Post by Moses on Nov 29, 2005 22:13:50 GMT -5
Better testing urged for sites of new schools
BOSTON GLOBE
By Kay Lazar
In Boxford, a chemical often found in explosives recently turned up in the drinking water of the Spofford Pond elementary school, reigniting questions about potential contamination from a nearby capped landfill.
In Lynn, the $40 million Classical High School, built on a landfill six years ago, is sinking into the ground. Repair estimates run as high as $10 million.
In Salem, a $16 million renovation of the Witchcraft Heights Elementary School three years ago uncovered tons of arsenic buried underneath the site, forcing the city to scrounge for another $2 million for cleanup.
Now, the head of a new authority charged with overhauling the state's school construction assistance program said he is likely to require communities to test all sites for contamination long before the backhoes roll in.
Under the old system, run by the state Department of Education,
environmental assessments were mandated in 2003 but only for new schools built on new sites. Expansion and renovation projects were exempt. So, too, were 425 projects statewide on a list that the department had approved before the new authority took over in July 2004.
''We won't be able to undo the damage from the older projects and the wait list, but hopefully we can learn from those mistakes," said state Treasurer Timothy Cahill, who also chairs the new School Building Authority.
''What we would like to do is to set guidelines for communities," Cahill said, ''so they don't build on sites that are either unfeasible or would cost so much money to mitigate, it would eat up the funds they would need to actually build the school."
Facing more than $5 billion in reimbursements to communities for
already-approved school construction projects, the state in 2003 imposed a moratorium on new applications until July 2007. Cahill said he intends to release draft regulations that include environmental assessment requirements well before then. He also said the new system would probably help reimburse communities for the cost of any required environmental reviews.
Exactly how many schools are located near potentially toxic sites is a question. State education officials have not tracked the issue, but the Center for Health, Environment and Justice, a Virginia-based nationwide coalition of health and environmental groups, pegged the number at 818 in Massachusetts in a 2001 report entitled ''Poisoned Schools."
Environmentalists, who have pushed for more stringent state oversight on the issue, say it is increasingly hard for many communities, particularly in urban areas, to find clean sites for school construction. But, they say, if communities are required to investigate before renovations, expansions or new construction, they will at least have a better handle on the toxic materials they may face.
''The teachers, parents, and residents deserve to have that debate in their community, if they had to build on contaminated property, so they could clean it up to a safe level that they could all agree would be safe, or decide whether the costs and concerns would be too much and they would need to look somewhere else," said Tolle Graham, healthy schools coordinator at MassCOSH, a statewide coalition of health and environmental groups.
In Boxford, the issue is more complex. The Spofford Pond elementary school, which opened in 1964, was built next to a landfill that was capped in 1999. The school's drinking water comes from a well on school property, which recently tested positive for perchlorate, a chemical that has been linked to thyroid problems and could pose a risk to children and pregnant women.
A follow-up test last week suggested that the chemical might be coming from the school's water treatment system, and not from the ground water. State environmental officials are continuing to investigate. In the meantime, students are drinking bottled water.
Two years ago, another routine test of the school's water detected mercury. Follow-up tests by state officials found no mercury, leaving authorities to conclude that the original results might have been contaminated at the testing lab, said school Superintendent Bernard Creeden.
The conflicting reports, and the landfill next door, continue to make
some uneasy.
''I don't mean to rush to judgment on anything but certainly there has been enough evidence over the years that it's prudent to be concerned," said Linda Greenstein, who has a fourth-grader at the school, and another son who attended Spofford for three years.
Communities that do build schools on or near landfills or other waste sites can face a variety of structural and health problems if they do not scrutinize the area's soils and ground water and take appropriate precautions, said Wendy Heiger-Bernays, an assistant professor of environmental health at Boston University's School of Public Health.
''Volatile organic compounds [gasses emitted from substances such as paint, pesticides, and cleaning supplies] can migrate from the [waste] site or landfill under the building and penetrate indoor space," Heiger-Bernays said. ''That's why it's important to understand the direction and characteristics of the ground water beneath the structure."
Heiger-Bernays and other specialists say another critical concern is
maintenance of the caps put on landfills and for other equipment
installed in or near schools to monitor the air and water from nearby waste sites. The federal Environmental Protection Agency recently approved a plan by the city of New Bedford to clean up, cap, and dispose of contamination at a former dump site selected for construction of a new middle school. As part of its approval, the EPA said New Bedford must put in place a long-term plan to maintain the site's cap and to monitor the ground water and indoor air quality at the school.
Some environmentalists say they worry cash-strapped communities may not have the resources to fulfill those types of long-term commitments.
School ''maintenance is one of the things they cut when things get
tight," said Graham. ''Ventilation systems aren't well maintained, roofs leak. That's the reality. Then you put in a highly sophisticated environmental control?"
The head of the state's new School Building Authority said he hopes to be able to tap environmental experts to help guide communities through the high-stakes debates.
Building on landfills ''can be done, but it has to be done wisely,"
Cahill said. ''You have to take into account the emotional effect of
putting young children on the land, of parents not wanting to listen to reason, even if you can prove beyond a reasonable doubt [that it's safe.] In some ways, we need to avoid those sites, if we can't convince people that it is safe to build there."
