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>> Coming up on "Need to Know", the topic of lead poisoning.-
Have we beaten it?-
Are we changing our minds on the acceptable level in the
system?-
What is the cost of making lead safe?-
We will get at that and the business section with the Democrat
and chronicle and our "Albany Report" with Karen DeWitt.-
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>> Any house that was built before 1978 potentially could have
a lead hazard.-
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[Captioning Made Possible by the U.S. Department of Education]-
(For "Need to Know")-
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>> Thanks for joining us.-
I'm Michael Caputo.-
The percentage of children in Monroe county with elevated lead
levels fell by 17% in 2003.-
That is good, right?-
Not if you are the parents of the more than 1,000 children who
tested positive for higher than accepted levels.-
Whale the numbers are dropping there is no peace among those
who take lead poisoning seriously.-
They say it needs to be eliminating.-
The health and societal problems are the reason to eliminate T.
children with high leads of levels can see slower physical
growth and problem with learning.-
The main problem is how it negatively affects the brain and
nervous systems of kids.-
But it can also lead to adult problems such as hypertension and
osteoporosis.-
What are the acceptable levels of lead in the bloodstream?-
First two of two records reports by July July.-
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>> People will regularly start talking about lead poisoning by
celebrating it as one of the great public health triumphs of
the 20th century and that is dead wrong as you can possibly
be.-
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>> True the average level of lead in our nation's children has
declined significantly in recent years.-
A local health official such as Andrew Doniger are optimistic.-
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>> They are more on Mystic that we can talk about eliminating
lead poisoning.-
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>> But the fact is they are finding that the data could be
irrelevant.-
A recent study at Rochester general hospital shows there might
not be any safe level of lead in a child's bloodstream, even
low levels causing damage and no one knows at what point the
damage begins.-
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>> When I started as an intern in pediatrics 30 years ago, the
action level was higher.-
It wasn't until later that people saw serious long-term
consequences of low level.-
So it went from 60 micrograms to 40, to 30, to 25, now down to
10, and now there are some who want to make it lower.-
And other people who don't see the point in making it lower.-
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>> After Dr. Dr. Weitzman says doctors are limited on what they
can do once they find lead in a child's body.-
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>> The biggest breakthroughs have had to do with the fact that
once a child is poisoned we now have strong evidence that those
children never regain functioning.-
Most lead ends up being stored in your bones, kidney, liver,
brain.-
There is no bodily function to lead.-
There was no good to colonel from it.-
Virtually every organ system studied has been shown to be
negatively affected by lead.-
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>> Just as childhood sunburns have been linked to skin cancer
later this life there's growing suspicion that childhood lead
poisoning is lurking behind many adult illnesses.-
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>> There was presentation at the university of a newly funded
study on osteoporosis, bone density and blood lead levels as
children. One other thing lead does is increase the bloop a
bit.-
If you do statistical modeling any number of studies suggest
that that may account for a good part of the premature death of
impoverished black individuals from heart disease.-
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>> So while progress is being made in reduce the level of lead
this children, the medical community might be grappling with
its devastating effects for decades to come.-
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>> With us to continue the discussion are Dr. Katrina
Korfmacher, a professor at the university of Rochester and
community outreach coordinator for the environmental health
signses center.-
And Bryan Hetherington an attorney with the public interest law
office of Rochester, part of the coalition.-
Thank you both for being here.-
Dr. Doniger reports that the percentage of children screened
with high lead levels has dropped from 31% in 1993 to 7% in
2003 so aren't we winning this Dr. Korfmacher?-
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>> As far as the population the levels have gone down.-
That is good largely resulting from when we took lead out of
paint and gasoline in the 1970'S.-
But now it has almost been redefined as a problem of
environmental justice because it is is in areas of older house
and particularly housing in poor condition.-
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>> Mr. Hetherington, I want to put the same question to you.-
It seems like this war is won, lick we have overcome the
problem when you cut it by what, four times?-
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>> Certainly it is not for the 1,000 children that were lead
poisoned in the county last year and have the difficult
