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Letter from Board of Education - February 5, 2002To Executive Committee, Stuyvesant High School Parents' Association |
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Ladies and Gentlemen: I understand that at a recent meeting of the Executive Committee, you voted 7-6 (a number of votes that may or may not represent of quorum of your organization - a matter raised here only for your consideration) to sue the Board of Education seeking the installation of HEPA filters at Stuyvesant. I write to provide information that I hope will bear on your ongoing review of this question: 1. Both the school's central air system and all the classroom unit ventilators have been retrofitted to provide better air filtration. These improvements were designed by Burns and Roe, were completed on January 22, and employ the best of four filters that were tested. Your expert, Howard Bader, has a copy of the report that Burns and Roe prepared for us. 2. The environment in the school has been excellent since December 15, and particularly so since the retrofitting. As you know, we have been conducting rigorous environmental testing at Stuyvesant (and the other schools affected by September 11), at a cost of $30,000 per week per school. The recent results have been enormously encouraging. Specifically: a. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) standard for asbestos in areas populated by children is 70 structures per square millimeter. There have been almost no structures detected in Stuyvesant since we began testing shortly after 9/11. The last date on which any structures were detected was December 7, when the reading was 22.24 (one fiber was found), well below the children's standard of 70. b. The EPA's recommended standard for "respirable particulates" (dust) applicable to "sensitive" individuals is 40 micrograms per cubic meter of air (evaluated as an area's average reading over a 24-hour period). The standard applicable to those not in a "sensitive" category is 65. Our consultants are taking over one hundred respirable particulate readings per day in and around Stuyvesant. On only two days since December 15 were there any readings from within the school that exceeded the "sensitive" standard of 40 (60 such readings on Jan. 15, and two such readings on Jan. 28), and on only one of these days did any readings exceed the higher standard of 65 (three such readings on Jan. 15). Since December 15, on every day except January 15 and 28, there have been no readings within Stuyvesant exceeding 40, despite the multiple days on which there were higher readings outside. With the exception of a single anomalous day (Jan. 15), the issue of respirable particulate matter in Stuyvesant appears to have been completely resolved. In other words, the filtration system currently in place is doing its job exceedingly well. c. The data in the above paragraphs, and more, are set forth in a report to the Board of Education from ATC Associates, dated February 5, which includes data from September 21 through February 4. A copy of the report has been faxed to your consultant, Mr. Bader. I will be pleased to provide copies of this report to any of you who may want one. Just call my office (718-935-5210), ask for the February 5 ATC report, and provide a fax number. 3. We understand that you have been misinformed that the expense for the HVAC retrofitting work will be reimbursed by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). This is not so. FEMA has advised us that they will reimburse us only for work done to return the schools to the condition they were in prior to September 11, but not for any improvements or modifications. 4. We also understand that the President of the Parents' Association discussed with the Robin Hood Foundation the possibility of the foundation funding the installation of HEPA filters, but that this proposal was not pursued because the project was deemed impractical. This conclusion is consistent with everything we have been told by the experts we have consulted. HEPA filtration is designed for very localized settings such as hospital emergency rooms. We are unaware of it ever having been employed throughout a building nearly as large as Stuyvesant. Even if we were to attempt to employ it in such an unprecedented context as Stuyvesant, it is impossible to retrofit the building's current HVAC system to accommodate HEPA filtration. Rather, an entirely new HVAC system would need to be installed - a process that would take many months (the experts estimate from 12 to 24 months) and would entail a very disruptive construction process throughout the school. And after all this the system likely would not be effective, as HEPA filtration is not designed for use in unsealed settings. 5. We have not been given an opportunity to review your proposal. Before you file suit, we ask that you permit us to review the proposed relief you would be seeking, and the reason(s) you believe it necessary, so our experts can evaluate its feasibility and we can attempt to reach an accommodation without the cost and distraction of litigation. Yours sincerely, David Klasfeld, Deputy Chancellor for Operations Cc: Chancellor Harold Levy |
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