Testimony
of Jenna Orkin, mother of Ground Zero Student
I am
the mother of a 17-year-old boy who was a student at Stuyvesant High School
four blocks north of Ground Zero on September 11.
In a
statement that will undoubtedly resonate for years to come, on September 14,
Christy Todd Whitman declared the air downtown to be safe. So, on October 9, Stuyvesant reopened to
cries of, "Get back to normal!" and, "Show the terrorists!" Wall Street was up and running again so all
was right with the world.
Unbeknownst to us at the time, the week that Stuyvesant returned
to its building was the week that Dr.
Thomas Cahill of U.C. Davis conducted studies a mile north of Ground Zero that
revealed levels of very- and ultra-fine particulates that were higher than at
the Kuwaiti oil fields.
For the next eight months, Stuyvesant got a double whammy of
toxic waste: Not only did they have the WTC site to the south. They also had it on their north doorstep for
that was where the waste transfer barge stayed while being loaded with the
debris that was to be carted away to Staten Island. This placement was in violation of state law but in the so-called
“emergency” that prevailed for the eight months of the cleanup (and what sort
of emergency was it, exactly, after the first few weeks when it was clear no
one else would have survived? A real
estate emergency? An economic
emergency?) Environmental laws were thrown to the four toxin-laden winds. The barge operation was host to diesel
cranes and idling diesel trucks that worked round the clock seven days a
week. According to the American Lung
Association of Pennsylvania, I believe, diesel contains dozens of toxins and
carcinogens.
How was Stuyvesant equipped to handle this onslaught? The school's filtration system was about 10% effective until the end of
January when it was upgraded to 40% effectiveness. Although we had been told the school had undergone a thorough
cleanup including the ventilation system, we later learned that in fact the
ventilation system had not been cleaned.
Particulate Matter 2.5 - dust that is small enough to penetrate
deep into the lungs and not come out again - was often higher at Stuyvesant
than at Ground Zero. Isocyanates and
tetrachloroethane were high when they were measured but after the troubling
results, they weren't measured again.
Lead in the ventilation system, of which wipe samples were taken only
when parents threatened to sue the Board of Education, was thirty times the
level one would expect to find on the floor.
(There is no official standard for lead in ventilation systems.) Asbestos was found at 250 times normal
limits in the auditorium which had been used as a triage center.
Despite all these findings, the Board of Education (now renamed
the Department of Education) continues to maintain the building is and always
has been safe. The lead, they said
after the results of the wipe samples were announced, would stay in the
walls. The asbestos, they said after
the results of the auditorium samples were announced, would stay in the carpet.
On February 7, 2002, Deputy Chancellor David Klasfeld wrote to
parents, "I can only conclude from the [Parent Association's] report's use
of sensationalistic language (e.g. "Diesel fumes are carcinogenic")
that the intent of this report is not to provide parents with useful
information but rather, to cause further stress and divisiveness to the
Stuyvesant community and to damage the school's mission for educational
excellence... [T]he report matter-of-factly claims that “diesel fumes are
carcinogenic" without... present[ing] any evidence or exposure data to
support these specious claims."
High levels of lead had been found in the Stuyvesant gym where
it could be inhaled deeply and in the cafeteria where it could settle on students'
food. Mr. Klasfeld wrote, "While lead can cause several adverse
health effects, these are usually from prolonged exposure to the dust from the
metal or when children consume lead-based paint." Perhaps Mr. Klasfeld
believed that while lead-based paint was not on the menu, lead on rye was o.k.
fare. He continued: "known adverse
health effects from these contaminants are generally the result of prolonged,
occupational type exposure."
Undoubtedly, in his view, studying is not an occupation because students
don't get paid and teaching is not an occupation because it is not usually
associated with
exposure to lead poisoning.
In spite of the fact that FEMA had allocated 20 million dollars
to clean the Ground Zero schools, the Board of Education refused to clean the
ventilation system of Stuyvesant until parents, using the pro bono services of
attorney Richard Ben-Veniste of Watergate fame, threatened to sue. Now that the asbestos has been found in the
auditorium carpet (using ultrasonication, a test performed not by the Board of
Education but by an engineer hired by the parents - a test which the EPA is
still not employing in its clean up plan for Lower Manhattan) they are balking
at testing or abating the auditorium seats.
Presumably they believe that the asbestos took a unanimous vote to
boycott the seats in favor of the carpet.
In the mean time, 60% of the staff at Stuyvesant reported in a
NIOSH study that they had had respiratory and other symptoms they attributed to
their exposure to the air at school. No
such study has been conducted among students.
However parents have reported that their children have been diagnosed
with new-onset asthma that may last the rest of their lives; chronic sinusitis
entailing heavy doses of steroids and antibiotics and the newly-coined
“chemical bronchitis." One girl
had her first asthmatic episode in seven years - an attack that landed her in
the Emergency Ward - after swimming in the Stuyvesant pool which had not been
cleaned.
Klasfeld complained that parents' reports of illnesses were
“anecdotal.” This is true. In the
absence of a scientific study, all we had to go on was anecdotal reports. He also said, "we believe the events of
September 11 and its emotional aftermath have contributed to a number of these
incidents." We, who? Mr. Klasfeld
and the students' doctors?
After several months of attending hearings and talking to scientists, by February, 2002, I had amassed enough evidence to convince my ex-husband that our son should not be in the Stuyvesant building. I put our son in an alternative high school, the only school that was willing to take a junior mid-year. The school offered no courses except one in Planned Parenthood. Instead, the students did “internships” which involved, in my son's case, stuffing a record number of envelopes.
In the last year, a number of parents have become
activists. In my attempts to research
issues related to those at Stuyvesant,
I went to Google and typed in "elementary schools" and
"toxic." Over 23,000 cites
came up. It's enough to make you think that the powers that be have other
interests at heart than the well-being of children.
When Christy Todd Whitman declared the air in Lower Manhattan to
be safe to breathe she set in motion a chain of events that many of us believe
will prove the undoing of thousands.
Already Ground Zero workers are suing the city for their exposure to
toxins during the recovery operation.
Many rescue dogs are sick and at least one, “Bear”, has died. The exposure of the students and staff at
Stuyvesant was not so different.
In fact, Stuyvesant is a microcosm of everything that can go
wrong. The foxes are in charge of the
chicken coop. Having made initial
mistakes they are in the position of having to defend those mistakes by
compounding them. Clearly, there are not enough checks and balances in
place. Not enough watchdogs nor enough
penalties to make those in charge think twice about lying and compounding the
lie. The penalties for compounding lies
should increase exponentially over time to prevent the paramount ethic at work
from being, "Cover your tracks at all costs."
Jenna Orkin
911 Environmental Action
www.911ea.org
Concerned Stuyvesant
Community
www.concernedstuy.org
718-246-1577
jennakilt@aol.com