0001
 1   ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY
 2       LEAD-BASED PAINT HEARING
 3           March 29th, 2006
 4           Washington, D.C.
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0002
 1        MS. DOA:  Good afternoon.  I think we're about
 2   ready to get started.  My name is Maria Doa.  I'm
 3   the Director of EPA National Program Chemical
 4   Solution which is the lead division for EPA's Lead
 5   Paint Program and here with me today starting at my
 6   right is Aquanetta Dickens who's the Chief of Toxics
 7   Programs and enforcement in region three.  Demian
 8   Ellis who's the region three Regional Coordinator
 9   and Julie Simpson who's the Chief of the Lead Heavy
10   Metal and Inorganic branch here at EPA.
11             I'd like to welcome you to the public
12   meeting on EPA's Lead Renovation/Repair Painting
13   Program Proposed Rule.  This is the second in four
14   public meetings we're holding around the country and
15   we look forward to hearing your comments on the
16   proposed rule.
17             Your comments are critical in ensuring
18   that we develop a good final rule that's both
19   protective and practical.  This rule is an important
20   component of the federal government's strategy in
21   getting to our goal and as important maintaining the
22   goal once we get there of eliminating childhood lead
0003
 1   poisoning.
 2             The comment period closes on April 10th.
 3   We've received a number of requests to extend the
 4   comment period and one comment that the comment
 5   period should not be extended.  The EPA is in the
 6   process of reviewing these.  If it decides the
 7   comment period is to be extended, we will announce
 8   that in a Federal Register notice on or before April the 10th.
 9   And we'll also post it on our website.
10             Again, I'd like to thank you for taking
11   the time to come and participate in the public
12   meeting and we do really look forward to hearing
13   your comments.  I'll turn it over to Julie Simpson.
14        MS. SIMPSON:  Just for the benefit of anyone who
15   isn't familiar with the federal rule making process,
16   after we publish a proposed rule we have a period
17   when we take public comment, we have a docket that's
18   open where people can submit written comment.
19             In addition, the remarks of everyone who
20   is speaking today are being prescribed by a court
21   reporter and the transcript will go into the written
22   record.  So also if you have any written materials
0004
 1   with you that you want to submit to the docket you
 2   can give them to Amy Mortimer or to Pujan at the
 3   back.  They're helping us today, they're with ICF
 4   Consulting and they're taking care of the logistics
 5   for us.  In order to make sure that we allow
 6   everyone time to speak, we've asked that everyone
 7   limit their remarks to a maximum of 10 minutes.  Amy
 8   will be calling the speakers who have registered and
 9   she'll be there to let you know if you start to
10   exceed your time limit.  Pujan in the back can
11   direct you to any facilities you may need to locate
12   in the building.  Any questions from the room?
13   Let's get started.
14        MS. MORTIMER:  The first person up is Olivia
15   Farrow.  After that Dennis Livingston.
16        MS. FARROW:  Good afternoon.  I am Olivia Farrow
17   Assistant Commissioner of the Environmental Health
18   Division with the Baltimore City Health Department.
19   I welcome this opportunity to support strong
20   mandated federal regulations to reduce exposure to
21   lead hazards created by renovation, repair or
22   painting activities that disturb lead-based paint.
0005
 1   With 20 million remodels each year in housing with
 2   lead hazard conditions, the nation's children are in
 3   need of further protection from this environmental
 4   hazard.
 5             We are well aware that childhood lead
 6   poisoning is the most common environmental hazard
 7   facing American children.  We are also aware that
 8   lead-based paint within the home has long been
 9   recognized as the leading cause of lead poisoning in
10   our children.  Therefore, removing lead-based paint
11   hazards from the home is an essential measure to
12   prevent further poising.  Lead hazard reduction
13   properly completed is extremely beneficial and may
14   reduce exposure.
15             However, if the lead hazard reduction is
16   improperly carried out the repair and remodeling can
17   cause a significant elevation of blood lead levels
18   in children.  One case reported that got national
19   attention regarding the hazards of remodeling and
20   renovation in lead hazard homes is the Marino case
21   named after the physician who treated the family.
22   Workers used rotary power sanders, hand sanders,
0006
 1   scrapers, torches, heat guns and chemical paint
 2   strippers to compete the renovation of this house.
 3   Dust was prevalent throughout all rooms.  As a
 4   result four cases of childhood lead poisoning and
 5   two cases of adult lead toxicity were identified.
 6   Initial blood lead levels in the children ranged
 7   from 56 to 87 micrograms per deciliter.  All four
 8   required chelation therapy.  The Marino case is just
 9   one of the many cases of serious lead poisoning
10   still occurring throughout the country.
11             In Baltimore City a family was referred to
12   the Baltimore City Health Department's Childhood
13   Lead Poisoning Program in September 2004 after
14   significant home renovations in 2000 had resulted in
15   a child's blood lead level of 18 micrograms per
16   deciliter.  In another example a couple moved to
17   Baltimore City with their one-year-old child in
18   2005.  The couple had their home tested for lead by
19   a private contract and educated themselves on proper
20   renovation procedures for an affected home.  A
21   contract was hired to do the renovations which
22   included removing walls and window replacement.  The
0007
 1   family remained in the property while the renovation
 2   was being completed.  By the time the child was
 3   referred to the Baltimore City Health Department's
 4   Childhood Lead Poisoning and Prevention Program on
 5   September 16th, 2005 the child had a blood lead
 6   level of 19 micrograms per deciliter.
 7             In another example, a family that rented
 8   an apartment in the Fells Point area found their
 9   child had a blood lead level of 25 micrograms per
10   deciliter after the landlord replaced the windows
11   one month prior to the family's arrival.  The
12   landlord had not insured that proper precautions
13   were taken to protect the family against lead dust.
14   The combined efforts of the City Health Department
15   and the Coalition to End Childhood Lead Poisoning
16   resulted in relocating the family to lead-safe
17   housing.  As of February 17th, 2006 the child's
18   blood lead level decreased to 12 micrograms per
19   deciliter from the initial 25.  These are just three
20   cases out of many in one American city.
21             Surveys conducted by HUD estimated that in
22   2000 38 million homes had lead paint and 25 million
0008
 1   had hazardous conditions.  Furthermore, substantial
 2   evidence proves lead paint removal be conducted on
 3   the 30 million homes the danger of a child being
 4   becoming lead poisoned is alarming.  One study found
 5   that refinishing activity performed in dwellings
 6   with lead-based paint was associated with an average
 7   of 69 percent increase in the blood lead level of
 8   the 249 infants living there.  Another study of 370
 9   recently lead poisoned children found a significant
10   association between renovation activity and elevated
11   blood lead level existed.
12             The Centers for Disease Control reported
13   that findings from a study in New York state
14   suggested that home renovation and remodeling was an
15   important source of lead exposure among children in
16   New York during 1993 to 1994.
17             The majority of Baltimore City homes were
18   built prior to 1950.  As Baltimore City continues to
19   experience an explosion in residential
20   redevelopment, the risk of lead poisoning of small
21   children becomes even greater.  Federal leadership
22   in regulating renovation and repair work in affected
0009
 1   properties would help stop preventable lead
 2   poisoning.
 3             While the EPA is taking greater steps in
 4   providing protection to children and homes under
 5   renovation, the Baltimore City Health Department
 6   would like to see the proposed rule go even further.
 7   We strongly urge that EPA, number one, make the
 8   proposed rule applicable to all homes whether a
 9   child resides in the property or not.  The proposed
10   rule would initially only impact homes where
11   children have been identified with elevated blood
12   lead levels.  We think that proposal is wrong and
13   allows the continuation of the poisoning of our
14   children.  We have seen the evidence in the City of
15   Baltimore that many young children spend several
16   hours each day with family, friends.  At any point a
17   property not currently occupied by a child may
18   become so for a variety of reasons.  Number two, we
19   strongly urge that EPA eliminate the waiver whereby
20   a renovator can seek a signed statement from the
21   owner stating that a child does not reside at the
22   property thus avoiding the obligation to comply with
0010
 1   the proposed rule.  We must make all the homes safe
 2   for all children whether residing or visiting in a
 3   property.  A home while not a permanent residence
 4   for a child may serve as a secondary residence.  And
 5   thirdly, we strongly urge that EPA impose stiff
 6   penalties for renovators who failed to comply with
 7   the new rule and direct those penalties or a portion
 8   thereof into the recognized lead abatement programs
 9   of the jurisdiction in which the violation occurred.
10   The need for financial assistance with lead
11   abatement is a continuing need for many struggling
12   homeowners who own old and historic housing in
13   cities like Baltimore.  I would like to concluded by
14   saying that this country has made tremendous
15   progress in the fight to eliminate childhood lead
16   poisoning, but we still have much to do to eliminate
17   this problem by 2010.
