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More than $400,000 has been donated to the Wellington City Mission to help survivors of the fatal fire at Loafers Lodge.
Wednesday marked three months since the hostel fire in Newtown broke out, killing five tenants and leaving about 90 others homeless.
Most survivors escaped the building with few, if any, possessions. The building was left fire and water-damaged and contaminated with asbestos.
Collection of donations closed on Wednesday, raising $404,959.14, including $50,000 from the Wellington City Council.
The public support was “remarkable and humbling”, Wellington City Missioner Murray Edridge said.
The donations funded accommodation, medical and dental care, clothing, flights for whānau, travel, furniture and legal documentation.
A payment of $10,000 also went to independent asbestos assessment of the Loafers Lodge building to see whether personal belongings were retrievable, Edridge said.
A judge at the High Court in Wellington was recently told that on June 20 a lodge property manager sent some tenants a text message “in relatively cursory terms” saying tenants’ belongings would not be returned.
It prompted at least two of the tenants to have lawyers ask the court for an injunction to stop demolition until steps had been taken to recover belongings if possible and return them to their owners.
DAVID UNWIN/The Post
Demolition barriers up at Loafers Lodge following the blaze.
Nothing was to happen in the building unless it was necessary to prevent deterioration that would cause an imminent health and safety risk. Lawyers for the tenants were to be updated daily about the work to be done the next day.
“The fund disbursements also include a final distribution of cash to the ex-residents of the Loafers Lodge of $162.00 each, which was deposited into each person’s bank account this afternoon,” Edridge said.
The Wellington City Mission was the holder and administrator of the Loafers Lodge Mayoral Relief Fund.
An independent financial audit would be pubically released in the coming weeks, Edridge said.
A 48-year-old man has been charged with five counts of murder and two counts of arson.
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