consequences that Dr. Weitzman talked about and who are six
times more likely to drop out of school, a third more likely to
engage in Juvenile crime than other children.-
So, for them the battle is not won.-
On the other hand, the good news is we have made enough
progress that we can talk rationally about ending lead
poisoning by 2010 here.-
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>> I want to ask if this good news doesn't hurt your cause.-
Because won't peel relax when they hear the numbers and say
that we have decreased the number of children?-
Does it hurt?-
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>> I think that that certainly is a danger.-
But it important to note that at the same time that the blood
lead levels have been coming down we have been learning more
about the severe effects they have at lower levels.-
So, the number of children with lead levels over 10 micrograms
per deciliter in their blood has come down but we know 10 is
too high.-
By the time a child reaches that level, they have lost on
average seven I.Q. point.-
So our understanding is that there isn't a threshold has
increased.-
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>> The standard of 10 micrograms of lead in deciliter of
blood.-
The New England journal of medicine says levels lower than that
might impair gets intellectually.-
So why isn't the standard lower?-
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>> In isn't lower at this point because the C.D.C. panel that
is studying it has not yet recommended lowering it.-
We advocate that the levels be lowered.-
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>> How low?-
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>> We don't believe that there is any safe level of lead.-
So it is an issue of trying to make all properties in our
community lead safe.-
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>> Would zero be the acceptable level?-
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>> It is probably not possible because lead is part of our
environment .-
It is in the soil, accumulated from when we had it in gasoline
and paint and built up over time.-
So it is not possible to have a level of zero.-
But any elevation of, above the background of one to three
micrograms usually shows there's a source in the environment
and because lead is an untreatable disease, we would like to
see it as low as possible.-
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>> What do you do for children who have it?-
I wonder if they get forgotten in this?-
Once we know they are above that standard, what can you do?-
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>> Well, at a level of 10 micrograms per deciliter the health
department is notified and they work with the physician to
educate the parent and the family and try to bring their blood
levels down and at least prevent them from going higher.-
When the level is above 15 micrograms in Monroe county, the
county health department does an investigation of the home.-
But the point is that testing kids doesn't make sense because
by the time they get to that level the harm has been done.-
What we need to do is keep them from getting poisoned in the
first place by testing the housing.-
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>> I want to ask one more time about the fact that the kids who
have lead poisoning, what gets done for them?-
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>> What ends up getting done for them, unfortunately there's no
curor lead poisoning.-
So what gets done is they receive special education services
that are very costly.-
They receive medical services to deal with the medical effects
of the lead poisoning.-
But by and large the only real intervention is to shut down the
source of the poisoning so the condition doesn't get worse.-
That is why we advocate an approach that says stop the
poisoning in the first place and if we do that then we don't
have to deal with the fact that science doesn't have anything
to tell us about what to do for the kids.-
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>> As Dr. Korfmacher said, you are trying to get away from
testing the kids, let's test the housing.-
I want to change the subject slightly and talk about housing.-
Those who advocate for lead changes say it is not a health
issue as much as it is a housing issue.-
Julie Philipp talked about whether lead safe homes mean lead
free homes.-
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>> While the number of lead poisoning cases in Monroe county is
on the decline, Joel Kunkler of the Rochester housing council
says there's a lot of lead out there.-
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>> Any house that was built before 1979 cover lead.-
You will see it in pits for the, Fairport.-
East Rochester.-
You will see it in any community that has houses that were
built before 1978.-
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>> But just because you see lead paint doesn't mean you will
see lead poisoning.-
Monroe county health director Dr. Andrew Doniger says 95% of
the lead poisoning cases occur in the northern or southwestern
parts of the city.-
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>> In those areas there's a high density of poorly maintained
older housing so that is why we see lead poisoning there.-
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>> It is wrapped up and stable, then it doesn't hurt you.-
At the point it begins to chip and flake and peel pieces of it
become part of the dust in the house and children are -- they
