I promise to update you on my goings on in New Orleans, including my new big pimpin' yellow cruiser I can now be find riding around Bayou St. John. It's amazing and you will be jealous when you see it. I'm currently on the search for a matching fedora. Because every cruiser riding lady needs a matching fedora.
Here is my latest Momsrising blog post. Turns out the Carson-Gore Academy for Environmental Sciences was built on contaminated land. Yes, you may recognize the names Carson and Gore from Rachel Carson and Al Gore. Cheers from a hot, humid, and spicy New Orleans.
A new school year, a new article on our country’s lack of safe school siting policies. More evidence that a tidal wave of debate over why building schools on top of contaminated land is a bad idea has washed over our country. In fact, that’s exactly what The New York Times article entitled, “Tainted Al Gore School Poster Child For National Toxics Debate”, states. The author, Elena Schor, described the latest in school siting scandals, this one with the just opened Al Gore school in Los Angeles. This school’s contamination is so well known that Bill O’Reilly and Dennis Miller have both mentioned it and its ironic connection to pioneering environmentalists on their shows.
EPA, mandated by Congress in 2007, to create and release voluntary national guidelines on how to safely site a school without exposing students and staff to a cocktail of toxic chemicals in the summer of 2009. Guess what, folks? It’s the summer of 2010 and there are still no such guidelines in the hands of school board members and parents alike. EPA, who was notoriously on permanent vacation during the Bush years, had a late start. Last summer they enlisted a large and diverse stakeholder group to help them craft these guidelines and we have all been waiting patiently since those recommendations were sent to EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson.
The Carson-Gore Academy of Environmental Sciences, named after lauded environmentalists Rachel Carson and Al Gore, has been built on toxic land. What I find a more important piece of the conversation is that California actually has the toughest school siting regulations and mechanisms in place to prevent such things from happening in the country. The state has been at the forefront of this issue. Just this past weekend, contaminated soil was removed from the school prior to its opening on Monday. But I wonder, with mechanisms in place, why did it take until mere hours before students arrived for their first day of school to remove contaminated soil?
As we know from No Child Left Behind and cross district busing, anything related to school districts is much more complicated than meets the eye. Often times, school boards are gifted cheap land by residents or businesses to build a new school. This gifted land is often cheap for a reason. It’s undesirable. Sometimes, many times, that reason is because of past contamination or proximity to a highway or under power lines. All things that can cause life long health problems for the students and faculty that spend so many hours there.
Sometimes nobody in decision making authority even knows that the land has been contaminated. But more often, decision makers simply do not know what to do or how to remediate or have any power to raise enough money to do so if they did know the answers to these questions. EPA’s guidelines are an important step in providing the right tools to those that are in charge of building our nation’s schools. With the average age of our nation’s schools reaching 50 years old, we need these tools more than ever. But what we need more than voluntary guidelines are laws. We must prevent exposing our children to toxic chemicals just by going to school.
Please urge EPA Administrator Jackson to hurry up, release these guidelines and get them in the hands of those that need them. You can leave her a message on her facebook page or you can call her office and leave this simple message “Administrator Jackson, please release the voluntary national guidelines to safe school siting today.” 202-564-4700
For a toxic free future,
Renee Claire
Showing posts with label safe school siting. Show all posts
Showing posts with label safe school siting. Show all posts
Friday, September 17, 2010
Monday, August 16, 2010
Fort Hays Kansas and Michelle Obama
Late Saturday night my father and I started driving from Washington DC to Oakland, CA. We are now resting in Fort Hays, Kansas. Kansas on a whole has been pretty lovely, but I think driving through Illinois has been my favorite so far. Really beautiful.
I also got word today that I will be volunteering for the Gulf Restoration Network for 3 weeks in late September, early October in New Orleans. I'm very excited to finally feel not useless about the oil spill. If you know of a place that may be free or extremely cheap for me rest my nappy head in New Orleans, please let me know.
Anyways, I will not be writing a whole post today, but I thought I would share with you a post I did for Momsrising late Thursday afternoon before I hopped on a plane from Amsterdam to DC.
Enjoy!
I’m starting to feel like a broken record, but I guess that’s what happens when you really care about something. Children are a vulnerable population. They eat more food, breathe more air, and drink more liquids per pound than adults. They are also more curious exploring the world around them in more tactile ways than the rest of us. This all means that children are more susceptible to the impacts of toxic chemicals. While all of this is happening in our own communities, our nation lacks important laws to prevent children from going to school on, near, or inside sources of pollution.
