In the Oct. 4, 2005 Northern Star, Bob Albanese, associate vice president of Finance and Facilities said, “We don’t want any of our students, faculty or staff to be in an environment that’s unhealthy. That’s always our No. 1 priority: health and safety.”

After a mold scare in Stevenson Towers last fall, NIU’s heating plant workers cleaned and installed more than 900 new air filters in the residence hall.

With new filters in the towers, students now can breathe easily once again without the aid of air purifiers.

The Star commends NIU for responding to the problem in a timely fashion and making the changes over Winter Break, when students’ rooms were empty for an extended period of time.

With one set of towers down and cleaner air flowing, we have to ask: Will the other residence halls on campus receive the same treatment?

Neptune was built between 1955 and 1960, Lincoln was built in 1962, Douglas in 1963, the Grant and Stevenson towers were built between 1965 and 1968.

With the youngest residence hall on campus being 38 years old, one wonders what is being done as far as preventative maintenance on air systems and the like.

While students escaped the mold with a few coughing fits and runny noses, NIU got off lucky. With the varied allergies certain people suffer from, it’s possible a student could have had an allergic reaction to the mold and ended up in the hospital or, even worse, dead.

So yes, it’s good to see NIU taking responsibility for its actions, but it seems like it came a bit too late.

Preventative measures should have been taken months, if not years, before this ever happened.

Students in Stevenson can now take a deep breath and no longer have to worry about toxic mold growing on walls and in corners.

It looks like the No. 1 priority is back on track.