BUT THOSE WORDS don’t offer much consolation to Mary Mulvey Jacobson. For nearly 12 years, Jacobson toiled on the fifth floor, serving as City Councilor Maura Hennigan’s chief of staff. She kept operations running smoothly by supervising employees, fielding calls, writing legislation. "I loved my job," she says.

All that changed in the fall of 2000, when she was forced to quit after being diagnosed with sick-building syndrome, which has been recognized as a disease by the World Health Organization since 1982. Until then, Jacobson had endured odd, recurring ailments for years. At first, her symptoms seemed benign. Her skin itched. She developed rashes. Gradually, though, these symptoms evolved into debilitating diseases. Sometimes, she would catch a cold. She’d cough or blow her nose, and chunks of blood would be left in the tissue. Other times, she’d stand up at her desk, only to lose her balance from dizziness. Or she’d experience a wave of fatigue so intense that it would drive her to close the office door and lie on the carpet.

Doctors dispensed antibiotics for her ailments, which never seemed to heal. From 1993 to 1999, Jacobson says she was treated for bronchitis at least 34 times. During her last five years at City Hall, she contacted various specialists a total of 140 times. Still, the source of her problems remained a mystery. Finally, in August 2000, she read an article in USA Weekend about mold making people sick in schools — and recognized symptoms. "I said, ‘Oh, my God. That’s me,’ " she recalls. She later sought relief from an environmental physician, who has since ordered her not to set foot in the municipal building.

Before Jacobson left her post in October 2000, however, she had asked the administration to test Hennigan’s office for air and mold pollutants. The office had a leak "for years and years," Hennigan confirms. "Every time it rained, a river ran down our walls." Newcomers commented on the earthy smell. Walls were stained a rust-brown. Whenever the office flooded, Galvin and his crew mopped up. Still, they had a hard time locating the leak. In the summer of 2000, things got so bad that water soaked much of the carpet. The wet carpet made for perfect breeding ground, and fungi flourished.

According to ATC Associates, which conducted the tests in Hennigan’s office in August 2000, the results revealed "sky-high" levels of fungi, yeast, and bacteria — as many as 80 million colony units per gram. (By way of comparison, the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration classifies air with bacteria levels above one million colony units per gram as contaminated.) To fix the situation, the property-management crew tore up the mold-infested rug and installed a tile floor. When air quality was measured again, Galvin says, "the levels were fine."

Things were not fine for Jacobson, however. She has since tried to return to work twice — armed with nasal sprays and antibiotics — only to suffer setbacks. Today, though she hasn’t opened the door to City Hall in more than 12 months, she endures symptoms. The experience has left her somewhat bitter. "I believe I lost my job over this," she says.

Hennigan agrees. "I have no doubt Mary’s health ailments are related to the mold," she says, although she makes it clear that neither she nor other staffers faced sickness — at least, not to the same degree as Jacobson. "I tried to make every accommodation for Mary," she adds. But when Jacobson’s symptoms persisted, Hennigan says, "I didn’t know what to do."

If the conditions in Hennigan’s office could make Jacobson so sick, it’s reasonable to think that it could happen elsewhere in City Hall. That wouldn’t surprise Hennigan. City Hall is old. Its plaster ceiling crumbles. Its concrete walls are riddled with divots. And, more important, despite the consultants’ findings of no water infiltration, the facility is known to leak. When Davis-Mullen took her tour last spring, for example, she spotted people in numerous departments with plastic over their desks to combat the flow. She saw buckets stationed strategically, as well as stains on walls. Hennigan realizes that she’s no expert. But she suspects structural problems like these could make people sick. As she explains, "City Hall could lend itself to sick-building syndrome. It looks like it has symptoms."

SICK-BUILDING syndrome is no joke. Remember the state Registry of Motor Vehicles headquarters in Roxbury? The agency occupied the new, nine-story Ruggles Center for 15 months before abandoning it in 1995, by which time more than 500 employees had complained of myriad illnesses. Experts blamed wool fibers from a fireproofing insulation sprayed on the beams, as well as poor air supply. In other words, says Jack Spengler, who teaches environmental health at Harvard’s School of Public Health, "This [syndrome] is well documented. It has real health and economic consequences."

Experts like Spengler, who has investigated hundreds of houses, schools, and offices where people got sick, explain there’s almost always a physical or structural reason for the ailments. It could be noxious odors caused by paints and glues. Or it could be office copiers, printers, and other equipment, which can emit carbon-based particles into the air. "Lots of stuff can give rise to legitimate complaints," Spengler says.

