A building in Newburgh that is housing the city's police and fire departments is overrun with mold and is also facing structural problems, according to officials.

Fire officials say environmental experts discovered hazardous levels of mold on vents, books and in locker rooms last week at the public safety building on Broadway.

Mold and health-threatening levels of asbestos were also recently discovered at the city's West End Firehouse on Upper Broadway, prompting officials to relocate all 16 firefighters immediately to the public safety building.

Officials say that without a firehouse on the city's West Side, response time to fires in that area has increased by at least two minutes. They say that delay can mean the difference between life and death.

Fire officials say they hope to set up a temporary West End firehouse in the next two weeks. They're looking at the Goodwill Fire Department, which is about a mile away in the town of Newburgh.

City officials will decide whether it's worth the several million dollars it would take to fix the public safety building, or if they'd be better off scrapping the building and erecting a whole new facility altogether.