and the threshold is for how much is too much then we can free up all of those homes and they no longer have to stigma of having trace amounts of pyrrhotite."
A timeline has not yet been set on when an official roll out of the test will take place.