18             Promulgating strong federal regulations
19   regarding renovating and repairing affected homes is
20   a key step.  On behalf of Baltimore City's Health
21   Department I thank you for the opportunity to
22   present our comments to the Agency.
0011
 1        MS. DOA:  Thank you.
 2        MS. MORTIMER:  Next, Jane Malone.
 3        MS. MALONE:  Good afternoon.  My name is Jane Malone.
 4   I work for the Alliance for Healthy Homes.  The
 5   alliance is submitting for the record four reports
 6   from work groups of advocates, researchers and
 7   others covering proposed rules, deficiencies
 8   regarding clearance, dangerous work practices,
 9   qualifications and training and enforcement.  These
10   important views reflect thoughtful deliberations by
11   many persons over the past few months.  We urge EPA
12   serious consideration of these recommendations.  I'm
13   going to just give copies to you.
14             Secondly, the Alliance is the party that
15   submitted the comments asking EPA to not
16   extend the rule making period and I just want to
17   clarify that our interest is in seeing this rule
18   move forward and we really believe that no further
19   amount of study by outside parties is going to add
20   to the factual record here and really make a case
21   for changes in the rule that we don't already know
22   need to be changed.  So I'd just like to reiterate
0012
 1   we would ask EPA to stick to the schedule and not
 2   extend the deadline.
 3             Let's consider all the lost IQ points and
 4   the missed teachable moments experienced by young
 5   children denied the opportunity to thrive in school,
 6   in the workplace, in life because they were
 7   needlessly exposed to excessive amounts of lead,
 8   after sloppy renovation work and paint jobs that
 9   were left room clean.  Hopefully the final
10   renovation and remodeling rule will help the U.S.
11   render childhood lead poisoning history.  The
12   Alliance for Healthy Homes is the preeminent voice
13   for advocacy to prevent childhood lead poisoning.
14   Our work enabled the passage of the 1992 legislation
15   that crystalized the bi-partisan consensus
16   commitment to mandate lead safety across the U.S.
17   including the prevention of exposure to lead fro
18   renovation and remodeling work.
19             The Alliance commends the EPA for the
20   development and proposal of a rule that requires
21   trained personnel to adhere to containment and clean
22   work practices in renovation and repair of pre-1970
0013
 1   housing.  However, the Alliance is deeply
 2   disappointed that EPA's proposed rule that, One,
 3   fails to require adherence to proven health
 4   protective performance standards which are
 5   refraining from the use of extremely dangerous work
 6   practices and collecting dust wipe samples for lab
 7   analysis to check for lead safety at the end of the
 8   job; Two, is a poor match with how most painting
 9   and renovation work is conducted and particularly
10   supervised; and, Three, promotes unproven cleaning,
11   quote, verification procedures that add incremental
12   costs better invested in clearance, mislead
13   consumers by creating false sense of security and
14   add not a whit of protection from exposure to lead
15   whatsoever.
16             We believe that the flaws in the proposed
17   rule are not indicative of EPA's misapprehension of
18   the science or unawareness of proven practices or
19   overall vacation from reality, but rather political
20   imperative to accommodate the Executive Branch's
21   consultation with and deference to proponents of the
22   renovation industry.  It's now time for
0014
 1   scientifically proven approaches, common sense and
 2   principles of public health to prevail, otherwise
 3   painting and renovation work will indeed become more
 4   expensive as the painters and renovators fear but
 5   the way they conduct business will fail to protect
 6   children.  And federal policy will have failed to
 7   protect the painters and renovators from liability
 8   problems.  This is a lose-lose proposition.
 9             Concerns about costs have always been a
10   factor of advocacy of lead poisoning prevention.
11   Health and housing advocates care deeply about
12   housing affordability and completely agree with
13   construction and real estate interests that the
14   incremental cost of lead safety must be kept to an
15   absolute minimum.  The feasibility of adoption of new
16   requirements depends whether the approach is
17   workable and practical.  Yet we're not convinced of
18   the relative merits of the proposed approach by the theoretical
19   estimates of cost for selected approaches that have
20   been presented in the economic analysis.
21             Because the administration prematurely
22   dismissed consideration of alternatives there are no
0015
 1   estimates documented in the docket for the
 2   incremental cost of refraining from uncontrolled
 3   power sanding or picking up dust wipes and sending
 4   them to a lab.  Instead the proposal promotes a
 5   white glove test characterized as cleaning
 6   verification and estimates that performing this test
 7   costs around seven dollars.
 8             Further, public health tradeoffs have
 9   resulted from the Agency's failure during its
10   deliberations and consultations subsequent to the
11   2000 panel report to transparently communicate about
12   its plans with experts in the health effects of lead
13   exposure, despite statutory requirement for
14   consultation with those knowledgeable about health
15   effects.  As a result the rule falls far short of
16   protecting children as well as the progeny of
17   pregnant women and other females of child bearing
18   age from needless exposure to lead.  Instead,
19   there's a checkoff form encouraging homeowners to
20   save money by declaring no child under six is
21   present.  Any exemption from these requirements as
22   our colleague said is dangerous because future
0016
 1   occupants and visitors may include vulnerable
 2   persons.  If there is to be no exemption under the
 3   theory that new owners friends, neighbors and
 4   relatives are invulnerable the exemption should be
 5   expanded to cover women of child bearing age.
 6   Ideally there would be no exemption whatsoever.
 7             Similarly, the scope of the rule misses
 8   the obvious opportunity to protect children in child
 9   occupied facilities, let alone begin to address
10   other public and commercial buildings by covering their
11   exterior renovation.
12             We are encouraged the EPA responded to
13   advocacy by expediting this rule and are hopeful a
14   final rule will be promulgated by the end of
15   calendar 2006, but the decision to expedite a rule
16   that is nine years overdue does not obviate EPA's
17   obligation to consult with parties in the regulated
18   industry.  There's still time to meet the statutory
19   requirement in deliberations prior to final rule
20   making.
21             The Agency completes due diligence by
22   giving full attention to the responses of those not
0017
 1   thoroughly consulted heretofore, the public health
 2   community, community based organizations and other
 3   advocates, full accountability to meet statutory
 4   requirement demands health experts views be fully
 5   considered, since proponents of the remodeling and
 6   abatement industries have already had their say.  I
 7   will be submitting further comments through the
 8   docket.  Thank you.
 9        MS. MORTIMER:  Dennis Livingston is on and Tom
10   Neltner's up after him.
11       MR. LIVINGSTON:  Thank you for the opportunity to make this
12   presentation.  I'm presenting from the point of view
13   of a contractor.  I've been a contractor my whole
14   life.  And one of the criticisms of this rule has
15   been that this will make a burden on contractors and
16   I wanted to speak to the fact that this will be the
17   exact opposite.  This will be a tremendous benefit
18   to contractors, particularly to the small
19   contractors.  The vast majority of work that's done
20   in this country on old houses, as far as maintenance
21   goes, is not done by large, above-ground, certified
22   insured contractors.  The vast majority of the
0018
 1   maintenance work, the painting work and the rehab
 2   has been work that is done by small neighborhood
 3   based contractors.  It's those contractors that we
 4   want to put at an advantage.  We want to give them
 5   the knowledge and the skills and the marketing
 6   capacity to be able to compete in the field, do the
 7   work right and do the work safely both for occupants
 8   and for the workers.
 9             I'm author of the book that HUD
10   distributed to every main library in the country and
11   the major author to the book distributed by HUD
12   around lead.  So as a contractor I've been very
13   interested in translating trade information into
14   comprehensible words that contractors can really
15   understand and the workers can.
16             As a small contractor what I want -- I
17   don't mind if I'm told to do something like send my
18   workers to one-day training, as long as my
19   competition is required to do the same.  I don't
20   like to compete on price.  I don't want to undercut
21   my competition because those low prices hurt me.
22   What I want is to be able to go into a house and say
0019
 1   here is my certificate that says that my company is
 2   certified.  Here are the names of the workers who
 3   will be working in the house and record that they
 4   have been trained.  I'm not telling you I'm going to
 5   be low bidder but I am telling you make sure anybody
 6   bidding against me has these pieces of paper or your
 7   house is in jeopardy and your children are in
 8   jeopardy.
 9             Now, I use that marketing strategy for
10   years and I can tell you I was able to get jobs with
11   high bid over and over and over again because my
12   competition came in and they didn't know what the
13   customer was talking about.  Now, eventually my
14   competition began to get that training because this
15   hurts them after awhile of not having this
16   information.  So this is a wonderful opportunity for
17   small contractors to be trained to do the work right
18   and to be competitive in their field.  This is not a
19   burden.
20             Secondly, there isn't such a thing as
21   supervisors.  Whoever is running that job that day
22   is the supervisor.  For small companies if I walked
0020
 1   in and saw somebody standing around and just giving
 2   orders and not using their tools they'd be fired.
