April 2007 News Stories (page last updated April 22, 2006)(Back to Previous Month) (Back to Archived News Stories) (Back to Main News Page) (Forward to Next Month)(subscribe to N&A, 9/11 EA's bulletin)
Firefighter Lung Ailments on the Rise, by Susan Edelman, New York Post, April 22, 2007
Twenty-six firefighters who toiled at Ground Zero came down with sarcoidosis, an inflammatory illness that often attacks the lungs, in the five years after 9/11 - a significant increase, a new study has found.
The study has angered the Patrolmen's Benevolent Association, which complains that the NYPD has refused to acknowledge that 9/11 caused sarcoidosis in cops.
Half the firefighter cases were diagnosed in the first year after 9/11 - a rate six times higher than the average for the Bravest in the 15 years before 9/11, according to a paper to be published in Chest, a medical journal.
The results "strongly argue for improved respiratory protection" at future fires, disasters and toxic sites, says the report, whose authors include FDNY top doctors David Prezant and Kerry Kelly.
The PBA, which has its own registry of ailing WTC responders, counts 19 cops with sarcoidosis.
Unlike the FDNY, the NYPD has been reluctant to link the disease to 9/11.
The NYPD has also rejected some cops' medical bills for sarcoidosis.
"First they denied any connection between the WTC and sarcoidosis. Now that there's scientific evidence, they refuse to accept it," PBA president Patrick Lynch told The Post.
NYPD spokesman Paul Browne said Commissioner Ray Kelly welcomed line-of-duty death benefits recently given the daughter of detective James Zadroga, 34, a 9/11 responder who died of respiratory illness.
"The department hasn't refused to acknowledge a link. The medical division is reviewing the cases," Browne said.
susan.edelman@nypost.comFederal officials can't be held liable for painting a rosy picture of lower Manhattan's air quality after the Sept. 11 terror attacks, a federal appeals court has ruled.
A three-judge panel of the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals on Thursday upheld a lower court ruling that tossed out a lawsuit by five emergency workers. The workers, who say they all suffer ailments related to their work at Ground Zero, charge that former Environmental Protection Agency head Christie Whitman misled them by issuing public statements assuring them the air was safe.
The court's chief judge, Dennis Jacobs, said holding public officials accountable for releasing bad information could have a chilling effect on future government responses during a crisis.
"Officials might default to silence in the face of the public's urgent need for information," Jacobs wrote.
In passing, Jacobs also took a dim view of a related lawsuit currently on appeal that was filed by students, workers and residents of lower Manhattan and Brooklyn. Last year, Manhattan Federal Judge Deborah Batts refused to dismiss that suit, saying, "Whitman's deliberate and misleading statements to the press" about air quality "shocks the conscience."
Jacobs said the panel disagreed with Batts' reasoning.
Five days after the attacks, Whitman said, "The good news continues to be that air samples we have taken have all been at levels that cause us no concern."
The collapse of the towers released a cloud of hazardous dust across lower Manhattan, including lead from personal computers and asbestos. Thousands of workers say they have suffered ill health as a result of their time at Ground Zero.
"There is a prospect, essentially, that these people will get nothing through the court system," said Stephen Riegel, the attorney representing the five workers: a national guardsman, a deputy U.S. marshal and three city Emergency Medical Service workers.
tzambito@nydailynews.comCourt ruling could spell trouble for 9/11 air quality lawsuits, by David B. Caruso, Associated Press, April 20, 2007
http://www.newsday.com/news/local/wire/ny-bc-ny--attacks-health0420apr20,0,4153108.story
NEW YORK -- An appeals court ruling could spell trouble for New Yorkers suing the Environmental Protection Agency and its former chief for saying that sooty Lower Manhattan air was safe to breathe after the Sept. 11 terror attacks.
A three judge panel of the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals declared this week that EPA Administrator Christine Todd Whitman and other agency officials can't be held constitutionally liable for making rosy declarations about air quality in the days following the World Trade Center's destruction.
The opinion, written by the court's chief judge, Dennis Jacobs, said opening EPA workers up to lawsuits for giving out bad information during a crisis could have a catastrophic side effect.
"Officials might default to silence in the face of the public's urgent need for information," Jacobs wrote.
The ruling, filed Thursday, applied only to a suit brought by five government employees who did rescue and cleanup work at ground zero, but it contained language suggesting that similar legal claims could face trouble.
It specifically mentioned a class action lawsuit brought by lower Manhattan residents who claim Whitman jeopardized their health by declaring that "the air is safe to breathe" at a time when, according to the EPA inspector general, a quarter of dust samples were recording unhealthy asbestos levels.
Last year, U.S. District Judge Deborah A. Batts, refused to dismiss that case, calling Whitman's statements "conscience-shocking."
