Firm of EPA Nominee Linked to Grace: Kirkland, Ellis Represents Company in Pollution Case, by Andrew Schneider, Baltimore Sun, June 25, 2005
http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/bal-te.epa25jun25,1,3117938.story?coll=bal-home-headlines
President Bush has nominated as chief of enforcement for the Environmental Protection Agency a partner in a law firm defending W.R. Grace & Co. against criminal charges in a major environmental case.
EPA employees were told late Thursday that Bush had nominated Granta Nakayama to lead the Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance, according to an EPA memo obtained by The Sun.
The Senate must approve the appointment.
Nakayama, 46, a specialist in environmental law, is a full partner in Kirkland & Ellis LLP.
The law firm is defending Grace against multiple criminal charges alleging that the Columbia-based company and seven of its current or former executives knowingly put their workers and the public in danger through exposure to vermiculite ore contaminated with asbestos from the company's mine in Libby, Mont.
"This is one of the most significant criminal indictments for environmental crime in our history," Lori Hanson, special agent in charge of the EPA's environmental crime section in Denver, said in February after the charges were announced by the Justice Department.
Grace has denied any wrongdoing.
Nakayama's firm is also representing Grace in its bankruptcy, a matter in which the EPA is trying to recover millions of dollars for environmental cleanup.
Nakayama was traveling and could not be reached yesterday.
'No involvement'
Brian Pitts, spokesman for the law firm, said: "Nakayama has had no involvement in [Grace's bankruptcy or indictment] during his tenure at Kirkland."
Thomas Skinner, the EPA's acting head of enforcement, said Nakayama would avoid any conflicts.
"Even if he hasn't worked on the Grace projects himself, he will have to recuse himself from Grace and a number of other matters that Kirkland & Ellis have handled over the years," said Skinner.
"I'm very confident that the first thing he's going to do when he walks in that door is to sign a formal recusal letter and to make clear to everyone in the agency that he's to have nothing to do with W.R. Grace or other clients represented by [Kirkland & Ellis] and nobody can talk to him about these matters.
"I guarantee you it will happen," Skinner added.
Kirkland & Ellis' Web sites list page after page of environmental battles fought, often against the EPA, on behalf of companies that use toxic materials and chemicals.
Eleven EPA lawyers and investigators contacted yesterday refused to comment on the record, with most saying that any public comments would be "a career-ender."
However, they said the appearance of a conflict of interest involving EPA's top enforcement official is likely to have a chilling effect on pursuing investigations and actions involving Grace and any other companies represented by Nakayama's firm.
Skinner said he understands the concerns from those in the field, but added, "The agency has procedures for handling these potential conflicts."
A White House spokesman would not comment last night on any questions of conflict of interest, but said Bush has "full confidence in the nominee."
Stephen Johnson, the EPA administrator, wrote the memorandum to staffers informing them of Nakayama's appointment.
"I am confident that Granta's experience will strengthen and enhance the agency's ongoing vigilance in enforcing our nation's environmental laws and regulations," Johnson said in the memo.
Since 1999, the EPA and Grace, a worldwide chemical company, have been at loggerheads over a variety of environmental problems stemming from the company's asbestos-contaminated vermiculite ore from its Montana mine.
Several of the EPA's regional offices continue to work with state officials and other federal agencies to determine how many of hundreds of abandoned sites in more than 40 states where Grace shipped the tainted ore for processing into consumer products remain contaminated and a risk to people living nearby.
Law student
While Nakayama was a student in George Mason University School of Law, Kirkland & Ellis led the successful appellate court battle to scuttle the EPA's 10-year effort to ban the mining, importation, use and sale of asbestos and asbestos-containing products.
The EPA introduced the ban in 1989, and two years later the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals threw it out.
In 1993, Nakayama wrote a 28-page law review article evaluating the court's ruling.
The law student said the court's decision "illustrates the importance of the substantive protection accorded private parties [industry] under the current" EPA statutes.
The United States is one of only a few
industrialized nations that have not banned the material.
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Thousands of First Responders to Receive Services for Health Problems Related to September 11, Occupational Health and Safety, June 22, 2005
http://www.ohsonline.com/Stevens/OHSPub.nsf/frame?open&redirect=http://www.ohsonline.com/stevens/ohspub.nsf/d3d5b4f938b22b6e8625670c006dbc58/f6695c24b053f73686257028005deab1?OpenDocument
An estimated 15,000 people who responded to the scene of the World Trade Center collapse will receive medical and social work services over the next two years for health problems related to the disaster through September 11 recovery grants totaling more than $16 million from the American Red Cross Liberty Disaster Relief Fund.
The Fire Department of New York City and the Mount Sinai Center for Occupational and Environmental Medicine, Mount Sinai School of Medicine are among seven organizations that were awarded recovery grants to enhance existing government-funded programs that screen and monitor World Trade Center responders but do not cover their treatment costs. They reflect the Red Cross's strategic, short-term support for public and private sector efforts to address the needs of the people who were most seriously affected by the events of September 11.
Uniformed and non-uniformed workers and volunteers who participated in the arduous recovery and reconstruction effort at ground zero are the primary beneficiaries of the Red Cross September 11 recovery grants. For as long as nine-months, they were exposed to a mix of dust debris, smoke and chemicals. Many are under -- or uninsured individuals who suffer from a variety of symptoms, including difficulty breathing, gastrointestinal problems and debilitating back pain. These temporary grants will help pay for the additional diagnostic tests and medications currently not covered by the federal government as well as provide funding for ancillary services, including programs that will assist them in applying for workmen's compensation and disability.
The grants are part of nearly $90 million that the American Red Cross September 11 Recovery Program projects it will award to established, non-profit organizations from now until 2007. These September 11 recovery grants will bolster the provision of services in communities that were the most directly affected by the terrorist attacks, and are a critical element of SRP's sunsetting strategy.
"This $5 million grant to the FDNY Fire Safety Education Fund will ensure that both active and retired members of the Fire Department continue to receive long-term medical care and support in the aftermath of September 11," said Fire Commissioner Nicholas Scoppetta. "Those individuals who selflessly dedicated themselves to the rescue and recovery work at the World Trade Center deserve access to the best medical care and monitoring. Without this grant and the support of the Red Cross, we would not have the financial resources for this undertaking."
The FDNY and Mount Sinai programs will serve individuals predominantly in New York and New Jersey. A grant to the Association of Occupational and Environmental Clinics will make screening and treatment for September 11-related health problems available to 500 workers and volunteers from around the country who responded to the World Trade Center site. AOEC anticipates that its clinics in Irvine, Calif.; Washington, D.C.; Tampa, Fla.; Chicago; Waltham, Mass.; Baltimore; Albany, N.Y.; Rochester, N.Y.; Syracuse, N.Y.; Cincinnati; and Lorain, Ohio, will serve the greatest number of responders.
The temporary funding for all seven organizations will be provided over two years to ensure smooth continuity of services. It covers the cost of strategies to enroll and retain the targeted individuals in appropriate treatment programs, and to assist them in accessing other critical support services, including publicly funded insurance, private charitable assistance and transportation. It also ensures the development and dissemination of clinical guidelines to health care providers who will screen other people with similar conditions, including residents of lower Manhattan.
To date, 100 organizations in seven states have been awarded more than $45 million in September 11 recovery grants from the American Red Cross Liberty Disaster Relief Fund for programs that fall into five broad categories: Access To Recovery Services; Health Diagnosis and Treatment (see attached); Mental Health and Wellness; Strategic Opportunities; and Youth Recovery and Resilience. Funding for a sixth category, Community Recovery in Lower Manhattan, will be announced later this year. For more information on this program, visit http://www.recoverygrants.org. More information about the American Red Cross September 11 Recovery Program can be found at http://www.redcross.org/september11/help.
9/11 Helpers Getting 16M, by Jimmy Vielkind, Daily News Writer, June 21, 2005
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/local/story/320902p-274426c.html
The Red Cross announced yesterday it will distribute $16 million to help 9/11 first responders as city officials blasted the White House for not doing enough.
The money, which will come from the $1 billion raised by the agency in the aftermath of the terror attacks, will fund health services and other assistance to an estimated 15,000 people, including firefighters, medics, cops and volunteers.
Grants were given to the FDNY, the Mount Sinai School of Medicine and other organizations to aid relief workers who labored under heavy emotions and poor health conditions at Ground Zero.
At Mount Sinai, which already screened and diagnosed disaster workers, $6.2 million will be used to fund treatment. Roughly 40% of the 11,000 workers screened don't have health insurance.
Elected officials praised the Red Cross at the announcement but attacked the Bush administration for trying to take back $125 million in unspent money earmarked for workers' compensation.
"We don't believe you can rescind emergency dollars," said Sen. Hillary Clinton, who vowed that the state's congressional delegation would fight to restore the funds.
Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-Manhattan), whose district includes Ground Zero, called the takeback a "shameful betrayal."
Where Time Is Stopped at Sept. 11, by David W. Dunlap, New York Times, June 20, 2005
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/06/20/nyregion/20deutsche.html?
The 34th floor is still hushed, a privileged cocoon of mahogany paneling, brass wall sconces, a meeting table longer than a limousine, carpeting the color of money and a men's room paneled in marble and granite.In the bright-white data center five floors above, air-conditioners big enough to cool a battery of computers still command views of Upper New York Bay.
Smoothie prices ($2.85 for 12 ounces, $3.35 for 16 ounces) are still posted in the fourth-floor cafeteria, a maze of Vulcan ranges, EmberGlo grills, Groen soup vats large enough to bathe in and stainless-steel serving islands offering "Rice & Noodle Bowls" and "Chop Chop Salad."
But the escalators to the lobby are frozen. At 130 Liberty Street - originally 1 Bankers Trust Plaza and more recently the Deutsche Bank building - the clock stopped on Sept. 11, 2001.
It never started again.
The building's life effectively ended when the World Trade Center collapsed across Liberty Street, carving an enormous gash into the facade and filling the 41-story structure with a tornado of hazardous contaminants.
Now, demolition awaits. Almost every furnishing, fixture and file has been removed. Much of the tower is shrouded in black netting. But the building is not empty. If you stand long enough in the board room or data center or cafeteria, you can almost hear the voices.
The Lower Manhattan Development Corporation, which acquired 130 Liberty Street expressly to raze it, permitted this reporter and a photographer - in respirators and double layers of polyethylene body suits - to visit sealed-off areas on eight floors of the building.
During this four-hour tour, no attempt was made at any assessment of potential environmental hazards. Rather, the point was to convey some sense of the building's final days.
"If there was a trademark of 130 Liberty Street, it was the energy," said John Foos, who worked there 26 years, as global director of security for Bankers Trust and then regional head of corporate security for Deutsche Bank. "That I remember and associate with it: the pace. How quickly people moved."
Even stripped down, 130 Liberty Street carries poignant traces of the 4,200 people who filled it every day. Mailbox cubbyholes on the 39th floor are still set aside for P. David, J. Gary, R. Livermore, M. Mongello, F. Rivera and J. Robinson. There are still personal mementos, like a calling card, lightly stained and slightly crumpled, on the carpet of the executive suite: "Michael Philipp. Member of the Board of Managing Directors."
Immediately above the executive domain, the global research center once shared space with a trading floor. Some analysts wore noise-reducing headphones to block the traders' bellowing, recalled Gregory B. van Inwegen, who worked in the research center.
The best views were from the data center on the 38th and 39th floors. Because the south side of 130 Liberty Street is unshrouded, it is still possible to appreciate the commanding harbor panorama.
"The techies had the last laugh," said David Ridley, a project manager at the development corporation.
Above the data center, the mechanical rooms still appear to be the musculature of a functioning building. The giveaway is the silence.
No air courses over the blades of the 20-foot-high intake fan on the 40th floor or through the three-foot-diameter exhaust ducts rising out of a six-story-high pipe gallery. Hundreds of backup batteries sit uselessly nearby. So does a yellow 675-kilowatt Caterpillar standby generator on the 41st floor. Dials long ago dropped to zero.
Another battery of silenced equipment fills the cafeteria kitchen and serving area on the fourth floor, which still look as if they could accommodate a crowd of impatient diners. "Lingering over lunch in the cafeteria - I don't think that happened often," Mr. Foos recalled. "It was: Grab a salad, grab a sandwich and run back to your desk."
But Dr. van Inwegen also remembered diners tarrying on the elevated plaza, which was connected to the World Trade Center by a pedestrian bridge. "You'd see boyfriends and girlfriends getting friendly in a corner," he said.
The plaza was destroyed in the attack. Throughout the building, even now, signs of that calamitous morning abound. Though the executive floor is remarkably intact, there is a conference room facing north whose window frames are filled with plywood barriers. Some 1,700 windows were blown out on Sept. 11, 2001.
A glass office partition lies in pebbly piles on the 10th floor. Nearby, parallel claw marks around a doorknob suggest that a prying tool was used by a search team.
Mr. Foos was on the 10th floor when the first plane hit.
He rushed downstairs. "I see this large piece of an aircraft in the middle of Liberty Street, a chunk of the fuselage," Mr. Foos said. "It's polished aluminum with pinstripe painting and I remember saying, 'My God, this is an American Airlines plane.' "
A bank executive who had once been a firefighter looked at the blaze near the top of the north tower and said, "There's no way this can be put out," Mr. Foos recalled. "Through an abundance of caution, we evacuated."
Dr. van Inwegen left with only his briefcase. After reaching the plaza level, he paused at a large window to look up at the south tower. "The next plane went right over our building, right over our heads," he said. "I just saw this huge, 'Towering Inferno' explosion at the top of the building. I was lucky that the glass I almost had my nose pressed against didn't shatter. It would have been like a guillotine."
A section of the collapsing south tower crashed into 130 Liberty Street, opening a gash 15 stories high. A 20,000-gallon underground diesel fuel tank was pierced and set ablaze. A bank guard, Francisco Bourdier, is believed to have died in the lower basement. Another Deutsche Bank employee, Sebastian Gorki, perished in the trade center. All others were evacuated.
Mr. Foos was allowed to return to 130 Liberty Street shortly after the attack. His visit took him to the executive dining room on the third floor.
"People who were there having breakfast got up and left as if they were going to step away for a couple of minutes and come back," he said. "There were remnants, beginning to deteriorate rapidly, that were in the rooms literally as they were left 10 days before. One person was having eggs Benedict."
Deutsche Bank declared the structure a total loss. Two of its insurers, the Allianz Global Risks U.S. Insurance Company and the AXA Corporate Solutions Insurance Company, maintained that it could be cleaned and salvaged. They battled in court.
Under a 2004 settlement, the development corporation acquired the property. Demolition has since been delayed as the scope of needed environmental safeguards and contaminant cleanup has grown. Consultants to the corporation have confirmed that the tower has excessive levels of asbestos, dioxin, lead, silica, quartz, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, chromium and manganese.
The corporation is now seeking bids for exterior scaffolding, cleanup and demolition. It expects work to begin this summer. But along with what officials regard as a blight on the Lower Manhattan skyline, the view that Dr. van Inwegen enjoyed from his 35th-floor cubicle - sailboats and liners, tugs and ferries - will also disappear.
"It was great working by the water and thinking of the history of Manhattan: trade, commerce, shipping," he said. "You still got that feel looking out the windows at New York Harbor. That's all gone. A memory."
Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company Back to TopLawmakers Say Feds Reneged on Promise; Red Cross Funds $16 Million in WTC Grants, by Karen Matthews, Associated Press Writer, June 20, 2005
http://www.newsday.com/news/local/wire/newyork/ny-bc-ny--sept11-redcross0620jun20,0,7081447.story?coll=ny-region-apnewyork
NEW YORK -- The American Red Cross announced $16 million in World Trade Center health-care grants on Monday while Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton and other New York lawmakers said the federal government has reneged on promises to help first responders to the trade center."It's hard to imagine that we can't get the help that we need," said Clinton, who was joined by Red Cross officials and U.S. Reps. Jerrold Nadler and Carolyn Maloney at the headquarters of the Red Cross' New York chapter.
The two-year grants announced Monday are part of the Red Cross' $90 million September 11 Recovery Program, funds donated to the organization after the 2001 terrorist attacks.
While the bulk of the money was spent on direct assistance to people affected by the disaster, the new grants will go to organizations that are providing long-term health and mental health services to World Trade Center rescue and recovery workers and others suffering from the attack.
"Since the terrorist attacks the Red Cross has been serving the victims of Sept. 11 with a combination of direct financial assistance and case management to help them achieve self-sufficiency," said Alan Goodman, executive director of the recovery program.
"Our recovery grants program now allows us to use the balance remaining in the Liberty Disaster Relief Fund to support non-profit institutions and community-based organizations that can address the longer-term mental and physical health needs of these individuals through a broader range of services than the Red Cross is chartered or equipped to provide," he said.
The grantees include the Fire Safety and Education Fund of the Fire Department, which will receive $5 million to aid firefighters and emergency medical workers who were exposed to toxins at the trade center site; the Mount Sinai Center for Occupational and Environmental Medicine, which will receive $6.2 million to expand its treatment and diagnostic programs for people affected by the attacks; and Bellevue Hospital Center, which will receive $2.4 million for evaluation and treatment for lower Manhattan residents.
The Long Island Occupational and Environmental Health Center at Stony Brook University will receive $1.2 million for services for first responders who live on Long Island, while smaller grants will go to the Association of Occupational and Environmental Clinics, the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey and Queens College.