 3   This is only large corporations that have these
 4   large crews that have supervisors.  Where you do
 5   have them they may be working four and five jobs,
 6   that means the vast majority of the time they're not
 7   on a job site.  Every single worker in small
 8   contracting companies is the supervisor of
 9   themselves.  There is no system you could create
10   that substitutes conscious trained workers with the
11   right tools and equipment.  You can't do that.  You
12   can do that on large jobs.  On those jobs you can
13   have a supervisor who's breathing down your neck
14   every minute.  That works.  That's not where
15   children are being poisoned.  Children are being
16   poisoned in these small jobs where workers all of
17   whom need to know what to do.
18             The other thing is these workers go from
19   job to job.  When I hire a worker I don't want to
20   give a lesson on how to use a hammer, I expect when
21   they come to the job site that they know this
22   information.  So we need an initial training.  But
0021
 1   workers go from company to company to company.  I
 2   want them to carry a card with them that doesn't
 3   need to be a certification, but basically says they
 4   have the training.  I can then use that as a
 5   criteria for hiring whether I'm hiring somebody for
 6   one job or a long-term job.  For most small
 7   contractors they don't keep on a large crew.
 8   Majority of jobs they're bringing people on and off
 9   and I want all the workers out there to not only
10   have the skills but to basically not poison the
11   people I'm working for.
12             The notion that this mythical supervisor
13   is going to train these mythical workers that they
14   have steadily for one hour is based on unbelievable
15   ignorance of conveying information.  It is
16   absolutely totally impossible to convey this
17   information in an hour.  I've done this training my
18   entire life.  That's not training, that's
19   harassment.  Training means they engage with
20   discussion, they talk with their experience, bring
21   their skills to the table, they demonstrate things,
22   they do things, they put the plastic up, they look
0022
 1   at how to do the window, they work on the door.  The
 2   way that I learned how to do things is with my
 3   hands.  If I was good academically I wouldn't have
 4   become a carpenter and it's true for a lot of
 5   tradespeople.  We learn by doing things.  I can do
 6   something in 10 minutes and remember it forever or
 7   you can tell me about it for two hours and I'll
 8   forget it the next day.
 9             So the crucial thing is to give enough
10   time in this training.  Six hours is the time
11   because I want an hour for taking a break and for
12   lunch and so forth, much more than that I'm not
13   going to be able to focus.  I want three hours,
14   lunch, and another three hours.  And then some spare
15   time on both ends of that.  So the hourly thing is
16   very, very critical.
17             So let me just go through the key points
18   one at a time.  Number one, we don't want to create
19   the myth of formal supervisors.  Whoever is the
20   senior person on that job with the most skill for
21   that particular, on one job I'm the carpenter, I'm
22   in charge.  On another job I'm working where the
0023
 1   painters are working and I'm prepping the wood the
 2   painters in charge.  Whoever is the senior skilled
 3   person on that job's in charge.  We don't have
 4   "supervisors" for the most part, other than the
 5   person that owns the company and we rarely see them.
 6             Number two, I want evidence -- as a
 7   contractor I want evidence people that I'm hiring
 8   have these skills, I would absolutely guarantee you
 9   that there is not a single person in this room that
10   would allow somebody to work with lead in their
11   house who's had one hour training.  Nobody in this
12   room would permit that.  So if nobody would permit
13   that for their own house, then the EPA shouldn't
14   create a rule that permits it for other people's
15   house.
16             Number three, as I said, five hours plus
17   an hour of eating is good because we have to include
18   how to protect a house, how to protect the
19   environment, how to protect the workers, how to
20   protect the occupant of the training is critical.  I
21   did training for HUD a year and a half ago where we
22   did substantial lead work in some rooms where the
0024
 1   family was still in the house.  And my crew had been
 2   trained to create no dust, zero dust.  As a matter
 3   of fact we went in and cleaned the house and during
 4   the course of the training the dust levels dropped.
 5   At the end of our jobs the houses are cleaner than
 6   they were when we got there and they're cleaner than
 7   they were when we got there during the job except in
 8   the areas we're working which are isolated from the
 9   other areas.  That is a valuable skill for
10   tradespeople.  That is something that all of the
11   trade associations should be ecstatic about is
12   having crews to do this.  So the certification is
13   very important.
14             I want the company certified because if
15   the company acts incompetent I want the ability to
16   remove the certification.  I need to give them
17   something I can take away.  There's no reason for
18   the workers to be certified, they just need a little
19   picture card that says they completed the training
20   that they can take with them from job to job.  That
21   should be centralized in some database someplace.
22             Five, obviously the way the rule is
0025
 1   written it makes courses given in a second language
 2   more difficult, obviously the EPA should do the
 3   exact opposite and make courses given in
 4   particularly in Spanish extremely easy.  We want to
 5   make translation, we want to train bilingual people
 6   to be able to give these courses and we want to make
 7   it as inexpensive and simple as possible because at
 8   this point in history an enormous amount of the
 9   tradespeople who are working within the trades,
10   particularly the renovation trades, are Spanish as a
11   first language.
12             And, finally, testing.  If these courses
13   are designed right there's no reason for any
14   tradespeople to ever fail them because what you're
15   doing is you are doing this stuff and the test is
16   doing this stuff.  It shouldn't be an academic test,
17   it should prove that you are able to do these
18   things.  You can't do it in an hour but in a six
19   hour training and so we have the opportunity for
20   people not just to know that they know which is the
21   true or false answer but they're able to put plastic
22   containment on a door, they're able to use this tool
0026
 1   and obviously this training would include those
 2   measures which we are positive poison children, such
 3   as using sanders and burning paint and using toxic
 4   materials that are able to dissolve paint and so
 5   forth.
 6             So it is crucial that no contractor ever
 7   uses those methods ever again because they're
 8   disastrous aside from the fact that they create lead
 9   poisoning.  The key thing is here is that small,
10   regardless of what the large trade associations say,
11   small tradespeople can put this to their advantage.
12   This particularly is helpful for small minority
13   contractors that tend to be locked out of the field
14   because the large suburban contractors are able to
15   have all this large certification training.  We want
16   this training given to every single trades person
17   and every contractor that works in an old house
18   particularly when children are present.  Thank you.
19        MS. MORTIMER:  Tom Neltner.
20        MR. NELTNER:  Thank you for the opportunity to come and
21   talk to you.  My name is Tom Neltner.  I represent
22   the National Center for Healthy Housing and while
0027
 1   you've had many very eloquent people talking about
 2   the rule, I just want to focus on a very narrow
 3   piece of it.
 4             There are 4.3 million events that will be
 5   using lead safe work practices under this rule.
 6   There are 10 million regulated events that are going
 7   to come under scrutiny under this rule.  Unless EPA
 8   is planning a tremendous investment of resources
 9   that it doesn't have, most of those projects are
10   going to go unmonitored.  I doubt that the states
11   and locals are going to have the resources to step
12   up and even visit a fraction of those.
13             What's missing in this rule is the
14   opportunity to deal with the two or three parties
15   that are present at each and every one of the jobs,
16   obviously the renovator, the owner and the occupant.
17   This rule continues the shortcomings of the
18   pre-renovation education rule by just giving the
19   owner and the occupant a generic brochure, but it
20   just gives them the booklet and assumes that that's
21   education.  In fact, the rule's been called
22   pre-renovation education.  That is not education.
0028
 1   EPA's own definition of environmental education by
 2   the Office of Environmental Education says
 3   environmental education increases public awareness
 4   and knowledge about environmental issues and
 5   provides the skills necessary to make informed
 6   decisions and take responsible actions.  It is based
 7   on objective and scientifically sound information.
 8   It does not advocate a particular viewpoint or
 9   course of action, it teaches individuals how to
10   weigh various sides of an issue through critical
11   thinking and enhancing their own problem solving and
12   decision making skills.  Nothing in this rule forces
13   the renovator to communicate to the owner and the
14   occupant the key information they need like did the
15   renovator decide that lead-based paint wasn't
16   present based on a spot test kit.  That's an
17   incredible bit of information.  If a contractor came
18   in and says I don't need to do it because it passed
19   the spot test kit, I'd like to know that.  I'd like
20   to have a right to know that presumption's is being
21   made so I can second guess it, I can ask questions,
22   I can make critical decision, I can be informed.
0029
 1   That's what this rule doesn't do.
 2             Similarly, I think there's some option to
 3   the white glove test, but if that does get into the
 4   final rule there's nothing that documents to the consumer what
 5   happened.  It seems reasonable that either a
 6   photograph of the actual wipe should be shown to the
 7   owner and occupant to say, look, this is what we
 8   did, we passed, let them see it, make their own
 9   decisions.  If they don't like it they can go in and
10   second guess it.  They can go in and check the work.
11   They can say to the contractor you didn't do it
12   right.  I can rub my own wipe there and get all this
13   dirt that you missed.  If we do go with the
14   clearance test which I think is the much better
15   approach there's no requirements that you tell the
16   consumer what happened as a result of the test.  It
17   seems to me imperative that the consumer get told
18   what happened, give them the lab results, the
19   clearance exams.  HUD does that.  The HUD rule
20   requires that this basic information go through.