That decision is now on appeal and has yet to be argued before the 2nd Circuit, but Jacobs indicated a reversal might be imminent, saying outright that the panel disagreed with Batts' reasoning.
Those developments brought a blunt assessment from attorney Stephen J. Riegel, who represented the national guardsman, deputy U.S. Marshal and three city emergency medical service workers who were the subject of Thursday's ruling.
"There is a prospect, essentially, that these people will get nothing through the court system," Riegel said.
Some preliminary scientific studies have indicated that as many as 400,000 people were exposed to toxic ground zero dust. Hundreds and perhaps thousands of people have fallen ill, and several have died from lung ailments blamed on inhaled Trade Center ash.
Thousands of people have sued various government entities over their exposure to the toxins.
Riegel said his own clients, who worked without respirators as the dust still swirled because they had heard EPA statements that the air was safe, had decided not to appeal.
More important decisions are pending: The 2nd Circuit recently announced it would hear a rare mid-case appeal of lawsuits against the City of New York, alleging it didn't do enough to protect rescue and cleanup workers from airborne dust.
Plaintiffs trying to hold government entities accountable for their injuries have some tough legal hurdles to overcome.
The law generally doesn't allow citizens to sue the government for mere incompetence, or failing to prevent someone from being injured; To win, plaintiffs must often prove that government employees actually created a danger themselves, through actions "so egregious, so outrageous," that they "shock the contemporary conscience."
Jacobs said Whitman and other EPA officials fell short of violating that standard, even if they had acted with deliberate indifference.
"A poor choice made by an executive official ... is not conscience shocking merely because for some persons it resulted in grave consequences that a correct decision could have avoided," he wrote.
"These principles apply," he added, "notwithstanding the great service rendered by those who repaired New York, the heroism of those who entered the site when it was unstable and on fire, and the serious health consequences that are plausibly alleged in the complaint."
EPA spokeswoman Mary Mears called the decision "positive," but said she could not comment on its potential influence on other cases until it had been reveiwed by the agency and Justice Department lawyers.
Copyright 2007 Newsday Inc.
A federal appellate court has decided that it was not "conscience-shocking" for the head of the Environmental Protection Agency to have reassured New Yorkers that the air near ground zero was safe following the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, even if the air was toxic.
Yesterday's decision by the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals throws out a lawsuit against a former leader of the EPA, Christine Whitman.
The panel of three judges reasoned that the government's interest in returning New York to normalcy following the attacks should protect it from lawsuits alleging that the government made false statements about air quality. The court did not make any factual finding as to the quality of the air, or as to whether the EPA had intentionally misled the public, which Ms. Whitman has denied doing.
"When great harm is likely to befall someone no matter what a government official does, the allocation of risk may be a burden on the conscience of the one who must make such decisions, but does not shock the contemporary conscience," the circuit's chief judge, Dennis Jacobs, wrote. "These principles apply notwithstanding the great service rendered by those who repaired New York, the heroism of those who entered the site when it was unstable and on fire, and the serious health consequences that are plausibly alleged."
Whether a government official's actions are "conscience-shocking" is a legal standard that decides whether an official is liable, in certain types of lawsuits.
"I always thought that if you accepted they were lies — lies to get these people working down there — that those lies were inherently conscience-shocking," the lawyer who brought the case, Stephen Riegel of Weitz and Luxemberg P.C., said.
The lawsuit was a class action on behalf of those who searched for survivors and cleaned up ground zero following the attacks. The men now suffer respiratory ailments, Mr. Riegel said.
A spokesman for the Justice Department declined to comment.
The court's holding in this case suggests that it will also dismiss a similar suit brought on behalf of residents near to the World Trade Center. The ruling yesterday is unlikely to have a result on another class action on behalf of workers at ground zero, which was brought under a different legal theory, Mr. Riegel said.
The panel also included judges Reena Raggi and Robert Sack
© 2007 The New York Sun, One SL, LLC. All rights reserved..Maikish, Downtown’s construction commander, resigns, by Josh Rogers, Downtown Express, Volume 19 Issue 49 | April 20 - 26, 2007
http://www.downtownexpress.com/de_206/maikishdowntowns.html
Charles Maikish announced on Tuesday he would resign as Downtown’s construction czar after two years on the job.
Maikish, 60, the executive director of the Lower Manhattan Construction Command Center, said when he took the job in 2005, he told Gov. Pataki and Mayor Bloomberg that he wanted to stay on for two years. The center, funded by a variety of government agencies, is responsible for coordinating about $10 billion worth of construction projects Downtown, including all that are valued over $25 million.
He said keeping residents and small businesses informed of construction disruptions is crucial.