Dr. Philip Landrigan, chairman of Mount Sinai School of Medicine's community and preventive medicine department, said the grants are needed because 40 percent of the 11,000 people who have been evaluated for trade center-related health problems at Mount Sinai have no health insurance.
Clinton, Nadler and Maloney said the Red Cross is filling a void left by the federal government, which is not providing the help that trade center first responders need.
"You can't call them heroes and not be there with treatment," Maloney said.
The three Democratic lawmakers criticized last week's move by a House Appropriations subcommittee to take back some $125 million in unspent Sept. 11 workers compensation aid to New York.
Nadler called the committee's action "disgraceful" and "inexcusable," and Clinton vowed to fight it in the Senate both on the merits and on technical grounds. "We don't believe you can rescind emergency dollars," she said.
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Sept. 11 Responders Press Congress Not to Withdraw $125 Million, by India Autry, Newsday, June 17, 2005
http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/nation/nyc-uswtc0617,0,5447832.story?coll=ny-leadnationalnews-headlines
WASHINGTON -- For more than a month, Jon Sferazo, a structural ironworker, sifted through piles of smoldering iron at Ground Zero in search of Sept. 11 survivors.
"We were there without questioning," he said at a news conference Thursday, gasping because of a loss of breathing capacity. "In my mind I kept thinking if it was me or one of my loved ones, I would want everything that could possibly be done to get them out."
Now Sferazo, of Huntington Station, needs help with medical bills, but Congress plans to withdraw $125 million in unspent workers compensation funds allotted to New York State.
Five Sept. 11 responders spoke about how after $44 million in federal funds have been spent, many have not been adequately compensated.
Help is pending for Marvin Bethea, a city paramedic from Kew Gardens Hills who had a stress-related stroke five weeks after Sept. 11. The state still questions whether he responded to the attacks.
Other claims have been denied because applicants didn't file for help within 96 hours or didn't work in the center of the rubble. Sept. 11-related claims are turned down 10 times more often than average applicants' are, Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-Manhattan) said.
Mike McCormick, an injured medic from Ridge, found the American flag that was paraded at the Salt Lake City Olympics, but his claim was denied because he didn't file soon enough.
"Abandoning wounded responders now is no different than leaving behind the wounded in combat," he said.
"President Bush, remember we were already victims of September 11th once," Bethea said. "Please don't make us victims twice."
Copyright 2005 Newsday Inc.
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Plea to W: Don't Stiff WTC Workers, by Michael McAuliff in Washington and Corky Siemaszko in New York, Daily News Staff Writers, June 17, 2005
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/local/story/319641p-273350c.html
New York lawmakers made a last-ditch appeal yesterday to stop the feds from taking back $125 million in unspent 9/11 relief money meant for workers injured at Ground Zero.
Standing with a delegation of disabled workers, they implored President Bush to honor the promise he made to help the city after the terror attack.
"To attempt a takeback of promised 9/11 aid shows how quickly Ground Zero workers are becoming forgotten heroes," said Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-Manhattan), who sounded the alarm last week over the vanishing money.
John Feal of Nesconset, L.I., who lost half a foot while supervising construction workers in The Pit, said he doesn't have the money to cover his medical bills. "The White House is wrong, the Bush administration is wrong, and shame on the President for letting this go on," Feal said.
"Abandoning our wounded responders is no different from leaving the wounded behind in combat," added Mike McCormick, a medic from Ridge, N.Y., who suffers from respiratory problems.
The House Appropriations Committee last night moved to cut the $125 million earmarked for workers' compensation and retraining - because it had not been spent. But the measure must still pass the House and Senate before the money would be lost.
Noting that disability claims of workers who toiled at Ground Zero were being denied at a rate 10 times higher than regular workers' claims, Sen. Hillary Clinton suggested that the money be "held in trust" until the claims can be sorted out.
Back to TopLet's Do the Right Thing for New York, Letter to the Editor, By Sens. Charles E. Schumer (D., N.Y.) and Hillary Rodham Clinton (D., N.Y.), Wall Street Journal, June 15, 2005
http://online.wsj.com/opinion/letters?mod=2_0048
In regard to your June 9 editorial "9/11 Chutzpah": To suggest that New York is not faced with extraordinary expenses related to the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks is shortsighted at best. The destruction to the city infrastructure alone was like nothing this country has ever experienced.In the days and months following the terrorist attacks, President Bush made a pledge to America and New York to commit at least $20 billion to help rebuild New York and address the tragedy that befell this magnificent city. We couldn't say it better than the president, who declared in March 2002 that providing New York with these critical funds was "the right thing to do. It's the absolute right position for our government to take. It is essential that New York City come back and come back strong, for the good of the entire nation."
Since the Sept. 11 attacks on the World Trade Center, there have been ongoing concerns about injuries and chronic illnesses related to the disaster among the many thousands of individuals who worked or volunteered there. These men and women were exposed to a range of environmental toxins, including cement and glass dust, asbestos, fiberglass, lead and other heavy metals and PCBs. They also sustained significant psychological trauma. If only, as you imply, they were left dealing with lung ailments. Indeed, this is only the beginning. What's more, 40% of the patients seen at Mount Sinai's privately funded WTC Health Effects Treatment Program have no health insurance.
In truth, New York will need far more than $20.8 billion to rebuild Lower Manhattan and take care of all the short- and long-term health affects of the many brave men and women who worked in and around Ground Zero.
Furthermore, we could not agree less with the Journal's flawed notion that U.S. taxpayers across the nation are being "shortchanged" by New York. New York sends nearly $20 billion more to Washington than it gets back from federal programs. This continues a trend that was documented over the past 25 years by our former colleague, Sen. Pat Moynihan.
The president and the nation were generous to New York after September 11 and we have spent the money wisely and will continue to do so. And we will continue to fight for every federal dollar we can for New York.
130 Liberty Street E Update #20, June 14, 2005, Kate MilleaRevised Deconstruction Plan
Today, the LMDC is submitting revised versions of the four sections of the 130 Liberty Street Deconstruction Plan that were previously released on May 12, 2005 which include the Waste Management Plan, the Ambient Air Monitoring Plan, the Emergency Action Plan (EAP) and the Health and Safety Plan (HASP) as well as the final section of the plan, the Asbestos and Contaminants of Potential Concern (COPC) Abatement and Removal Plan, for regulatory review. To view the revised Deconstruction Plan click here: http://www.renewnyc.com/plan_des_dev/130liberty/deconstruction_plan.asp
LMDC is submitting this Deconstruction Plan to all relevant federal, state, and local regulatory agencies for review to ensure compliance with applicable laws, rules, and regulations. Cleaning, abatement and deconstruction will not commence until the Deconstruction Plan has been approved by such agencies and the required permits and approvals are obtained.
The revised Deconstruction Plan incorporates the comments that were received by the regulatory agencies in January, 2005. The Abatement and Removal Plan specifically addresses the asbestos and COPCs identified in prior studies on both the interior and exterior of the Building. By removing and disposing of all contaminants in a safe and controlled manner, the Plan:
(i) prevents exposure of workers and the public to asbestos fibers and other COPCs,
(ii) safeguards workers and the public from construction debris, and
(iii) maintains a safe working and neighborhood environment throughout the cleaning and deconstruction process.
Furthermore, as required by applicable law, all interior cleaning and removal will be conducted under containment and negative pressure which will be maintained in each work area until independent, third party air clearance sampling demonstrates that elevated levels of asbestos and other COPCs do not exist. Additionally, all porous deconstruction waste generated prior to successful air clearance sampling will be handled, packaged, transported, and disposed of as asbestos waste, at a minimum, in properly permitted facilities.
New York State Department of Labor Variance Requests
In April, 2005 the LMDC submitted a Request for Variance for elements of the Phase I Deconstruction Plan to the New York State Department of Labor (NYS DOL) which regulates Industrial Code Rule 56 (ICR 56). Since April, official correspondence has been ongoing in regards to the variance. Furthermore, the LMDC has prepared an additional Request for Variance for Phase II of the deconstruction in preparation of finalizing the Deconstruction Plan for submission to the regulatory agencies. All documents related to the Variance Requests can be found below.
- April 11, 2005 Letter to NYSDOL
- April 11, 2005 Request for Variance
- May 11, 2005 New York State Department of Labor Ruling on the Request for Variance
- June 1, 2005 LMDC Variance Reopening
- June 10, 2005 Phase I Variance Reopening Decision Amendment
- June 10, 2005 Phase II Variance Petition
- June 10, 2005 Variance Reopening - Walker Duct and Raceway
- June 10, 2005 Proposed Pilot Program Work Plan for Removal of Aluminum Column Covers
9/11 Dollar Dilemma, Editorial, New York Post, June 13, 2005
http://www.nypost.com/postopinion/editorial/45311.htm
State and federal officials are quib bling over some $169 million in 9/11 funds, and both sides make fair points. But the argument by some New Yorkers that the state is entitled to the money is not only wrong, but it will serve unnecessarily to antagonize the rest of the nation.