21             What I'm calling for is that EPA set up
22   the opportunity for environmental education by
0030
 1   enhancing the pre-renovation education so it's more
 2   than just a notice to give the consumer basic
 3   information.  We'll submit written comments on what
 4   that information is, but it's the spot test kit.
 5   It's which rooms are covered by the work areas.
 6   Where's the entrance and the exit.  So if I'm a
 7   homeowner and I see work being done and people are
 8   going out the wrong door I've got a question.
 9             Another one would be how do I contact the
10   certified renovator.  They're not required in this
11   rule to be on site.  It certainly makes sense if I'm
12   the occupant and I see something going on that's
13   wrong I should be able to have a phone number to
14   call.  Again, if you do the white glove test I may
15   want to if I'm a homeowner or consumer or occupant I
16   need to know who I can call on to get an independent
17   clearance exam to double check the work if I've got
18   questions about it.
19             What I'm encouraging in this
20   pre-renovation is that EPA provide basic information
21   about the job, it's a fill-in-the-blank and make
22   sure that that gets filled out.  You heard Dennis
0031
 1   talk about the contractors wanting to take advantage
 2   of this rule.  I feel that unless there's a level
 3   playing field where the contractors who are going to
 4   cut the corners have to say what's going on, those
 5   contractors that are doing the job right are going
 6   to be at a disadvantage.  By making the consumer
 7   educated by actually doing what EPA's own definition
 8   of environmental education calls for you level the
 9   playing field, then you engage the owner and the
10   occupant in overseeing the project to being an extra
11   eyes and ears watching the project.
12             You also need to add post renovation or
13   post renovation repair and painting notice, which is
14   the results.  How many times were the wipes done, how
15   many times do I have to re-clean, did I fail the
16   dust wipe test, did I pass, what's the lab results.
17   That's important because that information should be
18   disclosed and if you don't require it going to the
19   owner and occupant it'll never require the
20   disclosure requirements that HUD has.
21             Recordkeeping.  EPA's got in their
22   requirements recordkeeping.  I actually tried to
0032
 1   fill out that recordkeeping and EPA estimates six
 2   minutes, is how I calculated out five hours, 51
 3   events per year, you can't do it if you're taking
 4   those requirements seriously in six minutes.  It
 5   took me 25 minutes.  What I'm suggesting is rather
 6   than require that contractor to write up a lot of
 7   information and then put it in a file drawer 4.3
 8   million times a year that no one is going to look
 9   at, let's narrow the recordkeeping to just the core
10   elements and make sure that that information gets
11   communicated to the owner and occupant.  So rather
12   than -- I think you can reduce, make clear actually,
13   the recordkeeping requirement so the rule's more
14   enforceable and get that communicated to the owner
15   and occupant.
16             EPA's only planning 12 people to enforce
17   this rule, while you may be able to engage some
18   resources from state and locals who care about it,
19   that's not going to be enough to handle the
20   questions and concerns that come up.  What I believe
21   is that if EPA, no matter what, unless EPA requires
22   an independent clearance exam for each project, if
0033
 1   the consumer, if the owner and occupant have
 2   questions about what happened and they can show
 3   things happened wrong like the plastic wasn't put
 4   down, like they used dry methods and there was no
 5   ventilation, like they left the door open, like they
 6   went out the wrong door and may have tracked it in
 7   the bedroom, that the consumer needs to be able to
 8   in the rule be authorized to be able to tell the
 9   contractor you pay for an independent clearance exam
10   to resolve the questions.  Provide a limited remedy,
11   not exclusive of the oversight that EPA has to do,
12   but to supplement it to say that if there's not an
13   independent clearance exam done that we make sure
14   that that gets done where there's questions about
15   it.  You can write the rule but I think the simpler
16   remedy to make sure you can resolve problems by
17   checking the job instead of having it rise to EPA's
18   attention would make the rule much more enforceable,
19   effective and you're going to have a shot at
20   reaching the 75 compliance rate that's in the rule.
21   Thank you.
22        MS. MORTIMER:  Katrina Korfmacher is up and
0034
 1   Dave Jacobs after that.
 2         MS. KORFMACHER:  I'm Katrina Korfmacher.  I'm Assistant
 3   Professor of Environmental Medicine at the
 4   University of Rochester.  I want to tell you very
 5   briefly how I got into the business of lead.  I
 6   started out life as an environmental policy
 7   scientist.  When I moved to Rochester, my best
 8   friend is a doctor.  She lives in the city of
 9   Rochester.  She had children eight, six, four, she
10   was going to have their porch repainted and I came
11   over one day and saw that there was dust all over
12   the place and the porch was getting remodeled and I
13   said, Lindsey, is there any lead there.  She said,
14   oh, no, I got one of those lead check swabs that you
15   told me about and I checked three layers of paint
16   and I said that's nice, why don't you have your kids
17   checked.  All of them had elevated blood lead
18   levels, all the way up to age nine.  This is a
19   doctor doing a renovation on her own home and if she
20   could feel reassured by a lead check swab and
21   poisoning her own children I really caution you
22   about incorporating that into a federal regulation.
0035
 1             I realized shortly that my friend's story
 2   was not typical of lead poisoning in Rochester,
 3   however.  This is a very poor community with 38
 4   percent of the children living in poverty, 87
 5   percent of housing was built before 1970 and as a
 6   result not surprisingly we have a 25 percent child
 7   lead poisoning rate, some of the neighborhoods it's
 8   over 40 percent.
 9             As people in Rochester became increasingly
10   concerned about this, they realized we have a very
11   weak framework for preventing lead poisoning in New
12   York state.  We became convinced we had to take
13   local action.  So several years ago we began talking
14   about how we could develop a law to prevent lead
15   poisoning in high risk housing in the city.  This is
16   a city that has 3000 abandoned houses that the city
17   can't tear down fast enough and an ongoing and
18   strong debate and fear about adding any regulatory
19   burden or cost to the housing providers here.
20             Even still, when we started considering
21   how we were going to effectively prevent lead
22   poisoning in Rochester there was universal agreement
0036
 1   that all rental housing was going to be targeted,
 2   not just childhood housing.  That was for several
 3   reasons.  A lot of people have multiple homes, they
 4   move frequently or there may be in-home daycares.
 5             The second was fear of discrimination
 6   against families with children.  If you only
 7   focused on housing with children people would be
 8   less inclined to rent or lie about the presence of a
 9   child in that unit.
10             Second, we agreed very strongly that homes
11   with hazards must be fixed by workers who have the
12   training.  That training's going to be required by
13   the City and required by anyone doing that work
14   whether it be the owner or contractor for the owner.
15   And, third, there was strong agreement that after
16   that work is done all homes must have a clearance
17   done in accordance with existing federal standards.
18             There was really very little debate about
19   this.  The property owners and the realtors and the
20   builders who were very concerned about the cost of
21   this law they did not argue one bit about clearance.
22   Part of it's because I ran a direct action project
0037
 1   called Get The Lead Out.  We found a number of homes
 2   that would have easily passed any white glove test.
 3   They looked perfectly clean.  The parents were
 4   excellent housekeepers.  You could have eaten off
 5   the floor but if you did you would have gotten lead
 6   poisoned because lead is sticky, it's invisible and
 7   you can't see it.
 8             We also had recently move to town Reverend
 9   Marlow Washington whose child was poisoned in a
10   parsonage in Rhode Island and that child ended up
11   having to be chelated.  A white glove test would not
12   have protected that child.  These anecdotes combined
13   with the scientific study showing the effectiveness
14   of clearance combined with the fact that it's
15   already a federal regulation means the property
16   owners, contractors, all strongly supported
17   clearance because they knew that's what would
18   protect kids and them from liability in the case of
19   inadvertently poisoning a child.  In a housing market
20   like Rochester it's widely agreed that we can
21   sustain a universal clearance test, other
22   communities can do it too.
0038
 1             If Rochester is willing to go out on a
 2   limb to require clearance, please don't undermine
 3   this by a weaker federal standard that is going to
 4   leave us out there as a community that's tried to do
 5   the brave thing and the right thing and the
 6   scientifically proven thing by saying that a
 7   national standard does not require clearance test.
 8             Finally, after years of debate and lots of
 9   study and a thorough environmental impact statement,
10   testimony from property owners, from scientists,
11   from educators, the City Council in Rochester was
12   flooded with cards from the Greater Rochester
13   Realtors Association asking them to delay the vote.
14   They said we just haven't studied this enough.  We
15   need more time.
