Lead, Asbestos, and Ignorance
Apparently, the previous owners of what is now Sully’s has to pay $62,500 for trying to remove asbestos pipes before it was sold. “E & E’s (deli) actions jeopardized the safety of both the public and untrained asbestos removal workers”. On Saturday we learned that Peoria had been given a gift of $3,000,000 to help out with lead abatement programs.
When we were looking to get the exterior of our house repainted several years ago, I asked the fellow that we were hiring about lead paint. We had young children and didn’t want lead paint chips all over the place. Who better to ask about lead paint than a painter! He told me that he had used bleach on a previous house and it worked very well. I found empty beer cans in my garage (Milwaukee’s Best, or something equally cheap) and my wife had to keep the blinds closed because he kept peering in. It eventually took the Peoria Police Department to force him to leave and never come back. Ok, he was an idiot, and I was an idiot for hiring him. He got my deposit, but no more. We had to scrape off his half-ass job a couple years later and repaint it outselves. His name was Bob Herman. Stay away.
I’m a firm believer in education. You’ll never get all of the asbestos out of the schools or older buildings, and you’ll never get all the lead out of all the old houses. It’s just not possible on a large scale, no matter how much money you throw at it. BUT- knowing when it is nescessary for removal and when it is not, and more-so, understanding how to control it is critical. That’s where the money should go. Educating the idiots.
September 19th, 2006 at 8:42 pm
Hey, don’t dis Milwaukee’s Best!
September 20th, 2007 at 7:20 am
Well, it has been a years since the City has received $3,000,000, for the purpose of Lead Abatement, yet the City/County Health Department has yet to produce an effective force, prepared to address this now funded, environmental health issue facing our community’s youth (especially African American).
After speaking with the leadership (PCCHD) of the issue, Two things are clear to me.
1. PCCEO has not served the community as best as it could have, in the field of Lead Abatement. WEPAC, Inc. (my organization) has been and will continue to advocate for the environmental safety of our area children, regardless of obstacle presented by PCCEO.
2. Perhaps the Peoria City County Health Department is in over it’s head, in dealing with this issue alone, without the city, and the areas foremost authority on Lead Abatement Information, registered with and approved by the Illinois Deptment of Public Health, that being WEPAC, Inc-Peoria.
3. Transparency and accountabilty are key in addressing this issue. The business as usaul and small democracy approaches that have been leveled against WEPAC, in the past will not produce an outcome acceptable to recieve federal funding, once the feds start to audit programs here in Peoria.
Wake up and smell the roses, Peoria. Hey, Mr. Mayor.
WEPAC, Inc.