And wind up seriously damaging New York state in the long run.
At issue are two pots of federal money $125 million in unspent worker's comp funds and $44 million for claims-processing that went directly to victims.
The Bush folks have agreed to let New York keep the $44 million, despite a Government Accountability Office demand that the money be repaid.
But on Thursday, a House panel voted to rescind the $125 million worker's comp fund on the grounds that such a significant chunk of change shouldn't be left sitting on the table forever.
In response, some New Yorkers, like Rep. Nita Lowey (D-Westchester), argue that the state should get to hang on to the money, because Ground Zero workers might get sick someday and file claims later. (Lowey made no comment about whether the onset of illnesses might be related to the knowledge that millions in funds are just waiting to be claimed.)
Both views are defensible.
But some go further, suggesting the state is automatically owed this money. And even if there are never any new worker's comp claims, New York should get to use the cash for other things.
President Bush, they say, promised he'd ship $20 billion after 9/11 and there shouldn't be any strings attached.
But that's going too far.
And New Yorkers shouldn't be surprised if the rest of the nation raises its collective eyebrow at such an argument.
Actually, even without the $125 million, Bush has more than satisfied his $20 billion pledge.
But if money isn't needed for the intended purpose, why should New York automatically without question get to keep it anyway?
(Such an attitude has led state and local officials to troll for Medicaid recipients; they don't want to waste a shot at having Washington pick up 50 percent of the cost, as the formula provides. As a result, New York spends more on Medicaid than the next two biggest spending states combined.)
In any event, don't be surprised if someone launches a campaign to recruit "sick" workers to claim the $125 million.
"Every New Yorker has an obligation to fight for every dime of that money," Lowey says.
Meanwhile, America's image of New York as just a tad greedy after 9/11 was sufficiently reinforced when Gov. Pataki raced down to D.C., demanding not $20 billion, but well more than $50 billion.
Nor did it help that he planned to use the money (which was meant for 9/11 recovery and rebuilding) for such things as a new high-speed-rail system upstate.
Washington gave that notion the respect it deserved that is, no respect whatsoever. And the governor's grab made it all that much more difficult to argue that, in many ways, New York does deserve special treatment.
The fact is that, when it comes to terror, the city is special a special target.
Many of the claims Police Commissioner Ray Kelly and other responsible custodians of the city's security interests make are beyond legitimate. But they must be argued from the moral high ground if they are to be realized.
Grasping of the sort now under way just makes Kelly & Co.'s work harder. In the end, it's hard to see how New York will come out ahead.
Copyright 2005 NYP Holdings, Inc. All rights reserved.
9/11 funds still needed, Editorial, Newsdeay, June 13, 2005
http://www.nynewsday.com/news/opinion/nyc-vpfun114302465jun13,0,3314751.story?coll=nyc-opinion-headlines
Don’t renege on pledge to NY
"Use it or lose it" is an unwritten rule of government funding that savvy recipients understand. So it's no great shock that Washington is moving to take back an unspent $125 million given to New York after 9/11 to help with the expected crush of workers' compensation claims.
Albany should have long since worked out an acceptable use for the money. Still, Washington shouldn't penalize 9/11 rescue workers facing the prospect of long-term health problems by reneging on this relatively small portion of its $20 billion, post-9/11 pledge of assistance for New York. That also goes for an additional $44 million that the Government Accountability Office says was earmarked for administrative costs and spent improperly to compensate workers.
The White House wants the $44 million repaid and has stripped the $125 million from its 2006 budget. Congress should oblige the New York delegation, which is fighting to keep the money. Albany is paying about $500,000 a year in compensation to rescue workers now, and still has hundreds of pending claims involving slow-to-develop health problems. Washington shouldn't pull the plug on this money until all those needs have been met.
Copyright © 2005, Newsday, Inc
Back to TopKicking up dust over new air testing plan, by Ronda Kaysen, Downtown Express, Volume 18, Number 3 | June 10 -16, 2005 http://www.downtownexpress.com/de_109/kickingupdust.html Downtown’s air will be monitored continuously throughout the years of intense construction, Downtown redevelopment officials announced this week.
The Lower Manhattan Construction Command Center unveiled an air monitoring system that, beginning this summer, will monitor the air below Canal St. for particulates until at least the end of 2008, when peak construction is expected to wane.
"We want to make sure that Lower Manhattan’s air is as good as, if not better than, anywhere else in the rest of Manhattan," Charles Maikish, head of the command center, told residents at a June 6 Community Board 1 meeting. The center, a joint city and state agency, was created earlier this year to mitigate the impact the years of construction will have on the community.
The monitoring systems scattered throughout the Downtown area will check for particulates as small as 2.5 microns (a human hair is 70 microns). The information will be examined daily at the command center and reports will be available to the public weekly at www.lowermanhattan.info.
The Environmental Protection Agency, which suggested the idea of a monitoring plan to the center and was active in the development process, voiced concerns to Downtown Express that the final product does not go far enough to ensure the air in the neighborhood is safe to breathe.The agency would like to see the center also check for asbestos, lead and man-made vitreous fibers below Canal St. (the plan calls for running the more comprehensive tests only near the construction sites).
"Given all the construction we felt [monitoring for toxins throughout Downtown] would provide information about what may be escaping into the community," said Mary Mears, an E.P.A. spokesperson. "We should err on the side of caution and do a wider monitoring program."
Under the current plan, air will be monitored for fibrous toxins at locations known to have contaminants, such as the Deutsche Bank building at 130 Liberty St., a contaminated building owned by the Lower Manhattan Development Corp. that will soon be demolished. "The air monitoring plan addresses the issues that are generally associated with construction fine particulates and dust," Maikish said in a telephone interview.
Fibrous toxins, on the other hand, are associated with renovations and demolitions. "Those issues [fibrous toxins] are addressed on a localized basis at local sites," Maikish said. "It should be only at a localized level because we don’t have asbestos all over Downtown Manhattan."Maikish’s plan was received favorably at the public meeting earlier this week, and received little criticism from the residents who attended. But harsh words from an environmental regulatory agency might impact the community’s perception of the plan.
"If L.M.D.C. wants to be credible, they should step up to the plate and do what the E.P.A. recommends," Catherine McVay Hughes, community liaison for the E.P.A. W.T.C. Expert Technical Review Panel and a C.B. 1 member who attended the meeting, said after hearing about the E.P.A.’s reservations. The L.M.D.C. is helping set up the command center. "If L.M.D.C. wants to earn the trust of the community, they would install a good air monitoring program."
A reverse turf war may very well be shaping up over protecting for asbestos – an E.P.A.-regulated toxin. "If the E.P.A. suspects that there’s an asbestos problem Downtown, then it’s their responsibility to do something about it," Maikish said,Although the E.P.A. is responsible for monitoring contamination, the command center is responsible for mitigating the construction problems that arise. And the air quality is very much one of those problems. "There is going to be an inordinate amount of construction and deconstruction activity in Lower Manhattan that activity is being led by the Lower Manhattan Construction Command Center," said Mears. "So we feel that in their appropriate role as the coordinator of all these efforts, it would make sense for them to run this network."
The E.P.A. has not always played the part of community champion in the years since 9/11. Residents sued the agency in 2004 accusing it of misleading the public about post-9/11 air quality. "I find it interesting that they’re piping up now," said Linda Rosenthal, an aide to U.S. Rep. Jerrold Nadler, one of the most vocal politicians on Downtown air quality concerns. "I’m glad the E.P.A. is showing concern, but the E.P.A. should put out its own monitors. The E.P.A. should have had monitors out this whole time, that’s their job."
http://www.downtownexpress.com/de_109/deutschebank.html
One of the final relics of the World Trade Center disaster may soon meet its fate.
A cleanup and deconstruction plan was released this week for the shrouded building at 130 Liberty St., which stands damaged and contaminated at the southern edge of the W.T.C. site, a looming reminder of what happened there nearly four years ago. The Lower Manhattan Development Corporation owns the building and will coordinate the painstaking cleanup process, which will cost the corporation as much as $45 million.
"We feel very confident that the regulators will approve the plan and we can start work this summer," said Amy Peterson, a senior vice president for the corporation, at a June 6 presentation of the revised cleanup plan for Community Board 1. Peterson expects to receive approval within four to six weeks.