16             Now, the cover letter to that message that
17   asked the members to submit that plea for more time
18   said, look, folks, we have to balance children's
19   health against costs, you got to stop this
20   ordinance.  Don't be fooled by a request for an
21   extension.  Our City Council saw right through that
22   request and said, look, our community is committed
0039
 1   to the federal goal of ending childhood lead
 2   poisoning by 2010.  The science we have been
 3   presented is clear the approach is based on federal
 4   standards and it's fiscally responsible.  If we
 5   delay another day we are not going to meet that goal
 6   of ending lead poisoning by 2010.  I'd say the same
 7   principle applies here in order to meet the federal
 8   government's own goal of ending childhood lead
 9   poisoning by 2010 you must adopt a stronger rule
10   now.  Thank you.
11        MS. MORTIMER:  Dave Jacobs, after him Ruth Ann
12   Norton.
13        MR. JACOBS:  Good afternoon.  My name is Dave Jacobs.
14   I'm currently the Research Director at the National
15   Center for Healthy Housing.  I've been doing
16   research in this field for I guess over 20 years
17   now.  Previously served on the faculty of Georgia
18   Tech.  I currently hold faculty appointments at
19   Johns Hopkins University and the University of
20   Illinois at Chicago.
21             I want to step back from the minutia of
22   this rule and basically say, first of all, it's
0040
 1   great to see this rule finally come out.  We've
 2   known for a long time that this demarcation that we
 3   have in this country between formal hazard control
 4   processes and renovation and housing repair is
 5   flawed.  Title 10 basically required us to use
 6   intent as the means of determining which was which
 7   and not really so much that the risks that were
 8   posed by the work.  So this rule holds promise for
 9   breaking down that subjective intent problem and
10   basically allowing the country to make sure that
11   work practices that actually pose substantial risks
12   are properly regulated.
13             My overall response is positive.  This is
14   one of the final rules to come out under Title 10.
15   I assumed that we would use much of the knowledge
16   and the infrastructure and the science that's been
17   generated over the last period of time, that is we
18   would build on the previous work that's been done,
19   but in many respects it seems to me this rule is
20   almost as if we're starting all over again from
21   scratch.  The citizens of this country and EPA and
22   other agencies have made a large investment to get a
0041
 1   lot of the systems in place to make sure this works
 2   well.  My basic message here is let's use what we've
 3   learned.  Let's use that system and not start over
 4   from scratch.
 5             The clearance process is now pretty well
 6   validated.  In fact, EPA itself set up a major
 7   testing program to make sure the results would be
 8   accurate.  We know that wipe sampling correlates
 9   with blood lead level.  We know it teaches
10   contractors to clean up the dust they can't see
11   that's most biologically relevant, that is that
12   poses that greatest risks to children.  It's a
13   simple procedure and costs have plummeted
14   dramatically.  In the '80s it could cause from 35 to
15   50 dollars per sample, to do a dust sample.  Now
16   it's down to about five.  But instead EPA has
17   proposed a new test method which I think is likely
18   to be much more subjective and, furthermore, no one
19   in this field has really been trained to implement
20   it.  It's essentially a visual examination.  The
21   National Center did a study in Maryland that looked
22   at the quality of advice you can get from a visual
0042
 1   examination and we found that 54 percent of the
 2   units passed a visual examination but they failed
 3   the clearance wipe test.
 4             Furthermore, EPA proposed absolutely no
 5   clearance testing process visual or wipe sampling
 6   for carpeted floors.  And how do we protect children
 7   who live in houses that have wall-to-wall carpeting.
 8             It also conflicts with other federal
 9   agencies which will cause confusion in the market
10   place.  And clearance process has been around well
11   before Title 10, used substantially in public
12   housing and the economic analysis submitted by the
13   agency did not even present as an option a monetized
14   estimate of the cost of clearance test.  If there's
15   a cheaper way of doing this I'm all in favor of it.
16   But we can't just decree a new analytical method by
17   regulation.  It has to be based on sound science.
18             Another example is permitting the
19   dangerous methods of removing lead paint.  As you
20   know this is also already banned in federally
21   assisted housing across the country.  I'm a little
22   perplexed that there's even a controversy.  I
0043
 1   couldn't find a single study anywhere in the
 2   literature that showed that these methods could be
 3   done safely.  My very first study in this field was
 4   in the public housing development where they were
 5   burning off lead poisoning and power sanding it.  It
 6   was done with an asbestos-like negative air
 7   containment system.  It didn't work.  The levels of
 8   exposure were enormous.  It was very difficult to
 9   clean it up.
10             There's a estimate in the record that
11   states that this is the only method that can be used
12   in historic housing.  But HUD has never reported a
13   single waiver request and HUD probably does more
14   work in historic properties than any other entity in
15   the country.  In our comments for the docket that
16   we've submitted we show the temperatures produced by
17   propane torches are well above those levels that are
18   likely to produce lead fumes.  So better
19   alternatives exist.  Let's use them.  Let's not
20   create confusion.  I want to point out there is an
21   OSHA regulation that prohibits, it's not the lead
22   regulation, it's another part of the OSHA regs, that
0044
 1   prohibits heating of painted metal.
 2             In general I find that the economic
 3   analysis overestimates the cost and underestimates
 4   the benefits.  Again the cost of paint testing was
 5   not even monetized as a formal option.  It didn't
 6   consider the fact that most paint even in older
 7   housing is not in fact lead paint.  There is no
 8   analysis done of how much it would cost to use
 9   laboratory or x-ray flourescence analyzers and so
10   forth.
11             So we shouldn't -- there are assumptions
12   in the economic analysis that I think are flawed.
13   For example, all pipe replacement is assumed to
14   disturb painted surfaces.  That's not a good
15   assumption.  We know that is not true.  I wouldn't
16   use the prevalence of lead paint anywhere in a room
17   to trigger cost estimates.  Let's use the specific
18   surfaces.  There are concrete estimates of the
19   prevalence of lead paint by the surface type.  We
20   should use those data to inform a better economic
21   analysis.  Those data are contained in the appendix
22   of the president's task force report.
0045
 1             Finally, the benefits should include the
 2   new slope estimate of the relationship between blood
 3   lead and IQ.  EPA is currently using the 1994
 4   Schwartz estimate.  The new estimate is between .6
 5   and .7 IQ points per one microgram per deciliter.
 6   The Schwartz estimate was .25 IQ points.  So this
 7   new estimate which is based on a much more
 8   representative blood lead distribution and also
 9   based on an international pooled analysis that is much
10   more robust.  Your new final economic analysis
11   should use those blood lead estimates so you can
12   properly characterize the benefits.
13             Finally, because this is an
14   inter-generational transfer issue, that is parents
15   are making investments to protect their children, I
16   believe the literature supports a discount rate of
17   one percent, not the three or seven percent that is
18   typically used in these sorts of regulations,
19   especially over the long time horizon that is used
20   in the economic analysis.
21             In closing, I know maybe more than any
22   other witness that will appear before you today how
0046
 1   very difficult it is to get these regulations out.
 2   This is one of those regulations that probably
 3   should have come out decades ago.  So in closing I
 4   want to salute those of you in the Agency for doing
 5   the hard work that's necessary to get this
 6   regulation out so that the children of this great
 7   country can be properly protected.  Thank you.
 8        MS. MORTIMER:  Ruth Ann Norton and Don Ryan.
 9        MS. NORTON:  Good afternoon.  I'm Ruth Ann Norton.  I
10   am the Executive Director of the Coalition to End
11   Childhood Lead Poisoning located in Baltimore,
12   Maryland and market seven states throughout the
13   country.  We do applaud the EPA for putting forth
14   regulations that are long overdue, but we have very
15   serious concerns.
16             Our first concern comes for the protection
17   of pregnant women.  As drafted we're concerned the
18   rule does not adequately protect persons at risk,
19   including pregnant women.  It's most concerning the
20   proposed rule talks about children under the age of
21   six and leaves pregnant women out while pregnant
22   women are classified at risk for lead hazards under
0047
 1   all medical standards.  We believe they must receive
 2   protection.  Our recommendation is to include
 3   pregnant women along with children under the age of
 4   six as the group to receive highest levels of
 5   protection under this program.
 6             Secondly, we're concerned about the
 7   housing units as they would be covered by the rule.
 8   The bifurcated phase-in of the rule we think is
 9   unnecessary and we think it will cause confusion.
10   In phase one the rule would apply to renovations for
11   compensation in all pre-'78 housing where the
12   renovation company receives documentation that a
13   child under six lives in the housing and has an
14   elevated level above 10 micrograms per deciliter or
15   set by state authority.  Then also all pre-'60 owner
16   occupied rental housing properties are under the
17   phase-in.  In the case of owner occupied housing the
18   rule will not apply if the renovation receives a
19   waiver by the owner that no child under six resides
20   in the house.  This is counter productive.  The
21   child under six can visit the owner's property, can
22   get poisoned through that process if they're
0048
 1   spending considerable time on a weekly basis
 2   visiting an aunt's house or friend's house and 
 3   that property will not have come under
 4   your rule.
