President Barack Obama signed a law Monday dealing with the issue of contaminated construction materials, the Drywall Safety Act of 2012. The investigative reporting group 100 Reporters has looked at the law, finding that it originally banned the use of contaminated drywall from China, but by the time the bill came out of committee it allowed regulators to defer to standards developed by the homebuilding industry.

A 100Reporters review of the legislation shows that the law is unlikely to provide relief to current and potential victims of contaminated drywall. It does little to prevent the sale of tainted homes to unsuspecting buyers. Absent from the law are meaningful standards to insure that new drywall – both imported and domestically produced – does not release potentially hazardous levels of sulfur gases.

In addition, after lobbying pressure from industry, the law hands off virtually all responsibility for writing a handful of new rules to drywall manufacturers themselves, rather than government regulators.

As a result little may actually change for those whose finances and health have been severely impacted by the tainted drywall.

Read reporter Aaron Kessler's full story at 100r.org.

More from Open Channel:

• Guns already allowed in schools with little restriction in many states
• 'Zero Dark Thirty,' the CIA and 'enhanced interrogation techniques'
• Exclusive: DEA agents arranged prostitute for Secret Service agent

Follow Open Channel from NBCNews.com on Twitter and Facebook