News Coverage
Group seeks funds to fight lead poisoning
Published May 8, 2004
A coalition of environmental and children's health groups is trying to persuade Congress to reject President Bush's proposed 20 percent cut in a federal lead poisoning prevention program.
The coalition says instead of cutting the program's budget, Congress should increase it from $174 million to $200 million. The coalition includes the Children's Defense Fund and the Alliance for Healthy Housing.
The number of lead-poisoned children has diminished significantly in the past decade because of national efforts to eliminate lead hazards in housing and other buildings. But more than 400,000 American children suffer from lead poisoning, coalition officials said.
The rates of lead poisoning are particularly high among low-income, minority children, and children in urban areas,they said.
"If funding for the program is cut, more children will be left behind due to the effects of lead poisoning, which diminishes the ability to think, concentrate, and make progress in school," said Emil Parker, director of the health division of the Children's Defense Fund.
At issue is funding for the federal Office of Healthy Homes and Lead Hazard Control, which is part of the Department of Housing and Urban Development. This year the program has a budget of $174 million, most of which is given out in grants for lead "abatement" efforts.
The HUD program is the main national vehicle for eliminating lead paint hazards in private housing, the most common cause of childhood lead poisoning. An estimated 39 million U.S. homes contain lead paint; 25 million of those homes have significant lead hazards, said Don Ryan, executive director of the Alliance for Healthy Housing.
HUD leaders have said their goal is to eliminate childhood lead poisoning by 2010. In HUD's proposed fiscal 2005 budget, Bush administration officials said the Lead Hazard Control program is "the central element of the President's effort to eradicate childhood lead-paint poisoning."
Still, Mr. Bush recommended only $139 million for the program for fiscal 2005. HUD spokesman Brian Sullivan noted that that was more than the $136 million Mr. Bush requested for this year, but acknowledged that it was far less than the $174 million approved by Congress.
Mr. Sullivan said HUD officials would not be upset if Congress decided to increase the President's proposed $139 million for fiscal 2005, which begins Oct. 1.
"When Congress gives us more money, we're not going to turn it down," he said. Mr. Bush also proposed a decrease in the budget of the Lead Risk Prevention Program, which is part of the Environmental Protection Agency. Mr. Bush's proposal would cut funding for the program from $15 million to $11 million.
Mike Oricko, director of environmental health for the Toledo/Lucas County Health Department, said the city just won a $3 million HUD grant that will make a "huge difference" in its anti-lead efforts.
"It's a very, very important grant for us," Mr. Oricko said. "It enables us to go out and do much more work in lead abatement. The city of Toledo has a lot of older housing stock; so this is a serious issue for us."
The city had one full-time and one part-time lead inspector. With the grant, the city will double that staff, and hire a nurse to help increase the number of low-income children screened for lead poisoning, Mr. Oricko said.
Most of the HUD money recently awarded to Toledo will be used to do lead abatement in low-income housing, Mr. Oricko said. "The way to deal with the problem is to do lead abatement. What we don't want to do is just move kids out of the housing, because that way the problem still exists.
"We do want to make sure that kids with lead problems get into the health system and get appropriate treatment and counseling, but we've also got to deal with the housing stock."
A recent study by the Environmental Working Group in Washington found that Lucas County ranked fourth among Ohio counties for the estimated number of lead-poisoned children.
Using figures from the Centers for Disease Control, the Ohio Department of Health, and the U.S. Census Bureau, the report found an estimated 996 lead-poisoned children in Lucas County. But only 16 percent of the children in the county had been screened for lead poisoning, according to the report.
Overall, only one of every seven children ages 1 through 5 in Ohio was tested for blood lead levels in 2002, despite recommendations by medical groups for universal screening of young children, the report said.
Mr. Parker, the health division director for the Children's Defense Fund, said that "barring greater action on our part," he's doubtful that childhood lead poisoning can be eliminated by 2010, especially if federal funding is cut.
"It can be eradicated. Probably not by 2010, but within the foreseeable future," Mr. Parker said.