Bed bugs an ongoing problem at Manitoba Housing complex

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This article was published 23/09/2018 (2543 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Every time Carlos Felgueiras’s apartment is sprayed for bed bugs, the disabled man has to follow the same in-depth procedure — a routine he has begrudgingly performed more times than he’d like to remember.

The Brandon Manitoba Housing resident has to move everything two feet away from the wall, clear off the counters and leave his apartment while the spraying takes place.

“When is this going to stop?” he asked on Tuesday, while sitting inside his sixth-floor Manitoba Housing unit at 253 9th Street, in which he has lived for the past 15 years.

“I’m disabled, I have to move everything around and it’s hard for me. This has got to stop. There’s got to be a way of killing these things quicker than what they’re doing.”

According to several of Felgueiras’s fellow residents who spoke with the Sun, bed bugs remain a reality in the building.

A spokesperson for Manitoba Housing said that the apartment building has received bedbug treatments since 2014. The most recent treatment took place on Sept. 11, with 24 units being sprayed — five that showed bedbug activity, and the other 19 as a precautionary measure.

“The precautionary treatments make the entire process more effective, reducing the likelihood that bedbug activity will just move from unit to another,” the spokesperson said.

“Manitoba Housing provides the pesticide applications, helps tenants prepare for the treatments and also provides information about how to launder bedding and clothing to make the process more effective.”

Although Felgueiras said he hasn’t had bed bugs for a year, his neighbour currently has them, he said, adding that this was how they originally spread to him in the first place.

The memories of them crawling around his apartment are still clearly-highlighted with a monthly spraying reminder.

The first batch came over and he was forced to get rid of many of his belongings, he said.

“My mom gave me a bed worth $3,500 and I had to throw it out,” he said. “She gave it to me before she died.

“I got rid of all my furniture, dressers everything, I threw everything out because they go in everything.”

A large bag of white powder sits in the corner of his apartment, which he uses to get rid of the tiny nuisances.

“You put it on the couches and stuff like that, and as soon as they dive in there, that’s it — they’re cooked,” he said.

“I took it into my own hands because these guys are not doing it,” he said of Manitoba Housing. “I’m tired of that bull—-, every month, you get tired.”

Pointing at his neighbour’s apartment, Felgueiras added, “He’s tired.” Pointing in another direction, he said, “That guy’s tired … Everybody’s tired, but there’s nothing we can do about it.”

Tenant Helen Pitch said that she has also had bed bugs before. There are two traps inside her apartment which she checks everyday. “Look, nothing but dust,” she said as she picked up one of her traps to show The Sun. However, one of her neighbours found one in the washing machine last week, and Pitch said that it’s because of incidents like this when using the machines that she always makes sure to be extra careful.

“When I put stuff in the dryer I really look good in the grooves and everything,” she said.

So far she said that she has been lucky, but others haven’t been quite so fortunate.

“He got sprayed, and she still has them,” Pitch said as she pointed in the direction of other units.

Pitch and her boyfriend, Lionel Finlayson, have tried their own methods, like Felgueiras has done, to make sure they don’t come back.

“We spray ourselves in-between those guys spraying,” Finlayson said. “We went and bought a spray for bed bugs and we spray our bed and all the walls. When they come in I can’t see where they spray most of the time, sometimes you don’t even smell anything so I don’t know if they’re spraying. They’re only in here a couple of minutes if that.”

The bed bug problem has been going on for at least five years now, multiple tenants said, but there didn’t appear to be any signs of improvement despite the frequent spraying.

People who live in the building need to speak up, Pitch said.

“There’s a lot of people that aren’t saying anything (about the bed bugs), and they shouldn’t be keeping it confidential.”

» mverge@brandonsun.com

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