Lead Czars Appointed

GALVESTON — Galveston has a new lead task force, and members promise to be more effective than their predecessors.

Community leaders formed the task force Monday after listening to a presentation from Winifred J. Hamilton, the Baylor College of Medicine researcher who recently authored a study about Galveston’s problems with lead contamination.

Creating a group to drive the island’s lead remediation efforts was one of 14 recommendations Hamilton made at the end of her study, which was paid for by the Kempner Fund.

Ben Raimer, a pediatrician who also serves as the head of community health services for the University of Texas Medical Branch, said he thought support from local agencies would make the current efforts successful.

“I absolutely think the momentum is there to make a difference,” said Raimer, who was appointed as the task force’s co-chair. “The stars are more aligned than they were before.”

Community leaders and parents formed a similar group 15 years ago after several well-publicized cases of lead poisoning prompted the city to admit it had a lead problem. The group successfully helped pass an ordinance that controls the methods used to remove exterior paint, one source of lead contamination.

But the group’s efforts fizzled soon afterward, and lead issues have been on the back burner until now.

While other cities around the country have successfully lowered the numbers of children testing positive for elevated blood lead levels during the last 15 years, Galveston’s numbers have remained the same at about 20 percent.

Pamela Diamond, director of community outreach at the medical branch’s center for environmental health and medicine, was part of the previous task force.

“I woke up this morning thinking, please God don’t let us walk out of this room and do nothing,” she said at Monday’s meeting, which was attended by representatives from the medical branch, the Galveston County Health District, the city, the Galveston Independent School District and several local poverty relief organizations.

Most attendees agreed the task force needed to work toward getting universal lead testing for all island children, but Diamond said local landlords were the real problem.

Hamilton’s research, which created a map predicting which island properties were most likely to have lead contamination, found that 20 percent of poisoned children lived in properties owned by just 12 landlords.

Hamilton declined to release the list of property owners, although she has said she would support making the information public. She plans to give the list to the health district in the next few weeks.

Mark Guidry, health district chief executive and Raimer’s co-chair on the task force, said he would consider releasing the list if it would be legal and helpful.

“Any time there’s a health threat, we need to inform the public,” he said. “As this task force gets together, if everyone thinks that’s part of the solution, we will consider it.”

Independently of the task force, city officials are researching their options for controlling sources of lead contamination.

Assistant City Manager Brandon Wade said last week it was obvious the city’s lead-based paint ordinance had not been effective.

Wade said he asked the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality and the Texas Department of State Health Services to refer him to other cities in the state with effective lead ordinances.

“Their response was nothing in Texas,” he said. “They referred me to Chicago, New York and San Francisco. We would almost have to start from scratch.”

Cities such as Baltimore require rental properties be certified lead safe each time a new tenant moves in, an example of stiff regulations Wade said might be hard to get enacted in Galveston.

“My fear is that anything the city could regulate would be so intrusive into everyone’s lives that it may not be tolerable,” he said. “Without another city having blazed a trail for us, we must do a significant amount of research. Then we must visit with the policymakers to see what is feasible."