NEW YORK — Authorities in New York City are taking action against a contractor involved in the construction of a building in the Bronx that partially collapsed.

The incident occurred in December 2023, when part of the building on West Burnside Avenue and Phelan Place in the Morris Heights neighborhood gave way. Initially, the city held an engineer responsible for the collapse.

However, the Department of Buildings (DOB) has now concluded that Arsh Landmark General Construction, the contractor, also bears responsibility for the incident.

"This was an avoidable, preventable tragedy," said DOB Commissioner Jimmy Oddo as the city's investigation wrapped up on Monday.

Contractor Failed to Notice Engineer's Mistake from the Start

The investigation found that the engineer had erroneously marked a crucial load-bearing column as merely decorative. Moments after workers began removing bricks, the entire corner of the building collapsed, similar to a Jenga tower.

"There has to be a series of mistakes that is made in order for a building to collapse," explained DOB Deputy Commissioner of Enforcement Yegal Shamash.

Shamash added that the contractor should have recognized the error "right from the beginning."

"The general contractor should've taken a look at the drawings and said, 'Hold on a second. This pier looks like it's supporting the whole building. Should I really just be taking the bricks out of this pier?'" Shamash remarked.

As a result of their failure, Arsh Landmark General Construction was issued two violations, which could lead to fines totaling up to $50,000. Additionally, the contractor's registration expired following the collapse, requiring the company to reapply to the DOB if it wishes to continue operating in New York City.

Meanwhile, the engineer's license was suspended, preventing him from conducting inspections for two years.

"Crappy" Property Owners, Engineers, and Contractors

With more than a million buildings in New York City and 40,000 ongoing construction sites, the DOB depends on property owners to conduct their own inspections.

"It seems that there are some crappy property owners, who tend to find crappy engineers, who tend to find crappy contractors," said Commissioner Oddo.

Miraculously, there were no injuries in the collapse. However, many families were left homeless, and building residents later accused the property owners of harassment and neglecting living conditions.

In the wake of the incident, the New York City Council passed legislation to change the DOB inspection process.

The city also allocated $4.7 million last week to create a new task force. According to Oddo, the team will utilize DOB data and predictive analytics to identify and address potential problems with construction work before tragedies occur.

"So that we can try to intercede on problematic jobs or bad actors that we've identified prior to having a side of a building collapse," Oddo explained.

We reached out to the contractor, engineer, and property owner for comment, but none of them responded.