“The key element is you have to communicate effectively, efficiently and immediately,” said Maikish.
Many Downtowners had been criticizing the center for a lack of communication, which was the subject of a front page Downtown Express article March 23. Since the article, several residents and business owners critical of the center said they noticed improvements in communication.
Maikish said the center won’t slide back with his departure. “The command center is not a one-man show,” he said. “We have a lot of good people – Robin Forst is excellent.” Forst, a Battery Park City resident, has been an effective trouble shooter, according to many Downtowners who have gone to the center with problems.
In his resignation letter, Maikish wrote “the direct reporting relationship to the offices of the governor and the mayor is the prime reason why the command center is able to function successfully.”
Maikish told Downtown Express last month that he had not met with Eliot Spitzer since the governor took office in January.
Avi Schick, president of the Empire State Development Corp., and Maikish both said the resignation was voluntary. A rebuilding official, speaking on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the press, agreed: “He jumped. He wasn’t pushed.”
Maikish is expected to leave on or before July 15. Schick and Deputy Mayor Daniel Doctoroff are likely to lead the search for his successor.
Members of the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation’s board of directors thanked Maikish for his service at their meeting Tuesday. The board also approved $23 million to cover the construction center’s upcoming budget. Maikish said it will be higher this year as they set up programs as the construction goes into high gear.
The center is also the direct manager of the project to dismantle the former Deutsche Bank building at 130 Liberty St. The removal of the building’s top began in March and Maikish said he thought they’d be able to complete the deliberate takedown of the damaged skyscraper by the end of the year.
Maikish worked on the construction of the original Twin Towers and later became director of the World Trade Center for the Port Authority, where he worked for nearly three decades. He led the effort to reopen the towers after the 1993 terrorist bombing. Maikish was an executive with J.P. Morgan Chase immediately before joining the center.
He had one change he would have liked to have seen at the center. “I would have set it up to have enforcement power but what we do have is the cooperation of the city agencies that do have enforcement,” he said.
He warned his successor of the biggest challenge ahead. “I think the hardest thing is to manage the details,” he said. “It is going to be a 24-7 effort.”
© 2007 Community Media, LLC
Downtown Express is published by
Community Media LLC.
Spitzer names new leaders of the L.M.D.C., by Josh Rogers, Downtown Express, Volume 19 Issue 49 | April 20 - 26, 2007
http://www.downtownexpress.com/de_206/spitzernamesnew.html
It’s not your old governor’s L.M.D.C.
Gov. Eliot Spitzer named two new leaders of the Lower Manhattan Development Corp. Monday and made it clear the days of Pataki, when the city had something approaching veto power over big decisions, are over. City officials were silent on the appointments for nearly three days, and although they are not criticizing the decisions or Spitzer, it could set up conflicts in the future since the mayor controls half the seats on the L.M.D.C. board. The corporation oversaw the development of the World Trade Center plans and has about $200 million left in 9/11 rebuilding money.
Avi Schick the new president of the state’s economic development corporation, was named L.M.D.C. chairperson, and David Emil, former owner of Windows on the World who set up a charity for its workers after 9/11, will be the president. Schick, 40, has been meeting with community leaders in recent weeks and has already been given high marks for improving relations with them. His L.M.D.C. position is unpaid.
Emil, 56, was president and C.E.O. of the Battery Park City Authority from 1988 to 1994 and had a stormy relationship with Community Board 1 back then. He did not return calls for comment and appears to have made no public statement about his new job – including in Spitzer’s own press release. Schick did not say when Emil would start. Emil’s salary will be $185,000 and he will fill a position that has been vacant since September.
Dep. Mayor Daniel Doctoroff, who has coordinated the city’s rebuilding plans since 2002, said in a telephone interview Wednesday that the relationship with the Spitzer administration is “coming along.” It can’t be the same as it was under Gov. George Pataki, he said, because rebuilding has progressed to a new phase. Doctoroff said the early signs are that there will be good cooperation.
As for Emil’s hiring, Doctoroff said, “I met with David Monday,” the day of the governor’s announcement. “I have known him a long time. It’s a very constructive step.”
Two former chairpersons of C.B. 1, Madelyn Wils and Anne Compoccia, said in separate interviews that it was not easy dealing with Emil.
Wils, an L.M.D.C. board member, remembered meeting with Compoccia and Emil in 1992 to see if he would agree to build temporary ballfields in Battery Park City.
“The first meeting he said ‘no way,’ Wils recalled. “I learned not to put all of my eggs in one basket.”
Compoccia said she then went to Gov. Mario Cuomo and he overruled the public authority he controlled. Despite Emil’s objections, the fields were built in 1993 and C.B. 1 convinced the city and the authority to make the fields a permanent amenity in 2000.
