US Environmental Protection Agency

World Trade Center Expert Technical

Review Panel

May 24, 2005

National Museum of the American Indian

The Customs House

One Bowling Green

New York, New York

Comments of Paul Stein, Health & Safety Committee Chairperson

PEF Division 199, NYS Public Employees Federation, AFL-CIO

My name is Paul Stein.  I am the Health & Safety Committee Chairperson of Division 199 of the New York State Public Employees Federation, AFL-CIO, popularly known as PEF.  My union represents approximately 53,000 professional, scientific and technical employees of the State of New York.  About 2,000 of our members currently work in lower Manhattan.  I speak today on behalf of several hundred PEF members who work at 90 Church Street, directly adjacent to the World Trade Center site.

We cannot support the current testing plan proposed by this EPA panel because we do not believe that its design will allow it to accurately and comprehensively measure the extent of contamination that remains from the events of September 11, 2001.  We endorse and urge you to carefully consider all of the criticisms raised and the recommendations made by the representatives of the World Trade Center Community/Labor Coalition.  We invite you to work with us to revise the current plan to create a testing scheme whose results all affected parties will have confidence in.

There is a crisis of confidence in Lower Manhattan, in Brooklyn, and in surrounding areas.  This crisis arose as a result of the past statements and actions of the EPA and other Federal, State, and City agencies that failed to protect the residents, workers, and students who were exposed to contamination caused by the events of September 11^th.  The current testing plan will not solve this crisis of confidence.  It will lead to more distrust.  Only by  your reexamining and perfecting the testing plan can our confidence be regained and our health be protected.

As workers in Lower Manhattan, we are particularly concerned about the voluntary nature of the testing plan.  We do not believe that most landlords and employers will allow their buildings and work sites to be tested.  Only the minority of buildings and offices that have been thoroughly cleaned will allow EPA testing, thus skewing the results and invalidating the testing plan.

The May 23-June 6, 2005 issue of The Battery Park City Broadsheet contains an excellent article summarizing a number of criticisms of the panel’s testing plan.  In response to criticism of the voluntary nature of the testing, the reporter for the Broadsheet made some inquiries and recounted the outcome:

No owners or managers contacted by the Broadsheet would comment on the likelihood of their participation in the new testing program, including those associated with buildings on Broad Street, Liberty Street, Rector Place, and South End Avenue.  One agent spoke candidly off the record about how she wasn’t surprised that managers are avoiding the issue of health versus value of real estate.  “You don’t want to say no,” the agent said, “but people would rather duck and run.”   (p. 1)

We believe the same avoidance would hold true for employers, who would not wish to expose themselves to legal liability, business disruption,  and difficulty recruiting and retaining workers, if contamination were found on their premises.

We urge the EPA to do everything in its power, in cooperation with other Federal, State, and City agencies that may have relevant statutory authority, to see to it that no landlord or employer may opt out of a well-designed environmental testing plan.

Thank you.