— Kay Lazar
Boston Globe
2005-11-13
BOSTON GLOBE
By Kay Lazar
In Boxford, a chemical often found in explosives recently turned up in the drinking water of the Spofford Pond elementary school, reigniting questions about potential contamination from a nearby capped landfill.
In Lynn, the $40 million Classical High School, built on a landfill six years ago, is sinking into the ground. Repair estimates run as high as $10 million.
In Salem, a $16 million renovation of the Witchcraft Heights Elementary School three years ago uncovered tons of arsenic buried underneath the site, forcing the city to scrounge for another $2 million for cleanup.
Now, the head of a new authority charged with overhauling the state's school construction assistance program said he is likely to require communities to test all sites for contamination long before the backhoes roll in.
Under the old system, run by the state Department of Education,
environmental assessments were mandated in 2003 but only for new schools built on new sites. Expansion and renovation projects were exempt. So, too, were 425 projects statewide on a list that the department had approved before the new authority took over in July 2004.
''We won't be able to undo the damage from the older projects and the wait list, but hopefully we can learn from those mistakes," said state Treasurer Timothy Cahill, who also chairs the new School Building Authority.
''What we would like to do is to set guidelines for communities," Cahill said, ''so they don't build on sites that are either unfeasible or would cost so much money to mitigate, it would eat up the funds they would need to actually build the school."
Facing more than $5 billion in reimbursements to communities for
already-approved school construction projects, the state in 2003 imposed a moratorium on new applications until July 2007. Cahill said he intends to release draft regulations that include environmental assessment requirements well before then. He also said the new system would probably help reimburse communities for the cost of any required environmental reviews.
Exactly how many schools are located near potentially toxic sites is a question. State education officials have not tracked the issue, but the Center for Health, Environment and Justice, a Virginia-based nationwide coalition of health and environmental groups, pegged the number at 818 in Massachusetts in a 2001 report entitled ''Poisoned Schools."
Environmentalists, who have pushed for more stringent state oversight on the issue, say it is increasingly hard for many communities, particularly in urban areas, to find clean sites for school construction. But, they say, if communities are required to investigate before renovations, expansions or new construction, they will at least have a better handle on the toxic materials they may face.
''The teachers, parents, and residents deserve to have that debate in their community, if they had to build on contaminated property, so they could clean it up to a safe level that they could all agree would be safe, or decide whether the costs and concerns would be too much and they would need to look somewhere else," said Tolle Graham, healthy schools coordinator at MassCOSH, a statewide coalition of health and environmental groups.
In Boxford, the issue is more complex. The Spofford Pond elementary school, which opened in 1964, was built next to a landfill that was capped in 1999. The school's drinking water comes from a well on school property, which recently tested positive for perchlorate, a chemical that has been linked to thyroid problems and could pose a risk to children and pregnant women.
A follow-up test last week suggested that the chemical might be coming from the school's water treatment system, and not from the ground water. State environmental officials are continuing to investigate. In the meantime, students are drinking bottled water.
Two years ago, another routine test of the school's water detected mercury. Follow-up tests by state officials found no mercury, leaving authorities to conclude that the original results might have been contaminated at the testing lab, said school Superintendent Bernard Creeden.
The conflicting reports, and the landfill next door, continue to make
some uneasy.
''I don't mean to rush to judgment on anything but certainly there has been enough evidence over the years that it's prudent to be concerned," said Linda Greenstein, who has a fourth-grader at the school, and another son who attended Spofford for three years.
Communities that do build schools on or near landfills or other waste sites can face a variety of structural and health problems if they do not scrutinize the area's soils and ground water and take appropriate precautions, said Wendy Heiger-Bernays, an assistant professor of environmental health at Boston University's School of Public Health.
''Volatile organic compounds [gasses emitted from substances such as paint, pesticides, and cleaning supplies] can migrate from the [waste] site or landfill under the building and penetrate indoor space," Heiger-Bernays said. ''That's why it's important to understand the direction and characteristics of the ground water beneath the structure."
Heiger-Bernays and other specialists say another critical concern is
maintenance of the caps put on landfills and for other equipment
installed in or near schools to monitor the air and water from nearby waste sites. The federal Environmental Protection Agency recently approved a plan by the city of New Bedford to clean up, cap, and dispose of contamination at a former dump site selected for construction of a new middle school. As part of its approval, the EPA said New Bedford must put in place a long-term plan to maintain the site's cap and to monitor the ground water and indoor air quality at the school.
Some environmentalists say they worry cash-strapped communities may not have the resources to fulfill those types of long-term commitments.
School ''maintenance is one of the things they cut when things get
tight," said Graham. ''Ventilation systems aren't well maintained, roofs leak. That's the reality. Then you put in a highly sophisticated environmental control?"
The head of the state's new School Building Authority said he hopes to be able to tap environmental experts to help guide communities through the high-stakes debates.
Building on landfills ''can be done, but it has to be done wisely,"
Cahill said. ''You have to take into account the emotional effect of
putting young children on the land, of parents not wanting to listen to reason, even if you can prove beyond a reasonable doubt [that it's safe.] In some ways, we need to avoid those sites, if we can't convince people that it is safe to build there."
— Kay Lazar
Boston Globe
2005-11-13