Law Department notice on WTC document preservation, Oct 2001

NYC 9/11 Public Portal Document

General Observations

Note 10 - We agree that the Agency’s response to the WTC collapse was unprecedented and enormous in terms of resources and human effort. Page 5 of the draft report acknowledged the many other activities - in addition to the air quality related activities - that EPA conducted in response to this tragedy.

Note 11 - We agree that the Agency undertook extraordinary efforts to provide information to the public and we acknowledge that the documents we reviewed indicated EPA provided full disclosure of sampling results. However, in our opinion, the importance of Agency press releases should not be minimized. As detailed in the draft report, EPA press releases result from a deliberative process that should reflect the Agency’s official position on significant issues. Press releases are made available to essentially all news media and may well be quoted or paraphrased in radio, television, and other forms of communication. In our opinion, the Agency could have provided more complete and more useful information in its press releases.

We also agree that future incidents may involve scenarios that cannot be anticipated. In order to address this possibility, the draft report recommends that EPA designate teams of Agency experts - at both the National and Regional level - who can be mobilized quicldy to provide needed technical support during a response, and that the Agency develop expert panels that can be used to quickly develop health-related benchmarks in emergency situations.

Chapter 2

Note 12 - We fully recognize the extraordinary circumstances that existed at the time the statement was made about the air being safe to breathe. However, for the reasons detailed in the draft report, there was insufficient information to support the statement made and the principle of acknowledging uncertainty was relevant.

We disagree with the assertion that EPA’s statement about the air being safe to breathe would clearly be understood by New Yorkers as applying exclusively to asbestos. The press release sentence which preceded the subject statement asserts that New Yorkers are “not being exposed to excessive levels of asbestos or other harmful substances....” The same press release also states that sample tests results are “below established levels of concern for asbestos, lead and volatile organic compounds.”

Note 13 - We agree that, to our knowledge, EPA never withheld data from the public, and the draft report makes this point (page 10). The draft report does not imply that it is “unusual” or “unexpected” for the Agency to coordinate with CEQ during a “catastrophic disaster.” In such a situation we would expect EPA to coordinate with numerous government entities and any non-govemment entity that could provide needed services. However, we would expect EPA to remain fully committed to its

134 Report No. 2003-P-00012

NYC-WTC_000145665