 5             Our recommendation is to eliminate the
 6   distinction for owner occupied housing and do not
 7   permit waivers even if an owner proves a child under
 8   six doesn't reside in the property.  In Maryland
 9   under our law we require all units to be treated and
10   we did not zero in on units where children under six
11   or residing because we do think that there are a
12   number of children that are poisoned every year in
13   the hundreds if not thousands in our state alone
14   where they're visitors to properties.
15             Also phase two would apply to all rental
16   target housing pre-'78 and owner occupied housing,
17   unless a waiver is mentioned.  The phasing is
18   problematic because it ignores the fact that at
19   least a quarter of the housing units between '60 and
20   '78 contains lead-based paint.  Our recommendation
21   is to eliminate the phase-in process and require
22   renovation procedures for all pre-'78 houses.
0049
 1             Our third area of concern is training,
 2   certification and accreditation.  We just simply
 3   find this inadequate.  We do not find the training
 4   adequate to protect residents of
 5   target housings where renovations are taking place.
 6   Our major concern is that as written the proposed
 7   rule does not require the on-site workers receive
 8   any third-party training before renovation
 9   activities.  We think this is a dangerous path to
10   take.
11             Under the rule the EPA is only requiring
12   that the renovation company doing the work have one
13   person trained as a renovator to act as supervisor
14   during the project but does not require this
15   training renovator to be on-site continuously while
16   the work is being undertaken.  The workers are not
17   required to complete a training course but are
18   permitted to receive on-the-job training from the
19   renovation company's supervisor on lead safe work
20   practices.  We think this is wide open to having
21   faulty training.  Under the proposed rule one
22   renovator can supervisor multiple jobs so they're
0050
 1   not even really assuring on a full-time basis the
 2   safety of any job.
 3             Unsafe work practices can create more of a
 4   hazard than just leaving lead-based paint in place
 5   and if you don't have proper training you can create
 6   a greater hazard.  And the current reality that we
 7   face in the states we work and throughout the
 8   country is that a substantial number of home
 9   improvement work is completed by non-English
10   speaking workers and the proposal to only require
11   on-the-job training we believe will overlook the
12   language barrier and health and safety of those
13   workers and families.  We'll often see in reality
14   the projects that are happening in our neighborhoods
15   and communities where we work that Spanish workers
16   are often trained by English speaking only people
17   and therefore they're really left I think to serious
18   harm for themselves, their children and the work
19   they're doing.
20             Additional concern with the training of
21   the renovator who has to receive third-party training.
22   There's no test or evaluation at the end of this
0051
 1   training.  This is a concern for us because not
 2   requiring any testing to receive the certification
 3   compromises the quality of training and provides no
 4   incentive for the renovator to take the training
 5   seriously.  Our recommendation is that all workers
 6   involved in the renovation receive a least a one day
 7   third-party training not provided by the supervisor
 8   and pass an examination to be certified as meeting
 9   the law's basic requirements.  The method of that
10   examination should take into account people's
11   different languages.
12             Our third concern with the training
13   certification and accreditation scheme is that there
14   are no proposed renewals for supervisors or workers
15   beyond the initial training.  There's no refresher
16   training put out in your proposed regulations.  The
17   lack of such training does not give an opportunity
18   for the renovator, worker or contractor to keep
19   current with any potential changes that may occur in
20   the field.  EPA's lack of emphasis on renewing
21   training conveys lead hazard reduction methods are
22   not evolving and we believe they still are.  Our
0052
 1   recommendation would be to require that all workers
 2   and supervisors conduct renewed training after
 3   initial training every year or two years to update
 4   and inform them on changes in lead hazard reduction
 5   and remind them of safety practices that are
 6   critical to keeping children and families safe.
 7             Our fourth area of concern is in the
 8   pre-intervention testing and clearance wipes at the
 9   conclusion of renovations.  The proposed rule
10   provides pre-intervention verification of lead-based
11   paint utilizing a new unknown EPA-approved lead
12   testing kit and a post-intervention testing by
13   the renovator utilizing a new swab test to determine
14   if unsafe levels of lead dust remain in the
15   property.  Dave Jacobs addressed this.  There is
16   great data out there and knowledge based on lead
17   dust clearance testing and we believe that that is
18   what should be used here.  Pre-intervention lead
19   based testing kit is not an approved product.  The
20   on-site swab testing which the proposed rule
21   recommends is also not really available or shown to
22   have a proven track record.  In fact EPA has been
0053
 1   critical of home testing kits and stated data retrieved
 2   from such kits are not reliable.  So we're putting
 3   forth a rule that appears to ignore EPA's on
 4   standards and research for home testing kits.
 5             In addition we're concerned that that test
 6   and the swab wipe clearance test are not currently
 7   available and this will serve as a method for
 8   further delay and potential inaction if they're
 9   delayed in reaching the market.  The rule does
10   not provide for any type of third-party clearance at
11   the end of the renovations or any method of
12   independently verifying lead safe work practices,
13   that they are actually employed.  The failure to use
14   lead safe work practices can create a greater hazard
15   than if no work is undertaken in some circumstances.
16             Having contractors verify the safety of
17   their own work, we feel, is not a protective
18   standard for children.  So we recommend the law's
19   implementation not be contingent upon the
20   development or approval of new testing methods but
21   to implement lead dust clearance testing and have
22   testing where possible to be done on an independent
0054
 1   third-party basis.
 2             We also have concerns for hazardous work
 3   practices.  The rule is proposing to permit unsafe
 4   work practices such as open flame burning, machine
 5   blasting and sand blasting.  We actually think this
 6   is terribly wrong.  The rule would also create an
 7   exemption in emergency situations involving
 8   properties occupied by a child with an elevated
 9   blood level.  Using these dangerous practices is
10   wrong to begin with and create a hazard and will
11   exacerbate the situation when there's a poisoned
12   child.
13             By allowing practices that are prohibited
14   during lead abatement to be used during renovation
15   activities the rule is not prohibiting or restricting
16   renovation work practices that are known to generate
17   lead dust, debris and cause poisoning.  While we
18   understand the need to expedite actions and hazard
19   reduction projects and properties occupied by
20   children with elevated levels, the exception
21   condones clearly unsafe practices in the most
22   at-risk properties where lead-poisoned children
0055
 1   reside.  Poisoning properties already contain
 2   significant hazards and permitting unsafe work
 3   practices will only exacerbate those hazards and we
 4   recommend that the practices that are prohibited
 5   under 40 CFR 745 also be prohibited for renovation
 6   work in pre-'78 properties.  We recommend that no
 7   exception to the rule be established for properties
 8   occupied by lead-poisoned children or children and
 9   pregnant women in general.  Those are our comments.
10   We do commend you in getting this rule and
11   regulation out.  We hope you will take our concerns
12   seriously and address them.  Thank you.
13           MR. RYAN:  Good afternoon.  I'm Don Ryan, a home
14   builder in Arlington, Virginia.  I participated back
15   in '92 when Congress was shaping Title 10 and
16   wrestling with all these issues and I directed the
17   Alliance to End Childhood Lead Poisoning.
18             I want to say for the record I'm one home
19   builder that urges EPA to go forward under your
20   originally announced schedule in bringing this rule
21   to closure.  The rule in fact is now 10 years late
22   and I urge you with all dispatch to go forward with
0056
 1   your process.  I think the process has had every
 2   opportunity for all sides to be heard.
 3             I want to commend you for proposing the
 4   rule and for holding hearings in Washington and
 5   around the country to get real feedback.  I want to
 6   empathize with the tough job that the Agency has
 7   had, salute the hard work of all the staff over the
 8   passed decade who have worked on this.
 9             I want urge EPA to simplify this rule and
10   to cutout some of the unnecessary red tape.  I think
11   there's an opportunity for this rule to take a giant
12   step forward for the country to make lead safe
13   housing the national norm and the 2010 goal
14   achievable.  I want to begin my comments by
15   acknowledging a reality that's a little bit painful,
16   but I think it needs to be put front and center and
17   that is that this rule will never be broadly
18   monitored and enforced in any meaningful way.
19   There's four million or more renovation events each
20   year and no matter how hard EPA's 12 staff work with your
21   counterparts in state and local agencies enforcement
22   and monitoring of the rule is not going to be
0057
 1   effective.
 2             I think the rule still holds a tremendous
 3   potential for making a difference.  So I want to
 4   suggest the ways that it will make a difference and
 5   urge you to consider the rule as you finalize it
 6   from that context.  I see four opportunities.  The
 7   first is reinforcing the industry norm, the emerging
 8   industry norm over lead safe work practices.  We are
 9   in a place right now far down the road far ahead of
10   where we were a decade ago and we're reaching the
11   tipping point in terms of lead safe practices being
12   standard.  In addition to what's legally required
13   what really matters out there is this is the way
14   it's done.  The norms that govern practice in the
15   industry and the National paint and Coatings
16   Association acknowledgment a few years ago of the
17   dangers of lead dust, their sponsorship of the
18   HUD/EPA training course in lead safe work practices,
19   all of these things have helped to establish a norm
20   and this rule needs to reinforce that norm.