Typically, though, the culprit is mold. David Straus, a professor of microbiology at Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center, ranks among the top experts on sick-building syndrome in the nation. He’s tested nearly 1000 public and private facilities, including city buildings. Nine times out of 10, he has traced illnesses to leaky pipes or roofs and fungal growth behind walls, in carpets, on ceiling tiles, and so on. "Almost without exception," he says.

There are, in essence, four ways a moldy building can make you sick. First, fungi can cause an infection, in which the mold feeds off your flesh, rather than synthetic surfaces. "This is rare," Straus acknowledges, "and obvious. You can see the infection." The second way seems more common: mold spawns an allergic reaction, which manifests as a runny nose, watery eyes, sinus headaches. The third happens when mold spores, or seeds, infiltrate the air. You inhale them, which in turn leads to respiratory trouble and chronic fatigue. Finally, mold can grow until it becomes a fuzzy, black cluster known as a "colony" that produces "mycotoxins." Exposure to these fungal poisons over time can lead to a host of sicknesses, including cancer.

The fact that 300-plus people at Boston City Hall have complained about symptoms associated with sick-building syndrome strikes experts as significant. "That’s a lot of people," Spengler observes. In any building, he estimates 10 percent of the population is unhappy, health-wise, for whatever reason — be it stress, marital strife, general dissatisfaction. But when 25, 30, or nearly 50 percent of occupants gripe, he says, "you have to pay attention." Straus, of Texas Tech, concurs: "I wouldn’t take that number lightly."

Given their experiences in the field, both experts question the city-funded consultants’ reports. Neither Straus nor Spengler has read the documents, they stress. Yet they warn that standard air-quality tests don’t necessarily tell you much. Many environmental companies focus on what Spengler refers to as "comfort-related things," such as carbon-dioxide levels, humidity, and temperature — none of which has anything to do with this disease. "If City Hall has been given a clean bill of health," he says, "the consultants probably didn’t find the source of people’s problems."

When it comes to sick-building syndrome, the most important evaluation — and, perhaps not coincidentally, the most expensive — measures mold contamination. While the consultants who tested City Hall did look for visible mold and water leaks, fungi tend to breed behind walls and ceilings and can be pulled into the air through old, faulty ventilation systems. A mold test uses high-tech instruments to quantify airborne fungal spores, both alive and dead. That is the kind of testing the administration reportedly did in Hennigan’s office — but not, Galvin confirms, elsewhere. "In my humble opinion," Straus says, "that is what absolutely has to be done before I’d be convinced this building is safe."

At the very least, experts argue, Mayor Menino and his administration should form a committee made up of employees, building managers, and consultants to conduct a survey of city workers. "If the administration were serious about this issue," Spengler says, "that would be essential." Employees, after all, have the best insight into the problem. They know when their illnesses started, where they flare up, and how long they persist. "People are not malcontents without a reason," he concludes. "The city must put faith in its workforce."

That prospect doesn’t seem likely, however. For one thing, Galvin makes it clear that he sees no need for an employee survey. His office, he says, has received health complaints "from time to time," although no formal process for fielding such complaints is in place. When asked whether the administration intends to quantify the issue by surveying employees, he replies, "No." He then adds, "I won’t do a survey. For an old building, I think it’s fine."

So, too, does Menino. "The tests undertaken by Chief Galvin have convinced the mayor this isn’t a sick building," says Nagle. As for future action, he adds, "We’ll leave that up to Galvin."

But not everyone is ready to give up on the issue yet. Despite the consultants’ positive marks, some councilors think it inappropriate to declare the issue dead. However tiny in number, employees did come before the health committee to share concerns. Councilor Turner expects the committee he heads to focus on the Elderly Commission. While Galvin and his crew have installed a reinforced steel door to seal the department from fumes coming from the underground parking garage, which sits directly below, Turner says, "Employees have suggested this isn’t enough."

Roache, meanwhile, plans to push for what experts recommend: an employee-health assessment. He considers a survey crucial, particularly in light of the seemingly oppressive climate at City Hall. Perhaps a questionnaire would encourage employees to speak candidly about their experiences. That way, the council could get to the bottom of the issue. "I want the administration to put together a team of people, including employees," Roache says. "I’d like to see an action plan."

That would require a valiant effort. But now that the clamor of some 300 people has diminished, Roache notes, with a hint of exasperation, "It’s hard to know what to do when you can’t define the problem."

Kristen Lombardi can be reached at klombardi[a]phx.com