crawl, they explore their universe like little scientists with
lots of hand-to-mouth activity and a large part of my career
has been spent doing research demonstrating that you can't
prevent children from having lead poisoning as long as had he
live in homes with large amounts of lead based paint in
disrepair.-
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>> Kids are more likely to get it in these areas and they are
high on the priority list for federal, state and local housing
funds.-
But the programs don't necessarily get the lead out.-
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>> Now I think we have come around to the idea that we can make
homes lead safer as posed to lead free.-
For making a property lead safer we are going to look at all of
the friction services in -- surfaces in the house, doors,
windows, flooring, we will make sure they are in table
condition.-
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>> There's no question that it would be safer for us to follow
a strategy to eliminate the presence of all lead in the
properties but it is not feasible.-
We need to make sure we have a continuing effort to assess
whether the hazards are recurring.-
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>> We have brought in a third expert to the panel as we
continue this look at lead.-
Andrew Ophard is a Rochester owner who has grappled with lead
while maintaining properties.-
Talk about the costs to property owners about making a home --
I will make it a two-part question -- making a home lead free
and making it lead safe.-
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>> I think the Rochester housing authority said make a typical
three bedroom house in the city of Rochester lead free cost
around $70,000 completely rehabbing the house, making it lead
free.-
They estimated that the per unit cost to make a unit lead safe
is around $7,500 a unit.-
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>> Let's mention lead poisoning, lead free means it is out but
lead safe is maintaining it.-
What would to cost to do that?-
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>> It could cost up to $7,500 per unit as estimated by R.H.A.-
It may be possible to do it a little cheaper but you can't just
do it in a haphazard fashion.-
Of to follow very strict procedures, make sure that in the
process of making the unit lead safe you don't further
contaminate the unit and the occupants.-
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>> That's why the coalition is going at lead safe rather than
lead free because of the cost?-
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>> That's correct.-
Lead free is awfully expensive.-
Lead safe is achievable.-
If you want to get all of the poisoning to stop, you have to
create a lead safe environment, not necessarily a lead free
environment.-
But then the other thing you have to do is if you are merely
lead safe you have to have a program of continuous
inspections.-
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>> But I would submit in the city people who own properties and
we know there's a dearth of decent housing in the city, $,500
is a lot.-
What can be done for people who say that is a lot of money for
a thousand that is probably appraised at $27,000.-
What kind of legislation could be done?-
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>> First of all, the estimate of $7,500 is an average that was
come up with a couple of years ago and in the project I'm
working with around the school 17 area we found lead hazards in
every house we went into but the estimated cost of taking care
of the hazards making it lead safe ranges from a couple hundred
dollars up to $10,000 with the average probably around $3,000.-
So, depending on the techniques you use it can be less.-
For example, instead of replacing windows you can treat them to
cover the surfaces that are creating problems.-
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>> Do you agree with those numbers?-
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>> It depends on the severity of the underlying problem as to
how cheaply you can get away with a fix.-
As you point out, it still is a really troubling issue for
property owners especially in the lower income areas.-
If you have a house on Jay street that is worth $19,000 and
someone tells you you have to spend $10,000 to make it lead
safe, a lot of folks don't have the resources to do that.-
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>> Brian, what do you do for people like that?-
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>> What you do is you end up having to do cost sharing.-
And the coalition supports a cost sharing set of proposals.-
We have currently in the community the mayor has put aside $5
million over three years.-
We have two large HUD grants.-
The city of Rochester has the largest HUD grant received by any
city in the country last year.-
And the county of Monroe has a HUD grant to assist landlords
and homeowners who have to fix up property.-
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>> Haven't you talked about, the coalitions, talked about tax
credits from the federal government.-
Why hasn't that happened?-
It is a matter of time.-
In New York the policies are based on secondary prevention.-
You were talking about testing kids and that secondary
prevention.-
Next is primary prevention.-
And as we think about the legislation that will make that
possible we certainly need to think about how are we going to,
first of all, make sure that all of the houses get tested, that
