This letter was sent from Jennifer deNicola of Malibu Unites to the SMMUSD Board of Education, addressed to Superintendent Sandra Lyon.
Dear Superintendent Lyon and SMMUSD BOE,
The school year has ended and parents need to have a clear picture of what’s going on at our schools. The EPA rejected Environ’s PCB plan. The EPA gave Environ until July 4 to submit a MHS-specific plan to address PCBs—a plan that will hopefully investigate, test and remediate PCB material that violate federal law or are health hazards. Based on new timelines, PCB testing and remediation will likely not occur this summer. We request you get portable classrooms for the Middle School students for this August. Our children and teachers should not be exposed to PCBs one day longer.
By the time Environ submits a plan for MHS and this new plan is reviewed by the EPA, the public, and Malibu Unites, it will be August. Environ will then have to make changes and resubmit, which will lead us to mid-August or later, hopefully with an agreed upon plan.
We have received the summer calendar for Best Management Practices (BMP) cleaning. While cleaning, is vital to the overall hygiene of our schools (and our schools are in desperate need of cleaning). Kent Thomas at EPA’s Office of Research and Development has indicated, “No scientific measurement data [has been] collected on the effectiveness of [BMP] cleaning, how often it needs to be done, and how to ensure it is done effectively for reduction in the potential for PCB exposures.” BMP will not protect our children from PCB exposure; only full remediation will ensure that.
The SMMUSD Board of Education must direct Environ to test sources of PCBs and remove them. Leaving them in place is harmful to humans and will require continuous air and wipe testing. For example, a Connecticut School had to pay approximately $50,000 quarterly for continuous testing, mandated by the EPA. This district decided spending $200,000 per year was neither a good financial decision nor a good long-term solution. It puts a very expensive Band-Aid on a serious health problem.
The way to effectively solve the PCB problem at MHS is to test all the sources now and remove them. Testing all sources is required by law before BB’s demolition of the library building, so why not just do this now? Measure BB bond clearly states that it is a “Safety and Repair Measure to improve health, safety and class instruction.” This bond should reallocate funds to rebuild the library building as planned and remediate or rebuild building E to ensure a healthy environment for students and teachers.
The best strategy for the district to reduce its liability is by fully investigating for PCBs and other toxicants, test all sources and disclose all results to parents and staff. Then parents and staff can decide for themselves what is an acceptable risk for their children and themselves, thus removing any further liability by the district, since parents have all the information necessary to make their own educated choice.
Based on the four months spent preparing an inadequate PCB plan that was rejected by the EPA, and that did not address TSCA requirements or provide further investigation for PCBs in our school, the following question must be posed: What specific experience does Environ or any of its employees have with PCBs in schools? According to Steve Armann at the EPA, MHS is the first school in California to deal with PCBs. Environ’s extremely inadequate plan seems neither born from experience nor intended to fully investigate and identify the PCB problem at our school, which questions Environ’s experience and intention to protect our children and their teachers.
I reiterate: Now is the time to order portable units for the middle school students for next school year. As we have said many times before, children should not be exposed to cancerous toxicants and classrooms that are in violation of federal law, until those rooms are remediated.
I look forward to finding a mutually beneficial solution for all stakeholders involved. We have all spent a great deal of time and energy dedicated to ensuring our children and teachers will no longer be exposed to harmful toxicants.
The head of EPA Region 9 will meet with Malibu Unites at Malibu High for a tour of campus on Friday, June 20, at 11:45 a.m.