Local schools pegged with PCB
contamination
by Neal Rentz
An analysis from an environmental services firm has revealed that
two more local schools have potential PCB contamination.
The disclosure regarding the Benjamin Franklin Elementary School in
the Lakeland School District and the Putnam Valley Middle School was
made during a meeting of the Westchester County Board of Legislators'
Committee on the Environment and Health on Monday.
But officials at the two school districts said yesterday (Tuesday)
they have not been contacted by the Westchester County Department
of Health and were not aware of the possible contamination.
During Monday's session the committee voted unanimously to create
a task force that will be chaired by Yorktown parent Daniel Lefkowitz,
who discovered PCB-laden caulking at French Hill Elementary School
in 2003. The task force will examine the possible dangers and what
should done.
At the request of Legislator Ursula LaMotte (D/Bedford), representatives
of the county Department of Health will be task force members.
PCBs (Polychlorinated Biphenyls), a known carcinogenic, have been
found to have several adverse health effects and were banned by the
federal government in 1976.
Many schools and other public buildings constructed in the 1950s through
1976 contain the substance. The material, banned for the past 30 years
by the federal government, was commonly used in window caulking for
public schools.
The presence of PCBs was discovered at Yorktown's French Hill Elementary
School in 2003 following window replacement that summer. The district
was ordered by the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to
clean up soil surrounding the building.
Lefkowitz told legislators at Monday's meeting there was now suspected
contamination at the Putnam Valley Middle School and Ben Franklin
Elementary School.
George Weymouth, a retired construction worker, said Monday he had
worked with PCBs and took the samples at the schools at Lefkowitz's
request. The samples from the window caulking and soil in the area
were sent to Paradigm Environmental Services in Rochester, New York.
According to an analysis, there is three times the federal standard
of PCBs in the window caulking at Benjamin Franklin and nearly 20
times as much in the school's soil that was tested.
At Putnam Valley Middle School, there are more than three times the
federal standard of PCBs in window caulking and about 10 times as
much as the standard in the soil, according to the report.
At the meeting, Gregory Carmichael, deputy commissioner of environment
health services for the county Department of Health, and J. Carlos
Torres, director of the Health Department's Office of Environment
Health Risk Control, agreed at the requests of legislators to have
the information about the PCBs passed on to the superintendents of
the Lakeland and Putnam Valley school districts.
But yesterday the chief administrators at both districts said they
had not been contacted.
"The district has no report from anyone" about PCBs at Benjamin
Franklin, Lakeland Superintendent of Schools Kenneth Connolly said.
He added he could not be certain of the presence of the compound even
if the soil tested was taken from the school campus.
Putnam Valley Superintendent of Schools Gary Tutty also said "nobody
contacted us" from Westchester County regarding PCBs at the middle
school.
The district learned about the matter when someone who attended Monday's
meeting contacted Assistant Superintendent for Business Paul Lee,
Tutty said.
There are many unanswered questions about PCBs at the middle school,
including information about Weymouth and why he chose to take samples
from the middle school, Tutty said.
If government officials confirm PCB contamination, the district would
deal with the situation, Tutty said.
"These are children we're talking about," he said Legislator
Michael Kaplowitz (D/Somers) said officials from the EPA are expected
to attend a committee meeting next month.
There needs to be more information obtained about what should be done
about PCBs, Kaplowitz said.
"It's a science in flux," he said.