the lead hazards get identified and get fixed.-
Part of making that possible will be coming up with a funding
mechanism to help people make the changes, and a tax credit
would be one way to make it possible.-
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>> One of the things on that is the coalition has worked with
senator Clinton and congresswoman slaughter both are
approaching lead bills.-
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>> When you make a house lead safe, what happens in 30 years
with the same house, a lot of wear and tear?-
Aren't you just putting off a problem, do you think?-
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>> That is a good question.-
Ultimately, yes.-
The problem may resurface.-
That is why it is important if you have made a unit lead safe
you have to go in on a regular basis and make sure there is
proper maintenance of the unit to continue that lead safe
state.-
By itself over time it will deteriorate.-
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>> It sounds like the education doesn't stop because in 10 or
15 years it is everybody again saying we have licked the
problem, maybe we haven't, maybe we need to remind people about
the problem.-
You wire about the lead safe being a little bit after time bomb
down the line?-
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>> Continuing is a manageable time bomb.-
It clearly is an issue.-
But if you look at the states and communities that have solved
this problem better than we did, what they do is they deal with
periodic reinspection.-
We have a group that is looking at the issue of, depending on
what fix you choose, how often would you have to come back in
and reinspect because how long could you imagine that that
repair is going to last.-
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>> I have only a few seconds left.-
We should have a lot longer time to talk about this.-
But we have an opportunity with a lead summit on the 10th at
the clarion riverside hotel.-
We thank you all for helping us with that.-
Evident mail us at NEEDTOKNOW@WXXI.org or call us on our
response line any time.-
The number is 258-0250.-
Now let's open up the business section.-
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>> Joining us is Ellen Rosen business editor for the Democrat
Dell.-
Let's talk about empire zones.-
You have a series on them because they are up for renewal in
the state.-
Basically empire zones are the areas created for economic
development with tax breaks and incentives and so forth.-
Why do we need them this why do we need these empire zones?-
Is it to compete?-
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>> It is a very competitive job market for creating jobs,
particularly this part of the country and Rochester and all of
New York state have lost a great deal of manufacturing jobs
which was the economic basis for decades.-
So we need to replace that.-
So the object is to attract other businesses, or businesses to
grow to make investments so we give them tax breaks.-
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>> We have seen it come under fire.-
I know that an assemblyman from downstate has been critical --
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>> The state controller.-
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>> And they looked at Monroe county, the way Monroe county does
its empire zones.-
But one of the stories you did a great comparison with ours and
one offered by Pennsylvania called the keystone opportunity
zone.-
Tell us about that.-
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>> It is similar to our program but it offers a little more of
the benefits for certain companies.-
For instance if you are within Pennsylvania you have to meet a
job creation requirement.-
But if you are outside Pennsylvania coming in from outside you
don't need to do that.-
And that may sound funny on the surface but in one way that's
what a lot of areas are trying to do.-
They are trying to attract business that's not already there.-
It is not just getting the company to move across the street.-
It is getting somebody not in the community to come in and
create jobs.-
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>> So the pressure is great on New York.-
You have that kind of competition -- -
>> You have competition all over.-
And a lot of it economic especially dealing with New York which
is a high tech state.-
Companies are looking for a lot of tax incentives.-
Why should I go to New York when I can go to Carolina and pay
less in taxes and you have to give them an incentive.-
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>> Kodak, Eastman Kodak, is talking about movie films.-
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>> It is a new process to put the sound track on movie films.-
And Kodak likes it because it is environmentally cleaner and
saves a lot of water.-
The other process used chemicals and you had to use it.-
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>> You used silver?-
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>> Yes.-
This saves enough to give a community of 75,000 water for a
year.-
So it is really an interesting new advance.-
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>> I thought Kodak was getting out of the old film business.-
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>> They are getting out of consumer -- they are not getting out
as much as they are recognizing that consumers are moving away
from taking film pictures to digital pictures.-
But movie film is till big.-
The movie theatres haven't made the transition to digital