But the Environmental Protection Agency, the lead regulator for the project, has yet to receive some components of the plan – including the asbestos abatement and removal plan, which the L.M.D.C. promised to deliver in the coming days – and has not given the corporation a green light. "We are still reviewing the parts that we do have and we haven’t signed off on them yet," said Mary Mears, an agency spokesperson. "They did make some of the changes that we asked for, but we have to do a careful review with the regulators." E.P.A. rejected the original draft of the cleanup plan last January, calling for a more thorough and extensive cleanup process.
Mears did not indicate how long this round of reviews might take. "We want to expedite it, but we want to make sure we do a thorough review."
According to L.M.D.C.’s revised plan, the building will first be enclosed in scaffolding covered with a layer of netting. As the scaffolding climbs the building’s 40 stories, the old netting will be removed. The corporation opened a bidding process for scaffolding contractors this week and will award a contract on July 1.
Washington St. will be closed while the scaffolding is erected, but the L.M.D.C. anticipates minimal impact on Greenwich and Albany Sts. The Liberty St. pedestrian walkway and bridge will remain open.
The first phase the abatement phase of the two-phase process will begin in August. Workers will use part of the building’s skin to create a negative pressure container within the building. From 7 a.m. until 4 p.m., five days a week, a team of 40 workers working several floors at a time, will clean and dispose of all porous materials such as ceiling tiles, sheetrock and carpeting. "We needed to treat everything in the building as if it is contaminated with asbestos," said Peterson. Non-porous materials, such as steel sheeting, may be preserved, when possible.
Workers, trained before the work begins, will be covered from head to toe and equipped with full-face respirators to protect their lungs from the toxins. As they leave the contaminated area, they will enter a decontamination zone to shower and change.
A hoist, located on Albany St., will carry all cleaned workers and decontaminated materials in and out of the building. "It’s all controlled descent and ascent," Lois Mendes, the L.M.D.C.’s newly appointed construction director told Downtown Express after the meeting. Contaminated material will be cleaned, decontaminated, double-bagged and sealed in a six-sided container before it leaves the building.
The building’s interior will leave Lower Manhattan in container trucks, 10 to 15 of them a day, loaded on Washington St., and traveling along Cedar St. to the West Side Highway.
By November, the demolition phase will begin. (The L.M.D.C. will open the bidding process for the demolition next week, and expects to award a contract by August.) A crane, located on the north side of the building and enclosed with fencing, will carry the building’s exterior down, loading it into 20 trucks a day that will follow the same path out of the area that the phase one trucks followed. At the height of the second phase, as many as 100 workers, following the same work schedule as in phase one, will dismantle the tower floor by floor. "It will be a slow, slow process," said Mendes.
Air monitors will be located at street level, atop the building and within. If a monitor hits a "trigger level," work will stop until the issue is resolved. Air monitoring data will be available on the L.M.D.C.’s Web site, www.renewnyc.com/130Liberty.
With the assistance of several city agencies including the police and fire departments, the L.M.D.C. created a draft of a community notification plan. In case of an emergency, onsite personnel (and anyone else who witnesses an emergency) are advised to call 911. According to the community plan, the L.M.D.C. will post flyers throughout the community, e-mail incident alerts and e-updates to a 130 Liberty St. list serve, hold periodic community briefings and provide a recorded toll-free information hotline, (646) 942-0694.
By early 2007, the imposing tower will have vanished from Liberty St. A small park, a Greek Orthodox church and Tower 5 of the new World Trade Center complex will eventually take its place.
9/11 Chutzpah, Wall Street Journal Editorial, June 9, 2005
http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB111827345637454778-email,00.html
After the September 11 terrorist attacks, Washington generously pledged $20 billion to help New York City recover. The taxpayers have since met that pledge and exceeded it by about $800 million. Included in the aid is $175 million earmarked for workers injured in the attack. Nearly four years later, it's clear that need was hugely overestimated; only $50.8 million has been spent. And so, reasonably enough, the feds are asking for $120 million back. Enter New York's Congressional delegation. Last week two-thirds of the state's Representatives fired off a letter of protest to President Bush, whose budget proposes to reclaim that money. The letter was signed by 20 House Members, including a handful of Republicans, and is aimed at drawing attention to the issue before a House hearing today. It has "been our understanding," they write, "that if it was ever determined that certain 9/11 disaster relief funding was not able to be fully used, we would have the flexibility to use this funding on other pressing needs related to 9/11." Senators Hillary Clinton and Charles Schumer didn't sign the letter, but they too are urging the President not to rescind the money. They want to redirect it to a program for Ground Zero workers who may develop lung problems down the road -- even though most have health insurance through the fire department or other agencies. The 9/11 money was set aside for two purposes. Some $50 million was to reimburse the state's Uninsured Employers Fund. Half of that was earmarked to reimburse the fund for benefits to those who worked for uninsured employers. But since the state hopes to recoup these expenses from the employers themselves, rather than insurers, almost none of it has been touched. Of the other $25 million, intended to reimburse the fund for benefits paid out to volunteers, only $456,000 has been spent. The remaining $125 million -- of which about $49 million has been used -- was to defray the costs of processing additional workers' compensation claims. The rest of that money has been sitting idle for years because the expected flood of paperwork and expenses never came. Some 90% of the 10,182 workers' comp claims have been resolved and 31% of the separate 588 volunteer claims have also been finalized. In addition, the Government Accountability Office reported this week that New York improperly spent $44 million -- a huge chunk of total spending -- on items not authorized by Congress and, barring further Congressional action, that the Labor Department should now move to recover this money. Keep in mind that President Bush made his initial pledge to save the state from extraordinary expenses resulting from the 9/11 attack. Washington has done that and more by spending or committing to spend far more than the President promised. About $8.8 billion went to support debris removal and other emergency actions, $5 billion toward tax incentives for downtown development and billions for housing assistance, transportation repairs, health care costs and more. No one is getting shortchanged here except Uncle Sam. Taxpayers across the country were generous in giving New York $20.8 billion to recover from 9/11. It would be nice if New York politicians returned the favor by giving back money that wasn't needed after all. N.Y.C. Debates Toxic Air, by Heather Moyers, Disaster News Network, June 9, 2005http://www.disasternews.net/news/news.php?articleid=2656
On Wednesday, the Lower Manhattan Construction Command Center (LMCCC) announced that it will operate a new air quality monitoring program during the Lower Manhattan rebuilding process. Residents and workers are concerned about the lingering toxins in Sept. 11-damaged buildings that are slated for demolition.The LMCCC was created by New York Governor George Pataki and New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg to coordinate the Lower Manhattan rebuilding process. The air quality monitoring program will be operated in coordination with the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the New York Department of Environmental Conservation, and the New York City Department of Environmental Protection.
"The Construction Command Center will consistently monitor the air quality in Lower Manhattan neighborhoods to ensure that construction projects are not adversely affecting the health of Lower Manhattan residents and businesses," said LMCCC Executive Director Charles Maikish in a news release.
"Among the major goals of the Command Center is to mitigate the impact of construction on the Lower Manhattan community, including monitoring air quality, and to assure that project sponsors carry out their environmental performance commitments during construction."
Residents are reacting positively to the plan and hope that the commitment to the community remains strong.
