AMNA NAWAZ: Military families are sounding the alarm about the presence of toxic mold in military housing.

It's an issue that's long been making service members and their families sick.

Stephanie Sy has our report on the ongoing problem and what is and isn't being done to address it.

STEPHANIE SY: The Pentagon acknowledged last year that there are serious health concerns related to base housing conditions, but families say the problems persist.

Bills introduced in the House and Senate to address the problems so far haven't progressed.

There are a host of reasons why military families may be disproportionately at risk for the ill effects of untreated mold infestations, and we will get to that in a moment.

But, first, hear what several families told us about how they're affected.

ERICA THOMPSON, Military Spouse: I'm Erica Thompson, and I'm a 22-year military spouse.

My husband is in the Air National Guard.

We moved into military housing.

And, right away, we noticed some issues with the HVAC system, and so we put in the proper service calls.

They came out and said, actually, you need a new HVAC system, but we can't afford to replace it.

And so they said, get a dehumidifier.

We ended up buying six dehumidifiers, and we were dumping about six gallons of water a day just to keep it at 70 percent humidity in the house.

JENNA VAN ROEKEL, Military Spouse: My name is Jenna Van Roekel.

I am a military spouse.

My husband's been in the military for the last nine years.

We have had two houses on base, and there has been multiple issues within each house.

The first house had bugs and mold, and the second house was also filled with mold and bugs.

DEBORAH OLIVER, Military Spouse: My name is Deborah Rampona Oliver, and I was an Air Force military spouse of 24 years.

When we moved in, there were Rid-X damp pots everywhere to kind of like suck the moisture out of the air.

We would notice that in the bathrooms and in the guest room.

Mold would begin to grow on the walls.

ERICA THOMPSON: Kids started getting headaches and feeling nauseous in certain rooms of the house, and that was about six months into living there.

Our dogs started having seizures, our 4-year-old dog that was healthy and in good shape.

That was very different, all of a sudden, seizures.

Within 10 days, our son started passing out.

So we were kind of all experiencing different medical issues and not understanding what's happening.

I was experiencing some cardiac issues in the home and going to the doctor and trying to figure out what's happening.

JENNA VAN ROEKEL: It caused a multitude of health issues, some more severe, some not, just on the non-severe side, headaches, exhaustion.

On the more severe side, it caused our brand-new baby at 12 days old to go into SVT.

Highest beats per minute were 306.

And she had to had lifesaving care and an ambulance, a defibrillator and a NICU stay.

DEBORAH OLIVER: We had condensation on the walls.

It was saturating my daughter's bed, which was up against the wall because the room was rather small.

We had rats, and I have pictures of rat chew marks all along the bottom of the door, and then shavings from where they were chewing.

We ended up buying our own dehumidifiers.

ERICA THOMPSON: We noticed a huge amount of medical issues and symptoms after they opened the walls and replaced the windows.

Kids started getting rashes on their faces and legs.

We have five kids and I homeschool, so we're at home most of the time.

The headaches were increasing.

The nausea was increasing, G.I.

issues.

DEBORAH OLIVER: I started getting very, very sick.

And I had always been a runner and always been very fit and was struggling to breathe.

And I ended up in the E.R.

several times at VMC.

And, ultimately, we decided to get out of the military.

JENNA VAN ROEKEL: And then we also have our 5-year-old and our 6-year-old who have had reactive airway diseases from all the mold they have consumed and breathed in, a lot of sleeping problems and anything that could go along with that.

ERICA THOMPSON: This is not political.

This is a basic right that somebody serving in the military should have healthy homes on base.

The kids should be healthy.

STEPHANIE SY: Joining me now is Rene Kladzyk, a senior investigator at the Project on Government Oversight.

She's spoken to a lot of military families about this issue over the years.

Rene, there are hundreds of thousands of military families who live in base housing.

How widespread is the mold problem and how long has it been going on?

RENE KLADZYK, Project on Government Oversight: Housing advocates I have talked to have said that mold is the number one issue that these families are facing.

And these advocates have worked with thousands of military families across the country.

I have also spoken with an attorney who specializes in military housing cases.

He says roughly 90 percent of his cases involve mold.

The military knows that this is a big problem.

I have done reporting on a coordinated effort that the Army undertook called Operation Counter Mold, where they were trying to battle mold in military housing and figure out a way to tackle it more comprehensively.

But when it comes to data, we're really lacking in accurate data that would convey the true scale of the mold problem.

STEPHANIE SY: As far as the pervasiveness, for what it's worth, Rene, a bipartisan bill to address this issue says -- quote -- "Thousands of military families living in privatized military housing have been exposed to hazardous environmental conditions, including widespread mold contamination, due to negligent maintenance practices and inadequate government oversight."

We contacted the Pentagon, by the way, and they have not responded.

But what are advocates asking for?

What have they told you about what families need most.

RENE KLADZYK: Well, military families face a lot of obstacles when it comes to seeking accountability and justice when say they have lost everything they own due to mold contamination.

And the main thing that the housing advocates are working for is to try to make these families whole again in whatever form that means.

Maybe it's getting appropriate health coverage to ensure that the health issues that they faced are being addressed, getting some financial remuneration for lost belongings, and also just getting them out of unsafe and unhealthy housing, fundamentally.

But, like I said, there's been a lot of barriers with the housing companies in terms of making that happen.

STEPHANIE SY: Expand on that a little bit.

Why is this problem so pervasive and hard to tackle, as opposed to how you might see it handled in the civilian world, where you're not talking about federally owned property?

RENE KLADZYK: Sure.

So it's important to note that this problem is not new.

Today, 99 percent of military family housing is owned and operated by private companies.

The reason that we privatized military housing was because there were problems in the housing when it was run by the Pentagon.

So, back in the '90s, the Department of Defense privatized military housing because they had a $20 billion maintenance backlog, and they thought they could eliminate that maintenance backlog in housing, and also save taxpayers money on the cost of military housing by injecting private capital.

Unfortunately, neither of those things have come to pass.

Today, my analysis has found that there's currently a nearly $7 billion maintenance backlog in military housing, and it's more than quadrupled since 2017.

Also, there was a recent report by the Congressional Research Service that found that privatized military housing has ultimately been more expensive for taxpayers.

I think it's important to know there are some fundamental differences between housing when you live in civilian housing versus military housing.

When you live in military housing, your landlord and your boss are in a business partnership.

So, when it comes to the potential for retaliation, which is something that I have heard from families that I have interviewed, there is a possibility that when you, a military family, speaks out about housing issues and complaints, their chain of command could get involved.

They could face professional consequences for speaking out.

So there's some very real disincentives for families to speak out and seek accountability.

And that's just, like, one of those kind of unique factors of military housing.

STEPHANIE SY: You know, there's no federal mold standard.

Does that complicate legal recourse for families, some of which I know have tried to sue?

RENE KLADZYK: It absolutely makes it more difficult for the families to seek accountability through the courts.

The absence of a federal mold standard for what is and isn't a safe level of mold in housing makes it more difficult to prove, like, this is the cause of my problems.

So that's a real problem that the families have faced.

And you have to remember too that these families are going up against multibillion-dollar real estate conglomerates in the courts.

So they already face a wide range of hurdles when it comes to fighting these cases.

And then, in the absence of that federal mold standard, it just makes it all the more difficult.

STEPHANIE SY: That is Rene Kladzyk with the Project on Government Oversight.

Thank you so much for joining us and sharing your reporting with our viewers.

RENE KLADZYK: Thank you for having me.

Appreciate it.