New York Times article on EPA to lead cleanup effort,

NYC 9/11 Public Portal Document ab mf NYC-WTC_000151984 The (aw York Ta Times Sl plow E. P.A. to Lead Indoor Cleenup Near Collapse Continued From Page From Page Al their air tested. _. “Rather than doing this in the first in the intervening months. Extensive testing of outdoor air in the neighborhoods and business areas downtown has for the most part shown little cause for any long- term health concerns. But because relatively few indoor spaces have been tested, public health experts and disaster adminis- trators, not to mention residents, also really do not know what the state of indoor air quality is. Some public health experts who had the plans described to them said a cen- tral question is whether the new poli- cy, coming nearly eight months after the attack, has already missed its opportunity. “Our worry is that this proposal is coming too late in the game,” said Peter Iwanowicz, director of envi- ronmental health at the American Lung Association of New York State. Mr. Iwanowicz said he had no reason to believe that residents should be alarmed by the change in policy. But the fact is, he said, people have not had enough information to assess their own risks, unless they have had the resources and inclination to have Tad couple of months, when it should have been done, people have been living and working in these spaces,” Mr. Iwanowicz said. But one public official who became a particularly sharp critic of the government’s response, Representa tive Jerrold Nadler of New Yor, said last night that he thought the policy was a huge step forward and should reassure residents that their health and welfare would be taken care of. “It’s good that they’re doing this,” he said. ‘‘We’ll watch that they do it right, but it’s a major step forward.” A spokeswoman for the E.P.A., Bonnie Bellow, declined to comment last night. In general, public health experts have divided the population of people who were potentially exposed to con- taminants from the trade center into two main groups: those who worked or volunteered at ground zero and everyone else. Ground zero workers, especially those who did not wear proper respi- ratory protection, are considered the most exposed because they were in the midst of the dust that blew around the site and the smoke from the fires that burned for more than three months after the attack. —-n--— Physicians who have treated peo- ple with respiratory complaints say that although some downtown office workers and residents have had se- vere reactions — mostly short-term irritation of their lungs and throats — the numbers are relatively low. One physician who has treated ma.y people with World Trade Cen- ter-related illnesses, Dr. Stephen M. Levin of the Mount Sinai School of Medicine, said at a conference last month in Manhattan that he believed that few residents should be alarmed about their increased risk of long- term illness from the disaster. ‘ But in dozens of interviews with residents over the last eight months, questions have continued to resonate about how clean is clean. Among the ‘issues that will probably emerge un- der the new cleanup policy is wheth- er residents will consider a building clean if only some of the apartments, but not all, participate in the E.P.A. program since dust, as anyone who has ever wielded a broom can attest, tends to move around, tracked from place to place. me. cel