"We have been assured that the (LMCCC) is seeking a partnership with the community to come up with the best possible program," said Kimberly Flynn of 9/11 ENVIRONMENTAL ACTION, a community group in Lower Manhattan. "We hope that the (LMCCC) will work with the community to make sure that the program is effective in capturing the kind of up-to-the-minute, accurate and comprehensive air quality information we need, and in disseminating it to the public in real time." The Lower Manhattan Development Corporation (LMDC) is already running an air quality monitoring program in the area as well, in coordination with their plans to demolish the 130 Liberty Street skyscraper – the former Deutsche Bank building that was heavily damaged on Sept. 11. LMDC officials noted Wednesday that they will continue their air quality program for the duration of the demolition process and keep it separate from the LMCCC program. In late May, the Transport Workers Union raised concerns over air quality issues near 4 Albany Street – another Sept. 11-affected building slated for demolition. A fan for a subway station is located near the building and the union workers requested an investigation by the New York City Transit Office of System Safety into worker and public safety during the asbestos abatement process for the building. According to the Office of System Safety, their office’s investigation process found levels of asbestos, nickel, and lead in excess of EPA-safe levels on dates in January and March. In a letter to the union, the Office of System Safety said engineers replaced certain fans, air filters, and air purifiers in April and no excess levels were detected during the remainder of the asbestos abatement. According to the letter, "the same procedure will be followed for the abatement and deconstruction of the building located at 130 Liberty Street to evaluate any impacts to the Albany Street fan plant." Also related to building contamination, two other buildings slated for demolition had their demolition permits revoked. In an apparent oversight among the New York City Department of Buildings (DOB), the city’s Department of Environmental Protection (DEP), and the EPA, adequate plans had not yet been made to handle the toxins remaining within the buildings enveloped by dust when the Twin Towers fell. Residents saw scaffolding going up and contacted Congressman Jerrold Nadler’s office for help, and a staff member alerted the involved agencies to the mistake. The building’s owners are now meeting with environmental officials to plan the demolition accordingly. That error left community activists worried that they are doing the jobs of the city and federal agencies. "The key thing is, without the constant vigilance of nearby residents, a regular demolition would have commenced of two heavily contaminated buildings – with the likely result that highly toxic – and also highly respirable – dust would have been released into the surrounding area," said Flynn of 9/11 Environmental Action. Flynn and other residents blame the city’s DOB and DEP for not paying attention, and the EPA for not taking on more of a roll in the demolition process. "It should not be possible to get permits to do work in impacted buildings without EPA scrutiny and guidance," Flynn noted. "(The) EPA is tasked under the National Strategy for Homeland Security with decontaminating buildings and neighborhoods contaminated as the result of a terrorist attack. They still have some serious unfinished business in Lower Manhattan. (The) EPA should take charge of these dangerous demolitions instead of, once again, shifting the burden of dealing with hazardous dust onto area residents." The EPA has stated numerous times that they are taking "a leading role" in the various demolitions throughout Manhattan, but residents say that is not enough. Residents continue to push the EPA’s Sept. 11 Expert Technical Review Panel to take more of an interest in the demolitions, yet the EPA’s Michael Brown said the panel is not responsible for that issue. "It is not in the purview of the panel to consider the deconstruction of buildings," said Brown, an EPA staff to the panel and associate assistant administrator for the EPA’s Office of Research and Development. He added that the only reason that the demolition process continues to get time during the panel meetings is because of public interest. The EPA’s website for the Expert Technical Review Panel states that the panel was created to "characterize any remaining exposures and risks, identify unmet public health needs, and recommend any steps to further minimize the risks associated with the aftermath of the World Trade Center attacks." At the last meeting of the panel, the revised draft sampling proposal was released. The sampling proposal aims at retesting buildings in Manhattan and Brooklyn to determine whether lingering WTC dust remains. The proposal’s final move is hinged upon whether a WTC dust "signature" will be found. EPA researchers at the May 24 panel meeting revealed that their original quest for two dust signatures is now down to only one. The scientists had originally hoped to find a signature for both the building collapse and for the Ground Zero fires – which continued for months after Sept. 11. After months of tests, they came to the conclusion that the fire signature could not be distinguished from other building fires. Brown said this is not all that surprising. "The things that burned in the World Trade Center towers are not unlike the very things that burn in other building fires – things like carpet, furniture, wallboard, computers, and more," he explained. "In that respect, the World Trade Center towers weren’t appreciably different from other office fires." Yet this news came as a surprise to residents and employees of the areas enveloped by the dust from the initial collapse and the smoke from the subsequent fires. Flynn said she knows of many people in areas that were only affected by the smoke who are now dealing with serious respiratory problems. She said her organization and its partners agree that the EPA’s choice of sampling for only one possible component of a fire signature was not enough because the smoke was a "toxic soup of pollutants." 9/11 Environmental Action is also united with the World Trade Center Community Labor Coalition against many aspects of the draft sampling proposal. The groups take issue with the plan’s aim to only test "accessible" areas of apartments, and not places where dust can settle, such as in ventilation units and behind appliances. Another major problem for these organizations and many public officials such as Congressman Jerrold Nadler and New York Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton – whose request helped bring the EPA panel into existence – is that the sampling plan does not require buildings slated for sampling to be tested. Building owners and landlords are allowed to refuse the testing. "Unfortunately, it appears at first glance that the EPA's long-awaited plan has been designed in a way that is fundamentally inadequate to determine the true extent of WTC dust contamination," said Nadler. "It is imperative that the EPA now act to incorporate more of the ideas and concerns of the residents, workers and environmental advocates into a revised, scientifically rigorous sampling plan."Members of the panel even disagree with the plan. "While we are pleased that (the) EPA agreed to test workplaces as well as residences, that is a hollow promise if employers can bar access for testing," said David Newman, industrial hygienist for the New York Committee for Occupational Safety and Health (NYCOSH) and member of the Expert Technical Review Panel. "If workers are disenfranchised under this plan, the plan will fail. (The) EPA must gain access to test buildings near Ground Zero." Yet the EPA and some panel members remain committed to the revised sampling plan, citing that they have listened to the public’s concerns and taken them into account. "This has been an open process since the first meeting in April 2004," said Brown. "We’ve moved significantly closer to a plan that reflects their desire, but at the same time, the plan must be scientifically credible and do-able." Brown anticipates the sampling plan starting later this summer, once the final dust signature is attained. Other important Sept. 11 issues coming up now: -Workers’ Compensation: The Bush Administration is battling the State of New York over the remaining $125 million in funds that was earmarked for workers’ compensation claims for Ground Zero rescue workers. The 2006 federal budget would reclaim the money, but community organizations and lawmakers are asking the Bush Administration to leave it with the state. They’re also asking the state to stop dragging its feet on the remaining claims for that money. "The lack of disbursement of these funds does not reflect a lack of need, rather it reflects difficulties that workers have faced in having their claims processed," said Maggie Jarry, director of disaster recovery and advocacy for New York Disaster Interfaith Services (NYDIS). "In addition, NYC agencies, like NYDIS' programs for recovery workers and the Unmet Needs Roundtable are now seeing significant increases of medical and mental health illnesses related to 9/11 exposures, especially for recovery workers. We believe it is immoral and unethical not to insure these funds are retained to address these emerging and serious needs." -Community Block Grants: The Lower Manhattan Development Corporation (LMDC) recently revealed its plans for the remaining $800 million in community block grants aimed at helping rebuild and revitalize Lower Manhattan. Community groups have been arguing with the LMDC for months now regarding how the organization has spent money aimed at helping the community, saying that the money should go to creating jobs and helping pay for the medical bills of those suffering illnesses caused by WTC dust. The LMDC said the remaining money will go toward grants and support for local schools, cultural sites, parks and playgrounds, revitalizing specific neighborhoods like Chinatown and the two waterfront centers, as well as other local issues. "The recent announcement by LMDC with proposed allocations is a hopeful step in many regards, but much remains to be worked out in the details of how the money will be spent," said NYDIS’ Jarry.
The Lower Manhattan Development Corporation, which owns the building, told a committee of Community Board 1 on June 6 their latest plan for safely leveling the structure, now holding contaminates from the World Trade Center collapse.
"We need to treat everything in the building as if it were contaminated with World Trade Center dust, which it is," said Ed Gerdts, an environmental consultant on the project for the LMDC. "And everything we do will be done under asbestos [removal] procedures."
There will be decontamination stations and showers for workers leaving the site and four air monitoring devices installed throughout the building to watch for dangerous levels of dust.
"There are trigger or action levels," said Gerdts. "If we do hit one of those levels, work would stop until correct action is taken."
At the urging of Community Board 1 and local environmental groups, 911 will be the first number workers are expected to call in the event of an emergency, rather than the LMDC or other agencies.
"I'm happy to see that the LMDC finally sees the importance of that," said board member Marc Ameruso.
Aside from dialing 911, residents are urged to call the LMDC emergency hotline at 646-942-0694. Concerned residents can also call Lou Mendes, director of construction for the LMDC, at 646-942-0694.
A scaffolding will go up around the 40-story building beginning in late July and by August crews will be picking through the building floor by floor to remove all the materials. Those materials, including sheet rock, ceiling tiles, flooring and any porous pieces will be cleaned and sealed in containers on trucks parked inside the building and shipped out of the neighborhood down Cedar Street where the trucks will undergo a wash before turning onto West Street. It is expected that 10 to 15 trucks a day will make the trip, though a landfill destination for the materials has not been selected.
"The only thing left in the building will be the steel, the concrete and the outside skin," said Mendes.
The LMDC will open the bid process on the deconstruction contract this month. Beginning in November, Mendes said, a net would go up around the scaffolding and crews would begin to shore away the beams and fold down the outer walls to the floor as level by level the building will be cut away.
"It's a very slow process," Mendes said. "The cutting is going to be an even slower process."
The deconstruction plan, nearly a year in the making, has been one of intensive public scrutiny. Last July, Congressman Jerrold Nadler and local environmental groups sounded an alarm during a press conference when they provided court documents that showed prior testing of the building indicated asbestos levels of 150,000 times the appropriate levels as well as dangerously large amounts of other contaminants. The LMDC has subsequently retested the building and the study found excessive levels of dioxin, asbestos, lead, mercury and other heavy metals on 77 percent of the 31 floors tested.
The federal Environmental Protection Agency and the city's Department of Environmental Protection will review the plans before deconstruction on the building begins. The public will get a chance to hear and comment on the plan at a public forum at 4 p.m. on June 20 at Pace University. The plan is posted at www.renewnyc.com.