Compoccia recalled late night phone calls and “a lot of nasty fights” with Emil, but said she always saw him as a smart, loyal and vigorous advocate for the authority.
Emil insisted that C.B. 1 endorse the design for the Chambers St. pedestrian bridge leading to Stuyvesant High School and Compoccia refused to sign off until Emil agreed to a public access community center in the school.
“He got his stupid bridge and we got the ballfield,” Compoccia said.
Neither she or Wils thought Emil’s past would be a predictor of his tenure at the L.M.D.C.
“He’s a seasoned executive,” said Wils. “I know David was very affected by this terrible tragedy.”
After 9/11, Emil set up Windows of Hope, a charity to help the families of the 79 restaurant employees killed in 2001.
Wils, one of the few original L.M.D.C. board members, still on the board, said Emil is becoming president of “a very different agency.” She said it’s no longer a development agency and it’s main function now is to watch over the allocated money as it is spent on Downtown projects.
In a prepared statement Spitzer said “With new leadership and a new direction, a reinvigorated L.M.D.C. will help revitalize an area that is important as an economic hub to New York and as a symbol of our freedom and resilience to all Americans.”
During his campaign last year, he called it an “abject failure,” but that view changed. On Monday, Schick told outgoing L.M.D.C. chairperson Kevin Rampe: “The Spitzer administration wants to give you our great thanks.”
Pataki and Mayor Bloomberg announced last summer that the L.M.D.C., having completed its mission, would close at the end of last year and it was given little shelf life in 2007, when Spitzer took power. Officials with the governor, L.M.D.C., the Empire State Development Corp. and the U.S. Dept. of Housing and Urban Development had refused to answer questions for months on the L.M.D.C.’s future until last week when they said it was not going to disband. HUD, which must approve all L.M.D.C. expenditures, insisted the agency stick around to keep tabs on the money.
“There’s a real legal need to keep the L.M.D.C.,” said Carl Weisbrod, an L.M.D.C. board member, pointing to the assets it owns such as the former Deutsche Bank building across from the W.T.C.
Weisbrod, who enjoyed a good relationship with C.B. 1 when he was president of the Downtown Alliance, said he thinks Emil’s previous difficulties with C.B. 1 will not resurface because it is such a different time. When Emil was at the authority, the Downtown economy was in such bad shape that he had to be creative to turn things around, and it’s not surprising it ruffled some feathers.
“I have no doubt he will work very effectively with the community,” he said. “He’s very smart. He has a real passion to see the renaissance of Lower Manhattan. When Windows reopened [under Emil a few years after the 1993 W.T.C. bombing] it was the harbinger of a new era in Lower Manhattan.”
Schick said after an L.M.D.C. board meeting Tuesday that he had convened a panel to review about 200 applications from Downtown organizations for $45 million worth of grants. The applications were due last November, but state and city officials had not even looked at them until recently.
C.B. 1 passed a resolution this week calling on Julie Menin, the board’s current chairperson to be selected to the L.M.D.C. board. When asked about that Schick did not respond directly but said he is working to improve relations and named Menin to the grant review panel.
“We have a really good relationship,” Schick said of the community board. “I speak to Julie Menin and my staff does most weeks.”
Menin agreed, saying Schick was a good choice to be L.M.D.C. chairperson. “I’m delighted he’s taken on this new role,” she said. “He’s been very receptive.”
The members of the review panel are: Shaifali Puri, senior advisor to Schick; James Whelan, Doctoroff’s senior aide who was just appointed by Mayor Bloomberg to the L.M.D.C. board; Amy Stursberg former director of the September 11th Fund and an L.M.D.C. consultant; Paula Berry, vice chairperson of the International Freedom Center; Anita Contini , director of corporate and public affairs for CIT Group, and a former L.M.D.C. executive in charge of the memorial selection process and cultural initiatives; and Menin.
Menin and Berry, whose husband was killed on 9/11, were both on the jury that selected the W.T.C. memorial design and are now on the Memorial Foundation’s board.
Menin said she will push for C.B. 1’s priorities for the community grants: programs for children, seniors, and for 9/11 related health issues. The community board has also written a letter supporting the 92nd Street Y’s application for a grant for its planned new center on Hudson St.
Menin said it’s important the community board also have representation at the L.M.D.C. since there are still a lot of important issues it will consider, even with most of the money gone.
Wils, Menin’s predecessor, disagreed saying the city officials are the ones now working on plans on L.M.D.C.-funded projects. “If they want to get more involved,” Wils said, “they should focus more on the city.'
With reporting by Skye H. McFarlane© 2007 Community Media, LLC
Downtown Express is published by
Community Media LLC.