21             Second, I think it's important for this
22   rule to clarify the standard of care in terms of
0058
 1   just what practices do remodelers need to follow in
 2   order to demonstrate due care, in order to persuade
 3   a judge and jury that they have done the right
 4   thing.  It's important that rule send clear messages
 5   that help reduce the confusion rather than split
 6   hairs.  I think it's extremely important to look at
 7   the role of consumers, property owners and
 8   occupants, because this rule has the opportunity as
 9   Tom addressed to empower consumers to give them
10   information, to help them make better decisions, to
11   give them leverage points in that process.
12             And finally I think this rule is important
13   because it holds the opportunity to encourage state
14   and local agencies to make needed reforms.  The
15   truth is we still have a lot of lead paint poisoning
16   prevention programs around the country that don't
17   appreciate the danger of unsafe practices, that
18   don't appreciate the importance of adequate
19   verification at the end of jobs.  So the best thing
20   to do is ban unsafe work practices.  The proposed
21   rule made a real effort to justify why you weren't
22   banning unsafe work practices and the truth is that
0059
 1   you just fell short, you failed to make that case.
 2   The emerging norm across the country recognizes the
 3   danger of unsafe work practices and EPA needs to say
 4   in a clear and crisp voice that is the reality.  We
 5   keep hearing concerns about historic preservation,
 6   there are some narrow situations where dangerous
 7   work practices need to be used.  Personally I'm
 8   unconvinced that is the case.  But if that is the
 9   case, I would urge you not to take that concern and
10   apply it across the board.  Ban unsafe work
11   practices.  If you need to -- a relief valve create
12   a little pocket and say, well, if you just must use
13   unsafe work practices and then set up a special set
14   of requirements and additional safeguards over
15   there.  But the clear and simple message across the
16   board needs to be ban unsafe work practices.  If EPA
17   misses this opportunity it really is going to be a
18   tragedy, if you put out a rule that allows open
19   flame burning it's clouding the waters.  It's going
20   to confuse everyone.  Let's just reinforce the clear
21   messages that are out there.
22             It's extremely important that the
0060
 1   individuals doing the work receive training.  The
 2   workers need to be trained.  I think the one hour --
 3   the supervisor doing one hour training for workers
 4   is just a fig leaf.  It's not real.  It's not going
 5   to happen.  Just on my own job I've got to see how
 6   teams of people work, I've got to see how
 7   supervisors and day laborers and different people
 8   work.  The folks who are actually doing the work
 9   need this training.
10             We have a wonderful training course, the
11   EPA/HUD five and a half hour training course.  There
12   are resources out there are for that course's
13   delivery.  The macro view of the world is our goal
14   needs to be everybody out there doing this work
15   needs this training and we're at the tipping point
16   where that reality is within our grasp.  There's
17   some cities that are now offering training in lead
18   safe work practices for day laborers for migrant
19   workers.  This is a way for those individuals to get
20   trained, get qualified, to get some certification,
21   find their way into the work force.  So this
22   training of workers is really critical.
0061
 1             I would urge you not to set up complicated
 2   certification programs for the workers.  I would
 3   urge you to drop the certification program for
 4   supervisors.  The training, that knowledge, is what
 5   is important.  It needs to be conveyed and you can
 6   rely on the firm, the certification of firms, to
 7   ensure that workers they use in fact have that
 8   training.
 9             In terms of verification, we would all
10   love to find the silver bullet, quick, inexpensive
11   realtime way to verify that lead dust hazards aren't
12   left behind.  I think you made a good a case as you
13   could for the white glove test.  The truth is it's
14   not ready for prime time.  The white glove test is
15   not scientifically sound.  It doesn't deserve to be
16   in a federal regulation.  It is not proven.  It's
17   not reliable.
18             When I read the rule I was struck by the
19   rule this part of it seems like Alice in Wonderland
20   to me, that we start with a -- this test which is
21   unproven and build this whole house of cards of
22   reporting and recordkeeping and all of this around
0062
 1   the swiffer test.  So I would urge you, there is a
 2   reliable method, it is affordable, it is widely
 3   recognized, it's recognized by state and local
 4   agencies and that's clearance dust testing.  This
 5   rule really needs to embrace clearance dust testing.
 6   It needs to inform consumers and arm consumers with
 7   that.  My personal view is that the rule need not
 8   require clearance testing in each and every
 9   situation, but the rule needs to identify the
10   utility and the reliability of this tool, require it
11   in the highest risk situations and arm consumers to
12   use this, again, I think it's very important that we
13   give consumers full credit for making the right
14   decisions.
15             I want to strongly urge you to abandon
16   the owner occupied exemption.  I guess you were
17   doing it to try to save costs.  There's a right way
18   to do things and a wrong way to do things.  And the
19   EPA rule needs to be very clear that this is the way
20   things get done, they need to do it the right way
21   and need to avoid unsafe work practices and workers
22   need to be trained.
0063
 1             So that's -- finally, that's about child
 2   care centers.  Congress charged EPA with regulating
 3   commercial and public buildings and this rule ducked
 4   that pitch completely.  Again, I don't think one
 5   size necessarily has to fit all.  But by any
 6   measure, the highest priority among commercial
 7   buildings is child care centers and, again, just for
 8   consistency this rule needs to reach out and embrace
 9   and offer protections to children in day-care as
10   well.  Thank you.
11           MS. SHABAZZ:  Good afternoon.  I'm Zakia Shabazz, mother
12   of a lead-poisoned son, founder and National
13   Director of United Parents Against Lead,
14   headquartered in Richmond, Virginia with 18 chapters
15   around the country.  I testify today on behalf of
16   lead-poisoned children and their families and I
17   bring with me 375 voices of those families
18   supporters and children advocates via signed
19   petitions.
20             They sent me here to remind you that we
21   demand zero tolerance when it comes to the
22   protection of our children.  There are no safe lead
0064
 1   levels in children.  I bring with me photographic
 2   evidence of dangerous work practices.  These are
 3   relatives of the paint chips that poisoned my son in
 4   1996 giving him a blood lead level of 30 at the age
 5   of one and a half.  These were left after unlicensed
 6   painters were hired to conduct the lead hazard
 7   control.  These other photographs were taken
 8   September 20th, 2005 on Lee Street in Richmond,
 9   Virginia, where as I drove along the street I was
10   compelled to stop and speak to the young man who was
11   using an open flame and scraping paint off of the
12   columns onto the grass and porch below.  When I
13   voiced to him the dangers of what he was doing he
14   said I've been doing this for years and it's okay as
15   long as I'm not inside.  He wore no mask or other
16   protective gear.  And I wondered how many children
17   would become poisoned by the hazardous way he left
18   it on the ground.  I gave him a brochure and
19   promptly reported to DPOR, our regulatory authority.
20   There must be meaningful enforcement and penalties
21   for non-compliance, especially for slumlords and
22   repeat offenders who own the toxic dwellings that
0065
 1   poison our children.  It is no longer acceptable for
 2   us to have laws on the books without proper
 3   enforcement and inconsequential sanctions.
 4             We were all saddened to hear about the
 5   lead-poisoning death of a four year old child in
 6   Wisconsin and although Reebok voluntarily recalled
 7   their tainted bracelets, I can attest that the CPSC
 8   does nothing to enforce the recalls.  These rings
 9   were readily available to children at our dentists
10   office at MCV Pedestrian Dentistry.  My daughter
11   received one in September 2004.  These rings were
12   part of a recall issued earlier that year in July.
13   We have available for you a news article that
14   contains statements made by CPSC representatives.
15   These rings had also been associated with a child's
16   death.  So we have a problem with the lack of
17   enforcement.  Our health director called me up and
18   said we don't want people to get alarmed, although a
19   child had once again died from lead poisoning.  She
20   said we don't want to take the focus off lead in
21   paint dust.  Well, I want everyone to be alarmed.  I
22   think our children should be protected regardless of
0066
 1   the source of lead poisoning.  And even the death of
 2   one child is cause enough for alarm.  How many more
 3   children have to die before we take action and do
 4   what is right.  One child is one too many and thus
 5   our call for zero tolerance.
 6             I'd like to share with you the six items
 7   that we posted to the public comment docket back in
 8   February that there are no safe blood lead levels in
 9   children.  EPA must review and adjust its lead air
10   standard and not bow to industry pressure.  EPA's
11   revision should incorporate the latest scientific
12   knowledge and must be sufficient to protect public
13   health especially the health and well-being of our
14   most valuable resources, our children.
