Demolition company lays out plan for condemned Waukesha condo building, as owners continue court battle

WAUKESHA, Wis. (CBS 58) -- The lengthy demolition process for the structurally unsound Horizon West condo building in Waukesha has begun, nearly two years after residents were first evacuated.

Monday night, Oct. 2, the demolition company updated residents and answered questions at an informational meeting.

For about a week now, those crews have been removing non-hazardous materials like carpeting and furniture. Then they'll seal it up and remove hazardous asbestos.

At the same time, the 48 condo owners are battling their insurance company in court, trying to get millions of dollars they say is owed them.

Joe Gozelski is the project manager for the demolition. He told the roughly three dozen people at the meeting, "Yes, this one is a doozy. This one is pretty involved."

The $873,000 project will require careful, DNR-regulated asbestos removal, then floor-by-floor demolition, all while mitigating dust, noise, and truck traffic.

But if all goes to plan, the Horizon West condo building that stood on West Ave. in Waukesha for 55 years will be no more by the end of the year.

Gozelski said, "I hope that before we see too much snow on the ground, around Thanksgiving time, you see us have this thing prepared for demolition."

To get to that point, demolition company The MRD Group will first have to clear hazardous asbestos, which could take six to eight weeks.

When the building is stripped down to steel and concrete, a "high reach" excavator will start demolishing the building.

Gozelski said, "We go in from the east end and we'll remove that structure from the center, try to pull everything in."

But that's only part of the saga.

Todd Dreger, a former Horizon West resident, said, "Then the attorneys can go through and start processing everybody's financial issues."

Most of the Horizon West owners are still in limbo 22 months after they were forced out of their homes forever.

Dreger said he was lucky and found a new home quickly, but added, "my rent is almost three times what my mortgage payment was."

And they're also fighting Traveler's Insurance. Dreger said the building was insured for $17.4 million, but a federal judge ruled in Travelers' favor that it was not liable to pay out the policy.

Dreger explained, "They are saying that the problem is not theirs and they should not cover it."

Dreger is one of many people leaving for Chicago Tuesday morning for the appeal hearing in federal court.

He said so many people are interested in going that their rented bus is full, so some people are driving separately.