The Center for Health, Environment, and Justice (CHEJ) has been calling for action and standing up for children’s health for 30 years. Today, CHEJ is asking concerned parents (and non-parents alike) to sign on to a letter to Mrs. Michelle Obama. The First Lady’s Lets Move campaign is getting children away from the TV by encouraging them to get active by playing sports, gardening, and eating healthy food in order to combat children obesity. Really good stuff. CHEJ thinks this campaign could be even better by expressing the need to eliminate toxic chemicals and sources of pollution from where children play, learn, and grow.
Join CHEJ and ask Mrs. Obama to strengthen the Let’s Move campaign to acknowledge that in some places in the US the air outside is so polluted that sometimes getting active can trigger asthma and expose children to nasty chemicals.
As CHEJ’s letter to the First Lady states, “new schools and playgrounds are still being built on or near toxic contaminated land across the country, although there is an effort by the EPA to establish a policy that provides guidance for school districts on safe school siting issues. Unfortunately, these are just guidelines and are intended only for schools, not playgrounds and other areas where children commonly are active. Siting schools on or near sources of environmental contamination as well as a lack of comprehensive remediation of already contaminated schools will only broaden the scope of childhood health concerns such as obesity.”
Toxic chemicals released from things like incinerators, coal fire power plants, and pesticide spraying can cause reproductive and developmental disorders at an important point in life, ultimately impacting the health and economy of the entire community. But by reducing the amount of toxic chemicals our children are exposed to in the first place, we are providing our children with a better quality of life and our community with a greater chance of success.
Please help CHEJ and ask Mrs. Obama to strengthen the Lets Move campaign.
For a toxic free future,
Renee Claire
I also got word today that I will be volunteering for the Gulf Restoration Network for 3 weeks in late September, early October in New Orleans. I'm very excited to finally feel not useless about the oil spill. If you know of a place that may be free or extremely cheap for me rest my nappy head in New Orleans, please let me know.
Anyways, I will not be writing a whole post today, but I thought I would share with you a post I did for Momsrising late Thursday afternoon before I hopped on a plane from Amsterdam to DC.
Enjoy!
I’m starting to feel like a broken record, but I guess that’s what happens when you really care about something. Children are a vulnerable population. They eat more food, breathe more air, and drink more liquids per pound than adults. They are also more curious exploring the world around them in more tactile ways than the rest of us. This all means that children are more susceptible to the impacts of toxic chemicals. While all of this is happening in our own communities, our nation lacks important laws to prevent children from going to school on, near, or inside sources of pollution.
The Center for Health, Environment, and Justice (CHEJ) has been calling for action and standing up for children’s health for 30 years. Today, CHEJ is asking concerned parents (and non-parents alike) to sign on to a letter to Mrs. Michelle Obama. The First Lady’s Lets Move campaign is getting children away from the TV by encouraging them to get active by playing sports, gardening, and eating healthy food in order to combat children obesity. Really good stuff. CHEJ thinks this campaign could be even better by expressing the need to eliminate toxic chemicals and sources of pollution from where children play, learn, and grow.
Join CHEJ and ask Mrs. Obama to strengthen the Let’s Move campaign to acknowledge that in some places in the US the air outside is so polluted that sometimes getting active can trigger asthma and expose children to nasty chemicals.
As CHEJ’s letter to the First Lady states, “new schools and playgrounds are still being built on or near toxic contaminated land across the country, although there is an effort by the EPA to establish a policy that provides guidance for school districts on safe school siting issues. Unfortunately, these are just guidelines and are intended only for schools, not playgrounds and other areas where children commonly are active. Siting schools on or near sources of environmental contamination as well as a lack of comprehensive remediation of already contaminated schools will only broaden the scope of childhood health concerns such as obesity.”
Toxic chemicals released from things like incinerators, coal fire power plants, and pesticide spraying can cause reproductive and developmental disorders at an important point in life, ultimately impacting the health and economy of the entire community. But by reducing the amount of toxic chemicals our children are exposed to in the first place, we are providing our children with a better quality of life and our community with a greater chance of success.
Please help CHEJ and ask Mrs. Obama to strengthen the Lets Move campaign.
For a toxic free future,
Renee Claire
Thursday, January 14, 2010
I'm Back. And Sleepy
Hello You,
I'm back in Amsterdam where it is freezing and I've nearly broken my legs 100 times in just the past two days from slipping on the icey snow. No cycling for me this week.