Back to Top City to Pre-monitor Air Around WTC Site, by Barry Owens, Tribeca Trib, June 8, 2005http://www.tribecatrib.com/
The Lower Manhattan Construction Command Center, the agency that over the next decade will coordinate truck traffic, enforce environmental regulations and otherwise aim to ease the damaging effect of constant construction in the neighborhood, will begin the task this month by first monitoring the quality of the air. An air quality monitoring program, which will include taking daily samples from several locations below Canal Street, will begin by the end of this month with the installation of sampling devices near the sites of major construction projects. Charles Maikish, the command center's director, presented a broad outline of the program on June 6 to a committee of Community Board 1. "The goal is to make sure that the air in Lower Manhattan is as good as it is anywhere else in Manhattan," he said. The devices are similar to the air quality monitors, and are meant to supplement, those to be set up on site during the deconstruction of Duetsche Bank, Fiterman Hall and other projects. The exact locations of the devices have not be determined, Maikish said, but the planned vicinities of the air monitors are in locations in both northern and southern Battery Park City, in southern Tribeca, on Park Row near City Hall Park and within the Financial District. The devices will test for particulates in the air and the analysis of the samples will determine in most cases where the matter emanates from. "We will be able to tell whether it is related to construction, or weather patterns, or even ship movement in the harbor," Maikish said. "If there is a spike in the readings, we have to determine why. If we determine that a contractor is not complying with environmental criteria, they will be shut down, period." That criteria includes the use of ultra-low sulfur diesel fuel in off-road construction equipment, restricting idling times on diesel powered engines and dust control measures at construction sites. The results of the daily samples will be published weekly, sent to various agencies and posted on lowermanhattan.info. Maikish said he expects construction in the neighborhood to be most heavy in 2007 and 08, but he is eager to have the air sampling devices up now so a baseline can be determined. The program will be overseen by the command center in consultation with the federal Environmental Protection Agency, the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation, and the city's Department of Environmental Protection. U.S. to N.Y.: Return $44M in Sept. 11 Aid, by Devlin Barrett, Associated Press, June 7, 2005http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/06/07/AR2005060701395.html
WASHINGTON -- A congressional inquiry has found New York failed to follow instructions from Congress on the spending of $44 million in Sept. 11 aid and should give the money back or get lawmakers to pass a law allowing the expenditure. A New York official countered Tuesday night that if the federal government persists with the effort, it would have to take the money back directly from Sept. 11 victims. "The federal government authorized these funds to go to 9/11 victims and their families in the first place, and given that they originally approved it, it would be wrong for them years later to take the money back from victims," said Jon Sullivan, a spokesman for the state workers' compensation board. The bad news for New York comes just as the House is considering whether to take back another $125 million in Sept. 11 workers' compensation aid because the state has yet to spend it nearly four years after the 2001 terror attack. The Government Accountability Office, the investigative arm of Congress, said in a 10-page memo Tuesday that the Labor Department "should seek recovery of $44 million improperly transferred" or get specific congressional approval for New York's use of the money. The GAO found the state was not entitled to distribute the $44 million through other agencies. The state used the other agencies because officials said it would be a quicker method of getting aid to victims. Labor Department spokesman David James said the agency is "reviewing the GAO legal memorandum to determine the course of action we will take." The House will consider later this week whether to take back an additional $125 million in unspent workers' compensation aid. The White House Office of Management and Budget has sought to retrieve the money because it has not been spent. New York lawmakers vowed to hold onto the workers comp funding for future Sept. 11-related claims. The GAO found the federal law that provided the $44 million did not allow it to be used that way. In such instances, GAO lawyer Anthony Gamboa wrote, the funds "must be recovered ... even when those expenditures have been incurred innocently." Jon Sullivan, a spokesman for the state workers' compensation board, defended the state's actions as "fully appropriate" and with clear permission from the Labor Department. The federal government granted more than $20 billion to New York to help recover and rebuild after the attacks. Rep. Carolyn Maloney, D-N.Y., had requested the original GAO investigation into the workers' compensation program run by the state, but on Tuesday said it made no sense for the government to start taking back even more money.2005 The Associated Press
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/06/07/nyregion/07stadium.html?hp&ex=1118203200&en=872e2c1072d77a6b&ei=5094&partner=homepage
Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg's nearly four-year quest to build a Manhattan football stadium that could spark the redevelopment of the West Side and lure the Olympic Games to New York was defeated yesterday when two of Albany's leaders refused to approve the $2.2 billion project. The decision threw into serious doubt the city's bid to bring the 2012 Olympics to the United States. By far the most contentious development project proposed for New York City in years, the stadium became a victim of the city's and state's clashing rebuilding priorities after the World Trade Center attack. Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, who held veto power over the stadium, said yesterday that he could not support the project on the West Side, along with the large commercial redevelopment plan the mayor has proposed, because it would undermine the redevelopment of Lower Manhattan, his district. "Am I supposed to turn my back on Lower Manhattan as it struggles to recover?" Mr. Silver asked at an Albany news conference. "For what? A stadium? For the hope of bringing the Olympics to New York City?" Joseph L. Bruno, the Senate majority leader, also declined to support the project, saying he had not been given enough information about it. He tried, but failed, to win support for a plan to authorize the stadium only if the city won its bid for the Olympics. Yesterday's decision, by the state's Public Authorities Control Board, makes it far more difficult, if not impossible, for the city to guarantee the construction of an Olympic stadium, a prerequisite to its bid. Just hours earlier, the International Olympic Committee released a report generally praising New York's bid, but calling attention to the stadium's uncertainty. Paris's proposal drew unqualified praise. In less than four weeks, the Olympic committee plans to pick Paris, London, Madrid, Moscow or New York for the site of the Summer Games. [Page D1.] "I had not been able to persuade him," Mr. Bloomberg said after Mr. Silver's announcement. "As for our Olympic bid, rejection of the stadium will seriously damage our chances at winning the 2012 Games." Those who opposed the stadium would have to explain why they were against jobs and economic growth, he said. Aides to the mayor added that he was furious at Mr. Silver, believing the speaker had failed to negotiate in good faith after promising to do so over the weekend. The vote also raises questions about Mr. Bloomberg's ambitious plans to redevelop the low-scale industrial neighborhood on the Far West Side and expand the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center. The mayor had planned the stadium as the centerpiece of a huge commercial and residential development in the old maritime district along the river, including a subway-line extension and broad new boulevards. Mr. Bloomberg, along with the Jets, the city's construction unions and some business groups, had said the stadium would help create thousands of new jobs, new tax revenues and a new commercial district. "Without it, we won't have the catalyst for the growth of this neighborhood, and we'll have to revise our plans to make up for it," Mr. Bloomberg said. "This delay will be measured in years, not months." He said the vote would also mean a loss of millions of dollars to the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, which had planned to sell the stadium site to the Jets. In his pursuit of the stadium, the mayor failed to reckon with the power of the little-known state board, which is controlled by Albany's three leaders - Mr. Silver, Mr. Bruno and Gov. George E. Pataki. Without a unanimous decision from the board, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority could not transfer the land, and the state could not contribute its half of the $600 million public subsidy. Because Mr. Silver and Mr. Bruno each ordered their representatives on the board to abstain - the equivalent of a no vote - the project cannot go ahead. Mr. Bloomberg could not overcome Mr. Silver's determination to fight for his downtown district, which has never recovered the economic vitality it held before the terrorist attacks. Aides to the mayor, saying they were baffled by Mr. Silver's vote, said they had offered him any number of incentives to keep businesses downtown, including commercial rent tax exemptions and penalties for moving from downtown to the West Side. The proposals, offered in last-minute negotiations over the weekend, were met by stony silence from Mr. Silver, the aides said. Mr. Silver objected to the 24 million square feet of development that City Hall envisioned for the West Side, saying that the administration's fever for the area would inevitably have hurt downtown's growth. "The 2012 Summer Games are being used as a shield to hide another goal: to shift the financial and business capital of the world out of Lower Manhattan and over to the West Side," Mr. Silver said. To get his vote supporting a stadium, he said, it would have to be built somewhere other than the West Side - ideally, near Shea Stadium in Queens - and the big development project for the West Side would have to be stopped. Many of the city's largest civic groups, many economists and West Side neighborhood groups agreed with Mr. Silver's opposition, though sometimes for different reasons, saying the stadium would hurt development by discouraging office tenants and residents who would not want to work and live next to it. "This was never an economic development project," said Robert D. Yaro, president of the Regional Plan Association, which opposed the stadium while favoring the redevelopment of the West Side. "Virtually every independent observer concluded that the impediment to the redevelopment of the West Side was the stadium." Many in the real estate industry had warned Mr. Bloomberg and his deputy mayor, Daniel L. Doctoroff, the former investment banker and architect of the city's Olympic bid for the last decade, that the stadium would be the Achilles heel of the Olympic bid. At a founding meeting of the pro-stadium Hudson Yards Coalition four years ago, Jerry I. Speyer, a developer and a minority owner of the Yankees, warned the group that building over the West Side railyards was folly because of community opposition, potential lawsuits and environmental regulations. He was not the only one. "Everyone in town gave the Olympic organizers that advice," Mr. Yaro said. At the time, though, no one predicted that James L. Dolan, whose family controls Cablevision and Madison Square Garden, would come to view the stadium as competition and begin an all-out effort to stop the project, hiring lobbyists and spending millions on television ads. The Jets had proposed building a $2.2 billion stadium, nearly quadruple the $630 million cost of the most expensive stadium in the United States, the new Soldier Field in Chicago. The Jets promised to pay $1.6 billion themselves, more than any other professional team, while the city and state were to invest a combined $600 million. The team designed the stadium to double as an exhibition hall, to work in conjunction with the Javits convention center, but that feature did little to blunt criticism of the project. The Jets will probably stay in New Jersey, Mr. Bloomberg said, and the state's acting governor, Richard J. Codey, said he was confident the team would remain there in a new Meadowlands stadium. The meeting of the Public Authorities Control Board, which usually meets in out-of-the-way rooms in the Capitol and draws only a handful of mild-mannered observers in pinstripe suits, met in a large convention room yesterday, and drew hundreds of angry union members, some in hard hats, who noisily called for the stadium. The tensions reached a boiling point when State Senator Thomas K. Duane, a Democrat who represents the West Side, went over to talk with the stadium opponents. Suddenly he was swarmed by stadium boosters who began screaming at the opponents. The standoff was defused when several state troopers entered the room, and some of the cooler-headed union members urged their colleagues to sit down. After the vote, a moan went up in the crowd of ironworkers, who got louder. The members of the board were escorted into a back room. One ironworker shouted, "We'll see Silver in the morning." As the members of the board filed out, the ironworkers chanted, "Silver's got to go! Now!"Charles V. Bagli reported from New York for this article and Michael Cooper from Albany. Al Baker, in Albany, and Jim Rutenberg, in New York, contributed reporting.
Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company
130 Liberty E Update #18, June 7, 2005, Kate Millea
Today, the Lower Manhattan Construction Command Center (LMCCC) the agency created by Governor Pataki and Mayor Bloomberg to coordinate and minimize the impact of construction on residents, businesses, workers and commuters throughout the Lower Manhattan rebuilding process, announced that they will be conducting a community wide air monitoring program through 2008. This monitoring program, detailed in the press release below, will target particulate matter and occur independently from required air monitoring programs that will operate separately for the many individual projects that will be occurring during the rebuilding.
The LMDC will continue to conduct a separate comprehensive air monitoring program that will be in place throughout the duration of the deconstruction of 130 Liberty Street. To view LMDCs air monitoring plan in the Phase I Deconstruction Plan click here: http://www.renewnyc.com/content/pdfs/130liberty/MayDeconstruction/Ambient_Air_Monitoring_Plan.pdf
LOWER MANHATTAN CONSTRUCTION COMMAND CENTER ANNOUNCES NEW AIR QUALITY MONITORING PROGRAM FOR DOWNTOWN
Command Center to Conduct Program to Help Ensure Environmental Safety of Community Throughout Rebuilding Process
The Lower Manhattan Construction Command Center (LMCCC) will conduct an air quality monitoring program throughout the Lower Manhattan rebuilding process. The program will begin this summer by collecting background data and proceed throughout peak construction activity through 2008, and it will be an important tool to help ensure environmental safety and minimize construction impacts to the downtown community.
The program will be administered by the LMCCC in consultation with the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC), and New York City Department of Environmental Protection (DEP).
As we move forward with the rebuilding of Lower Manhattan, we want to make sure every necessary step is taken to ensure the health and safety of the downtown community, Governor Patakis Chief of Staff John Cahill said. The program will allow us to monitor air quality during construction and take the measures needed to protect our environment. There will be a great deal of construction in Lower Manhattan in the coming months and years, and we will make sure that the community is informed and protected throughout the rebuilding process.
The Construction Command Center will consistently monitor the air quality in Lower Manhattan neighborhoods to ensure that construction projects are not adversely affecting the health of Lower Manhattan residents and businesses, Lower Manhattan Construction Command Center Executive Director Charles Maikish said. Among the major goals of the Command Center is to mitigate the impact of construction on the Lower Manhattan community, including monitoring air quality, and to assure that project sponsors carry out their environmental performance commitments during construction.
Department of Environmental Conservation Acting Commissioner Denise M. Sheehan said, "DEC is proud to partner with State and federal agencies to ensure the rebuilding of Lower Manhattan proceeds in an environmentally sound manner. This is one of the most significant projects ever undertaken in New York, and our air monitoring efforts will be an important component to protect the environmental quality and public health in the area around construction activities."
Ensuring the quality of life for the people of Lower Manhattan continues to be a priority as we rebuild, Department of Environmental Protection Commissioner Emily Lloyd said. DEP is supportive of this monitoring effort by the federal, state and local governments.
The LMCCCs monitoring program will help preserve environmental quality and safety through data collection, assessment, and coordination among construction activities. The program will focus on preventing elevated concentrations of particulate matter in surrounding neighborhoods during construction and will inform measures to minimize potential impacts. The LMCCC will analyze both short-term and long-term data throughout the rebuilding process in order to take appropriate mitigation action and enforcement if necessary.
The air monitoring program will consist of fixed air samplers located in the neighborhoods surrounding the sites of major construction activities in Lower Manhattan including the World Trade Center Site redevelopment, the deconstruction of 130 Liberty Street, the Route 9A reconstruction, Fulton Street Transit Center, and the World Trade Center Transportation Hub. The proposed vicinities of the air monitoring locations include: northern Battery Park City/Tribeca, southern Battery Park City, Park Row/City Hall Park, and the Financial District.
The program will begin this summer by collecting background air quality data before full construction of the Lower Manhattan rebuilding projects commences. This background data is necessary for baseline monitoring and comparative purposes once full construction is underway. When major construction begins, the LMCCC will monitor daily and weekly air quality data. The data will be examined to determine any trends or deviations from the baseline conditions. Threshold levels will be established that will trigger further investigatory and/or corrective actions as needed by the LMCCC. Data will be made available to the public on a timely basis.
The LMCCCs air monitoring program is just one part of a comprehensive environmental construction performance plan for Lower Manhattan. The plan also includes project environmental performance commitments such as the use of ultra-low sulfur diesel fuel in off-road construction equipment. Construction sites will be encouraged to use electrically powered equipment instead of diesel powered equipment where practical. Idling times on diesel powered engines will be restricted to three minutes. Dust control measures will be enforced at construction sites, limiting the release of particulate matter. The Command Center will also have ability to monitor and enforce these environmental performance commitments.
Governor Pataki and Mayor Bloomberg created the Lower Manhattan Construction Command Center, to ensure that construction conflicts do not hinder the rebuilding effort, while also minimizing the impact of construction on residents, businesses, workers and commuters. The Construction Command Center will serve as a one-stop shop for information and advisories on construction activities, traffic rerouting, and other important topics.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/06/04/nyregion/04stadium.html
ALBANY, June 3 - Supporters of a proposed West Side stadium postponed a crucial vote on its construction on Friday, shortly after Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver signaled his intention to vote against it. The delay threw the stadium's fate back onto Albany's murky trading floor of favors and promises, and set up an expected frenzied weekend of talks intended to change Mr. Silver's mind. Once again, the project that has become Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg's centerpiece became the subject of negotiations over political needs hundreds of miles apart, from the future of downtown Manhattan after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks to the revival of depressed towns upstate. City and state officials said they were preparing a broad package of incentives to lure businesses back downtown - appealing to Mr. Silver, who has made such an effort his pet project - and a senior aide to Mayor Bloomberg said the administration believed room remained for negotiation and compromise with the speaker. But the enigmatic Mr. Silver, who with Gov. George E. Pataki and Senate Majority Leader Joseph L. Bruno holds veto power over the project - declined to show his hand in a day of high-stakes brinksmanship. Early in the day, he scheduled a 1 p.m. news conference at ground zero, a clear signal to stadium supporters that he planned an announcement to disappoint them. The possibility of such an announcement clearly shook Mr. Bloomberg and Mr. Pataki, who were more accustomed to hearing Mr. Silver say he still had reservations or unanswered questions about the football stadium. On Thursday, both men had made it clear they would brook no delay in the vote by the little known Albany panel, controlled by Mr. Pataki, Mr. Silver and Mr. Bruno. "The meeting will be held tomorrow," Mr. Pataki said on Thursday. Mr. Bloomberg said, "We've run out of time."