EPA expanded WTC indoor cleanup plan, August 2002

NYC 9/11 Public Portal Document

Robert > From: Gair, Brad [[email protected]] Sent: Thursday, August 15, 2002 12:06 PM To: ’Avaltroni, Robert’ Subject: EPA News on Indoor Cleanup

Bob, More good press for our partners. Details of EPA Cleanup Plan Draws Fire Publication: Downtown Express By: Sascha Brodsky Date: August 14, 2002

The federal Environmental Protection Agency last week released an expanded plan to clean indoor apartments near ground zero nearly a year after the World Trade Center disaster. The plan now includes some testing for dioxins and toxic metals in a sampling of Lower Manhattan apartments but is still coming under fire from critics. The E.P.A. bowed to pressure from infuriated tenants around ground zero in May, promising to clean and test apartments for asbestos. The agency maintains there is no major health hazard in the area. The E.P.A. had released a plan to clean homes south of Canal St. three months ago, asking residents to request a cleanup by Sept. 3. The cleanup is available to those who live south of Canal, Allen and Pike Sts. Businesses are not eligible for the federal cleanup. The agency and many scientists have downplayed any health risk from the dust, saying tests have shown the asbestos did not reach hazardous levels. But some critics are still calling the cleanup plan too little too late. They said that the plan should be more comprehensive in testing for a wide array of contaminants and go beyond the E.P.A.’s Canal St. boundary. “We know there was not a wall at Canal St.,” Dr. Marjorie J. Clarke, a scientist in residence at Lehman College in the Bronx, told a rally of scientists and residents outside the agency’s Lower Manhattan headquarters last week. Former Councilmember Kathryn Freed said at the rally that she has suffered from respiratory problems that she attributes to World Trade Center contaminants. “To date, the majority of apartments near ground zero are still not cleaned,” she said. “The E.P.A. has put the onus on us on individuals to know how to clean up these apartments. Somehow, we are supposed to be the experts” But agency spokesperson Bonnie Bellow said that the E.PA. will test select apartments for other contaminants such as heavy metals with an eye toward expanding the cleanup. “We will take a look at the data and then we will have a much clearer idea at what is out there,” she said. “If anything comes up we will make sure to follow up on it.” The agency plans to test 250 apartments for dioxins and toxic metals like lead and mercury. Those apartments will be randomly chosen from the approximately 3,600 apartments whose residents have requested asbestos cleaning and testing. An additional 1,000 apartments will be tested for asbestos at the residents’ request and cleaned only if their levels exceed federal standards. If tests indicated dangerous levels of dioxins and toxic metals, the apartments would be cleaned and an expansion of tests and cleanups would be considered.

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