I was just searching through my blog posts trying to find one about Kiddie Kollege. I know I've written about it but I'm too sleepy to keep looking and as I have recently noticed I have never tagged any of my posts. Hmmmmmm. Maybe I'll start now. why haven't any of you told me this? I depend on you to make sure I'm not forgetting these things.
Kiddie Kollege was a day care that was built inside an old thermometer factory. Oh yes, inside! Similar to an elementary school that opened August 2008 outside Austin,Texas inside an old chemical facility, which so outraged parents that they started a state-wide coalition to introduce and pass safe school siting policy at a state level. It didn't pass but the coalition was really effective and the bill will be re-introduced this coming session.
I feel particular kind of solidarity with this group because as they were learning how to build this coalition I was learning how to put together a national coalition to get local, state and national safe school siting policies passed around the country. It was a great learning experience and though hasn't stayed together very well since I departed, did help pressure EPA to produce federal guidelines (public comment period is coming up) that are much more comprehensive than they would have been without so many dedicated activists at the table (our biggest ask of the agency). All work that I miss very very very much right now.
Damn it. I just got yelled at by one of the facilities guy to stop banging my feet on the ground. My bad! Lyle Lovett made me do it. This is the same guy that had a dream about me last night that I was a red head and pregnant but I lived in a really big house. Hmmm . . . I'm not sure how feel about the dude who kicks the shit out of me in our weekly football game dreaming that I'm having babies.
Kiddie Kollege. This day care center was open between 2004 and 2006. Since its closing, there has been a number of investigations and lawsuits to figure out who is actually responsible for the fact that 100 babies and children suffered mercury inhalation. Is it the original owner of the property? Is it the person who opened the day care? Is it the Department of Environmental Protection who knew this property was contaminated? Is it someone else entirely?
The day care was shut down after someone from the New Jersey's Department of Environmental Protection discovered the day care in the contaminated building. The owner of the day care said that he misread the environmental report. The state department released a timeline in 2006 that showed a series of miscommunications about the property and contamination. It first started when the original owner went bankrupt and was forced to close the business. According to law, a company, even one in bankruptcy, is responsible for cleaning up a contaminated site. So when the clean up didn't happen, the state should have put a lien on the building and put up signs to make sure the contamination wouldn't go unnoticed. Obviously this didn't happen.
I want to stress how often this the case. One of the most fundamental pieces of any safe school siting policy must be meaningful community involvement. The state doesn't always know what former businesses were sited on property but a lot of times the family that has lived on the same street for the past 30 years will. People must be invited to participate so that a high school doesn't end up being built on a former undocumented landfill, as is the case many times over in more rural areas. Meaningful community participation is laughed at more often than not in the siting of schools and this is one of the biggest mistakes any school board can make.
Interestingly, Lisa Jackson, the current EPA Administrator, was New Jersey's commissioner of environmental protection at the time Kiddie Kollege was closed. She has made children's health a priority in her reign at the federal level. I've seen a stark change of will in the agency in the past year in promoting safe school siting and releasing information on areas where changes need to be made and children are being exposed to toxic chemicals. In fact, in March of 2009, EPA announced that it will be testing 63 schools in 22 states because of high air contamination in those areas. Here is a national map of where these schools are located.
All the school testing has come back and communities are looking into the results. One thing that should be noted about this project is that industry did know ahead of time when the testing was being completed. I heard from a community leader in Ohio who overheard a manager at a nearby plant say that they were going to shut down emissions that day. Doesn't this man know children who attend that school? Business is business, right? Even if we only have sick communities at the end of the day.
The most important element in understanding air testing like this is not how much of what toxin is captured, though that is extremely important, we must take into account that children are a vulnerable population and the timing of the dose is also extremely important. Industry often discusses that the level of exposure of whathaveyou chemical is 'safe'. What they mean is, when a particular chemical is released, it only matters how much of it is released in order to know if it is of concern. What matters even more than how much is when. Children consume more per pound than adults and have habits of exploring the area around them in a much more tactile manner which exposes them to a greater quantity of toxins than adults. You can damage a child's body for life with just a small amount of exposure and since toxicity is based on an adult male, not a small child, we don't even know what that exposure rate is likely to be.
Today, the Kiddie Kollege building was torn down and the parents of the children and former Kiddie Kollege staff are currently waiting for the next step in their lawsuit against the owner of the building, DEP and Franklin Township for medical monitoring of their children.
Ciao,
Renee Claire
I'm back in Amsterdam where it is freezing and I've nearly broken my legs 100 times in just the past two days from slipping on the icey snow. No cycling for me this week.
