Valerie Watnick is a professor at Baruch College, teaching environmental and business law, and is a past Co-PTA President of PS 199 in Manhattan. She has written about the dangers of PCBs. This is her third update for Insideschools.org about the efforts to rid New York City schools of PCBs and other environmental dangers.

Parents and advocates have been mobilizingin the wake of the city's February 23 announcement that it would take ten years to replace PCB containing light ballasts in all the New York City schools. The City Council will hold a hearing on April 13, with parents expected to turn out in mass to protest the ten-year timeline.

PCBs are polychlorinated bi-phenols that were widely used in construction from the 1940s until they were banned in 1978. They are believed to be carcinogenic, immuno-toxic and to have a host of other ill health effects, including a relationship to depressed IQ.

The Regional Administrator of the EPA, Judith Enck, said that ten years is too long to take these contaminated light ballasts out of schools. In a March 11 letter, 41 of 51 members of the City Council  urged the EPA to require the city to act more swiftly to protect children from PCBs commonly found in flourescent light ballasts.

After New York Lawyers for the Public Interest (NYLPI)  issued a Freedom of Information Act Request, the city released previously concealed test resultsfrom a pilot study done last year at several schools. These results indicate that the caulk and ballast tests done in the summer of 2010 showed that many of these PCB levels in schools were above EPA action limits and in serious need of remediation. For example, one test done at PS 199 in Manhattan showed PCB levels in caulking around a classroom sink to have over 86 parts per million, which is above the EPA action level of 50 parts per million.  New York Lawyers for the Public Interest said that the city should have been more forthcoming on these test results from the pilot study.  A copy of all of the city’s previously posted test results can be found on the Department of Education's website.

How can parents get involved? Join NYLPI's campaign to free the schools of PCBs, and attend the City Council hearing to make your voice heard: April 13 at 1 p.m., Emigrant Savings Bank, 49-51 Chambers Street in Manhattan.