SCHOOLS

NYC 9/11 Public Portal Document

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Kelpin, Gerry From: Marx Terry [email protected]] Sent: Thursday, January 17,2002 4:32 PM To: [email protected]; [email protected]; [email protected] ; [email protected]; [email protected]:Jjsa{3> eny.mecLnvu.edu:___ /ji___ i ,, [email protected]; a......._____________ .,.i [email protected]; [email protected]; [email protected]; [email protected]; [email protected]; [email protected]; [email protected] Cc: [email protected]; [email protected]; [email protected]; [email protected]; Hemida Mohamed; Orlan Bernard; [email protected]; Sacks Burt Subject: wtc schools

THANK YOU ALL for agreeing to help review the BOE monitoring data for the schools near the World Trade Center. I am writing to briefly summarize and follow up on yesterday’s meeting. For those of you who could not make the meeting, as you probably know, 6 NYC BOE schools were closed after 9/11, and so far, only Stuyvesant High School has reopened. The others will open within the next few weeks pending final assurances of health and safey. I am sending, under separate cover, the monitoring data that was discussed yesterday, as well as a map which you may find helpful in knowing where the schools are located. The data include the BOE monitoring (by ATC Associates) of Stuyvesant High School since it re-opened on October 9, 2001, as well as the results from PS/IS 89, PS 234, and PS 150 since their cleanup. Results on the High Schools of Leadership and Public Service and of Economics and Finance below the WTC will be hopefully be available early next week, and we will send to you as soon as possible. As the data show, thousands of samples have been taken at the schools, both indoor and outdoor, many at the request of the parents’ associations and their respective environmental consultants. Monitoring done includes samples for asbestos, respirable particulates, PCBs, mercury, fiberglass, silica, dioxin, hydrocarbons, metals, lead, cyanide, fungus, and lAQ measures for C02, CO, TVOCs, temperature, and humidity. This is all public information which you can feel free to share with any colleagues that would like to help review this with you. Yesterday’s meeting, attended by Phil Landrigan, Joel Forman, George Thurston, Jackie Moline, as well as staff from DOH, DEP, BOE, UFT, and ATC Associates was very helpful. There was full consensus from the group yesterday that none of the measurements so far have revealed any values of concern, and that plans to reopen the schools could proceed pending final assurances of health and safety for the students and staff. However, a number of issues were raised: 1) While the measures for dioxin have been indeed been very low, there were no standards known by the group yesterday to compare them to. Ken Carlino from DOH kindly found and emailed this information today to everyone that met yesterday. I am enclosing it in the packets for those not present. As expected, the school results fall far below the Binghamton standards. 2) The monitoring for respirable particulate matter has been done by the Dust-Trak monitor, in order to give ’quick and dirty’ real-time measurements, because of the initial daily uncertainties after 9/11. While the overall trends in these measurements have clearly shown improvement, this is not the most appropriate measuring technique. Therefore, going forward, particulate matter should and will be monitored with 24 hour filter measurements. 3) The overall number of samples being tested was thought to be excessive, both in what is being looked for as well as the frequency of samples, especially 4 months after the event as the fires subside. Given that the vast majority of samples have resulted in negative readings, this scope of monitoring need not continue for Stuyvesant nor 1

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