World Trade Center environmental data report, 2001-2002

NYC 9/11 Public Portal Document

should take in disaster situations. A national body such as the NIEHS or National Academy of Sciences could play a role in developing an action plan

Recommendation: Consult with the community and empower them to be involved. Set up a process to have a liaison research committee to the community.

(11) New on-scene emergency protocolfor measuring potential pollutants.

Sen. Hillary Clinton has suggested that setting health-based air quality standards should be part of the Homeland Security Act. She has called for the passage of the Disaster Area Health and Environmental Monitoring Act of 2003, legislation she cosponsored with Senator George V. Voinovich (R-OH) and which was approved by the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee.

“This legislation would ensure that the health of first responders, workers, residents, school children, and other community members is adequately protected and monitored when exposed to harmful substances and other health risks in a declared disaster area," according to Clinton. (8)

Recommendation: Create a new emergency protocolfor environmental health identifying the pollutants to be measured in the aftermath ofa disaster and standardsfor controlling them.

(12) Give environmental health higher priority.

“At 9/11 safety professionals were rotated in and out but we didn’t have the manpower,” says Bruce Lippy of the National Union of Operating Engineers.

Professionals needed more staff and funding, argues CDC’s environmental health expert Ron Burger. “There should be more than 2 or 3 environmental health professionals in a local health department of 20 or 30,” says Burger.

Patrick Meehan at the CDC agrees. “New York City, as well funded as it was, didn’t have enough capability. That speaks to what we can expect from other, much smaller, cities and towns.”

One way to give environmental health greater priority would be to issue advisories to physicians so that (hey can be aware of illnesses that may arise out of environmental health consequences, suggests Stephen Levin of Mt. Sinai Hospital.

Recommendation: Beefup environmental health finding, staffing, and other public and professional resources.

(13) Be reatfy to improvise.

“You can’t plan for every single thing; but when something happens, it’s not time to take a plan out,” says CDC’s Ron Burger. At both Groimd Zero and the Pentagon, says disaster scholar Kathleen Tierney, improvisation was as critical as pre-planning in helping handle everything from unsolicited food donations to creating credentialing procedures (hat balanced effective access to the site against security.

Recommendation: “Plan effectively beforehand," urges Tierney, but also create an environment where you can “improvise solutions to unforeseen problems that will inevitably develop. ”

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