Access-A-Ride office is bedbugging out

From the Daily News:

The Queens office of a contractor for NYC Transit is still infested with bedbugs less than three months after the agency tried to exterminate the tiny pests, workers say.

NYC Transit hired exterminators in November to steam clean parts of the facility, remove cubicle panels and office chairs that bug-sniffing dogs found to be overrun with the insects, and fumigated the furniture off site.

But some experts said the extermination effort was inadequate.

Waiting a week to begin killing the bedbugs after canines tracked their location was a major flaw, said Timothy Wong, a pest control technical director at M&M Environmental.

"It must be treated 24 to 48 hours after the dogs come in," he said, "especially with a commercial premises like this where there's heavy traffic, a lot of electrical equipment and no control of the environment."

The combination of steam cleaning, fumigation and the use of Cryonite - a gas that freezes the pests to death - can make for a hefty bill as well, Wong said.

"Something like this can be taken care of," he said. "But it can't be shoehorned into a budget."