projection which would have to happen before film went out.-
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>> So it is exploitable.-
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>> Yes.-
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>> Credit unions, this is such a quaint sounding phrase but the
word "Quaint" doesn't apply.-
This is another story that the paper did about them.-
They are not quaint, are they?-
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>> No, they are very competitive and they are giving banks a
run for their money.-
You are right, you thought a generation ago it was a place that
maybe your father belonged in the neighborhood and he knew
people.-
Now they are big business.-
They started with Eastman savings and loan which was just
serving Kodak employees is now huge.-
It is one of the bigger banks in the area, credit union.-
But in terms of the things it doing and they are increasing the
services they are offering.-
So not doing a lot of business to business but what you can get
there as a consumer there's a lot to offer.-
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>> I know the fearmings are always dealing with the weather.-
It has been a very difficult spring, so wet, the plant
something late and when that happens the crop season is shorter
and you get less yield and when you are dealing with profit
margins of 2% to 3% every little bit off is a lot and with the
gas prices it is tough.-
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>> I imagine that is playing into that.-
Tell us what is coming up Sunday?-
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>> We are looking at networking opportunities for younger
workers, how that has changed, if there more.-
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>> That's the way to get a job.-
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>> Keeping young people here is the goal.-
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>> Ellen, thank you.-
Now let's move to the business of Albany.-
Here with us now is Karen DeWitt.-
She was the Albany correspondent for WXXI AM-1370 and NPR
stations around the state.-
The governor was in Rochester pitching his proposal to deal
with school aid.-
Then we had the assembly speaker talk about his plan it deal
with school aid.-
What's going on here?-
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>> Finally all three sides, the so-called three men this a
room, the governor and two legislative leaders, they have
released their education plans that.-
Would be great except there is only about 2 1/2 weeks left
until the ends of the session and they are facing a July 30
court order.-
That's the deadline to reform school aid and they are still
billions of dollars apart.-
Silver wants to spend $6.1 billion but doesn't name a dedicate
fund or a way to pay for it.-
He is saying it will be naturally occurring revenues.-
And the governor and Bruno condemn that.-
They at least have a plan they may want it use gambling to pay
for the education increase.-
So they are at a terrible stalemate.-
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>> And this comes from lawsuit the campaign for fiscal equity
is talking about better distribution, more equal distribution
of school aid.-
Right?-
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>> That's right.-
That's why they have the July 30 court deadline.-
It different than other careers when they can drag things out
and make a vague plan and leave.-
They have to actually do something concrete by July 30 or a
special master will be appoint and will do it for them.-
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>> Do you think this will be resolved before the ends of the
session?-
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>> You know, I don't think so right now.-
I wouldn't bet money on it.-
But they don't have much time left and the three of them are
not talking to each other right now.-
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>> And we are two months after the fact, after the April 1
deadline.-
Let me ask you about a bill to make beer and soda industry give
the state unclaimed bottle deposits.-
It sounds like a lot of expectation and support in the ledge
legislative for it.-
What happens to it?-
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>> It is common sense.-
More people drink bottled water and tea.-
Polls show you should expand the deposit law to include those
and take back all the unclaimed deposits that the bottlers get
to keep.-
But in New York it has become a dead issue.-
The research group decided to find out why and they looked at
finance reports and lobbying reports and found that opponents
that $1.2 million in can campaign contributions and $2 million
in lobbying and last year it started to move and they found a
couple days later the beer wholesalers gave $40,000 to the
democratic assembly campaign committee and the next day they
gave $50,000 to the Republican senate campaign committee and
the bill then died.-
And coincidence, maybe, maybe not but maybe that's an
explanation of why it is not going anywhere.-
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>> Won't remember he going to see any reform on, you know, on
lobbying?-
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>> Well, in a few seconds I would say no.-
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>> Karen, thank you for being succinct.-
Your comments to anything that we talk about on "Need to Know",
email us at NEEDTOKNOW@WXXI.org or call us at 258-0250.-
We will see you next week.-