I was just searching through my blog posts trying to find one about Kiddie Kollege. I know I've written about it but I'm too sleepy to keep looking and as I have recently noticed I have never tagged any of my posts. Hmmmmmm. Maybe I'll start now. why haven't any of you told me this? I depend on you to make sure I'm not forgetting these things.
Kiddie Kollege was a day care that was built inside an old thermometer factory. Oh yes, inside! Similar to an elementary school that opened August 2008 outside Austin,Texas inside an old chemical facility, which so outraged parents that they started a state-wide coalition to introduce and pass safe school siting policy at a state level. It didn't pass but the coalition was really effective and the bill will be re-introduced this coming session.
I feel particular kind of solidarity with this group because as they were learning how to build this coalition I was learning how to put together a national coalition to get local, state and national safe school siting policies passed around the country. It was a great learning experience and though hasn't stayed together very well since I departed, did help pressure EPA to produce federal guidelines (public comment period is coming up) that are much more comprehensive than they would have been without so many dedicated activists at the table (our biggest ask of the agency). All work that I miss very very very much right now.
Damn it. I just got yelled at by one of the facilities guy to stop banging my feet on the ground. My bad! Lyle Lovett made me do it. This is the same guy that had a dream about me last night that I was a red head and pregnant but I lived in a really big house. Hmmm . . . I'm not sure how feel about the dude who kicks the shit out of me in our weekly football game dreaming that I'm having babies.
Kiddie Kollege. This day care center was open between 2004 and 2006. Since its closing, there has been a number of investigations and lawsuits to figure out who is actually responsible for the fact that 100 babies and children suffered mercury inhalation. Is it the original owner of the property? Is it the person who opened the day care? Is it the Department of Environmental Protection who knew this property was contaminated? Is it someone else entirely?
The day care was shut down after someone from the New Jersey's Department of Environmental Protection discovered the day care in the contaminated building. The owner of the day care said that he misread the environmental report. The state department released a timeline in 2006 that showed a series of miscommunications about the property and contamination. It first started when the original owner went bankrupt and was forced to close the business. According to law, a company, even one in bankruptcy, is responsible for cleaning up a contaminated site. So when the clean up didn't happen, the state should have put a lien on the building and put up signs to make sure the contamination wouldn't go unnoticed. Obviously this didn't happen.
I want to stress how often this the case. One of the most fundamental pieces of any safe school siting policy must be meaningful community involvement. The state doesn't always know what former businesses were sited on property but a lot of times the family that has lived on the same street for the past 30 years will. People must be invited to participate so that a high school doesn't end up being built on a former undocumented landfill, as is the case many times over in more rural areas. Meaningful community participation is laughed at more often than not in the siting of schools and this is one of the biggest mistakes any school board can make.
Interestingly, Lisa Jackson, the current EPA Administrator, was New Jersey's commissioner of environmental protection at the time Kiddie Kollege was closed. She has made children's health a priority in her reign at the federal level. I've seen a stark change of will in the agency in the past year in promoting safe school siting and releasing information on areas where changes need to be made and children are being exposed to toxic chemicals. In fact, in March of 2009, EPA announced that it will be testing 63 schools in 22 states because of high air contamination in those areas. Here is a national map of where these schools are located.
All the school testing has come back and communities are looking into the results. One thing that should be noted about this project is that industry did know ahead of time when the testing was being completed. I heard from a community leader in Ohio who overheard a manager at a nearby plant say that they were going to shut down emissions that day. Doesn't this man know children who attend that school? Business is business, right? Even if we only have sick communities at the end of the day.
The most important element in understanding air testing like this is not how much of what toxin is captured, though that is extremely important, we must take into account that children are a vulnerable population and the timing of the dose is also extremely important. Industry often discusses that the level of exposure of whathaveyou chemical is 'safe'. What they mean is, when a particular chemical is released, it only matters how much of it is released in order to know if it is of concern. What matters even more than how much is when. Children consume more per pound than adults and have habits of exploring the area around them in a much more tactile manner which exposes them to a greater quantity of toxins than adults. You can damage a child's body for life with just a small amount of exposure and since toxicity is based on an adult male, not a small child, we don't even know what that exposure rate is likely to be.
Today, the Kiddie Kollege building was torn down and the parents of the children and former Kiddie Kollege staff are currently waiting for the next step in their lawsuit against the owner of the building, DEP and Franklin Township for medical monitoring of their children.
Ciao,
Renee Claire
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