15             When CDC and EPA failed to do the right
16   thing by lowering the lead poisoning action level
17   they sent a loud and clear message that they do not
18   care about our children's health and safety.  Air
19   monitoring should be required and instituted at and
20   around all race tracks, leaded gasoline should be
21   banned from use in racing cars immediately.
22             Finally, I urge federal agencies, namely
0067
 1   the EPA, HUD and CDC, to continue funding beyond
 2   2010 because we all know that lead poisoning will
 3   not vanish by the year 2010, nor should any of our
 4   efforts or funding to prevent lead poisoning.  Lead
 5   poisoning remains the number one environmental
 6   health threat to children.  Don't let our children
 7   continue to die from this preventable disease.
 8   Thank you and I'd like to leave information packets
 9   for the panel and I also have additional ones for
10   members of the audience.
11             MR. SUSKAUER:  Good afternoon on behalf of the National
12   Association of Home Builders I just wanted to make
13   some brief comments about EPA's proposed rule for
14   renovation of repair in the painting industries.
15   NAHB is a Washington,D.C. based trade association
16   representing more than 225,000 member firms involved
17   in home building, remodeling, multi-family
18   construction, property management and other aspects
19   of residential and light-commercial construction.
20   More than 14,000 of our member firms identify
21   themselves as being involved primarily in remodeling
22   or renovation work and that's about one fifth of the
0068
 1   marketplace.  We very much sympathize with the issue
 2   of lead poisoning in children and believe that this
 3   is an issue that needs to be addressed.  However, we
 4   think that this rule is not suited to achieve those
 5   goals.
 6             First and foremost the rule is not
 7   effective in significantly reducing lead poisoning
 8   in children.  Unfortunately the rule will only
 9   regulate professional remodelers, the
10   do-it-yourselfers who work on their own homes
11   conduct about half of the -- more than half of the
12   jobs nationally and these do-it-yourself homeowners
13   will remain unregulated.  According to Harvard
14   University's Joint Center of Housing Studies more
15   than half of the kitchen and bathroom remodeling
16   jobs are conducted by these people.  The substantial
17   exclusion of over half the marketplace subverts the
18   stated intent of the rule of eliminating childhood
19   lead poisoning by 2010.  Furthermore, the rule will
20   drive homeowners into the unregulated segment of the
21   market.  The increased compliance costs that will be
22   imposed on the professional sector will be passed
0069
 1   along meaning that fewer homeowners will be able to
 2   afford to use a qualified remodeler.  These additional
 3   rules mean more costs and, therefore, the higher
 4   prices will result for remodeling work.  The
 5   increased compliance costs will then lead to fewer
 6   homeowners able to afford a qualified remodeler.  As
 7   a result, the increase in do-it-yourself activities
 8   will occur and unfortunately homeowners who did it
 9   themselves are more likely to lack experience with
10   typical renovation and remodeling jobs and
11   additionally tend to work in their free-time being
12   evenings, weekends, so that the project can take
13   more days and weeks to complete.  These increased
14   timeframes prolong potential exposures to lead
15   dust. A professional remodeling firm would more
16   clearly have the experience and expertise in
17   completing jobs quickly and safely.
18             Furthermore, remodeling jobs should be
19   encouraged and not discouraged.  Renovating and 
20   remodeling activities are what help improve the
21   condition of surfaces coated with lead-based paint.
22   Lead-based paint causes a lead exposure problem when 
0070
 1   it is deteriorated, Poorly maintained paint is
 2   most likely the culprit.  This proposed rule will
 3   make maintenance more expensive causing some
 4   homeowners to defer necessary maintenance which would
 5   create even more deteriorated surfaces in the
 6   future.
 7             As currently proposed these rules will
 8   cause many remodeling firms to elect only to work in
 9   post 1978 housing, thus limiting further the amount
10   of professionals available and increasing costs,
11   thus further undermining the intention of the rule.
12             Another important point is that remodeling
13   and abatement are very different activities with
14   different purposes and different methods.  Because
15   remodelers are not hired to remove lead they should
16   only be required to avoid making lead exposures
17   worse.  The only test necessary for a typical
18   renovation job should be the simple standard of no
19   visible dust and debris.  If there is no visible
20   dust or debris the job site is probably at least as
21   clean as it was before the job with no more lead
22   present.  In that case the remodeler has done no
0071
 1   harm.
 2             As EPA has clearly stated there is a big
 3   difference between abatement and remodeling.
 4   Abatement jobs are designed to eliminate all lead
 5   from a structure while the primary intent of
 6   renovation and remodeling is to change the
 7   structure, function or appearance of a room or
 8   building.  As a by-product some remodeling
 9   activities may actually result in reduction of
10   lead-based hazards through the replacement of old
11   windows with new ones that have no lead-based paint
12   on them.  This important distinction provides
13   further illustration why clearance testing should
14   not be required.  Requiring renovation contractors
15   to clean up to an abatement standard effectively
16   makes the contractor responsible for all the lead
17   that was in the home prior to when the remodeling
18   work commenced.  That means that a remodeler would
19   have to remove any lead that had no relationship to
20   the activity that was being conducted in the home.
21   An unintended consequence of this requirement will
22   be that many certified renovators will become
0072
 1   excellent at judging the level of cleanliness in a
 2   home when giving an estimate.  If a home looks dirty
 3   or poorly maintained, in short, if it looks like
 4   there may be lead dust present, the remodeler is
 5   likely to refuse the work or to charge a high price
 6   to cover the increased cost of compliance.
 7             A possible approach for EPA would be to
 8   develop a voluntary lead safe work practice and
 9   program for both for remodelers and homeowners.
10   NAHB has supported the development of voluntary lead
11   safe work practices which would protect occupants
12   and workers from the risks of disturbing lead-based
13   paint.  We have worked with EPA for five years
14   developing voluntary lead safe pilot program which
15   focussed on the remodeler and homeowner on how to
16   safety conduct remodelling activities.  A voluntary
17   program allows appropriate flexibility for both
18   homeowners and remodelers to choose which practices
19   best suit unique jobs.  Another advantage of a
20   voluntary program is the avoidance of potential
21   legal conflicts between existing state laws and
22   EPA's proposed rule.
0073
 1             For example, EPA's proposed clearance test
 2   is inconsistent with the existing state requirements
 3   which already define state certified lead-based
 4   paint testing firms and these are not remodeling
 5   firms.  EPA abruptly ceased work on the voluntary
 6   program last Spring and NAHB encourages EPA to
 7   return to a voluntary program approach.  And we'll
 8   be filing more complete comments before the end of
 9   the comment period, thank you.
10        MS. MORTIMER:  Let's take a five minute break.
11                     (Off the record)
12        MS. MORTIMER:  Next up is Bruce Campbell and
13   then Andrew Langer.
14        MR. CAMPBELL:  Good afternoon, my name is Bruce Campbell.
15   I'm a certified property manager, member of the
16   Institute of Real State Management and the National
17   Association of Realtors.  I'm here on behalf of
18   myself as well as those organizations.
19             I was appointed by then Governer Donald
20   Schaefer of the state of Maryland in 1994 as a
21   member of the Lead Paint Poisoning Prevention
22   Program that was developed over two years to bring
0074
 1   about a change in the problem with children being
 2   poisoned, particularly in older housing.  It was a
 3   well-balanced commission.  I think we addressed most
 4   of the areas that we could possibly address and we
 5   tried to make it fair and phased it in.
 6             This past February we completed our 10
 7   year phase-in which required that all pre-1950
 8   houses be at least dust tested and pass a dust test
 9   or a modified risk reduction standard.  That means
10   one hundred percent of the units to be in
11   compliance.  The biggest problem we have had is
12   getting everyone to comply.  I think the responsible
13   owners, the responsible landlords, the responsible
14   managers, in all cases certify their units, register
15   their units, continue to do the work that is
16   necessary and every year our state legislature looks
17   at improving that law and is currently going through
18   some additional recommendations to tighten it up a
19   little bit and come into compliance with some of the
20   changes that EPA has adopted, and the CDC has
21   adopted.
22             That being said, I would hope that EPA
0075
 1   could consider some type of exemption for those
 2   states that already have a very significant program
 3   in place that they would have an exemption if
 4   they're in compliance with the regs within the
 5   state.  This would be some benefit to those who have
 6   already gone through a very extension program in our
 7   state of certifying workers, certifying inspectors
 8   and certifying our units.
 9             When we started there were thousands of
10   young children who had elevated levels above 15 to
11   25, some were seriously poisoned.  I believe our
12   2004 statistics had less than 250 cases throughout
13   the entire state, most of which, as you can well
14   imagine, are in certain census tracts in Baltimore
15   City.  Of those units, unfortunately, I believe 70
16   percent were owner occupied units which were not
17   under our regulations.
18             In addition, in the remaining 30 percent,
19   the vast majority of those were non-compliant
20   owners.  And therefore had not even gone into the
21   program to get the exemption.  That left a handful
22   of compliant owners who unfortunately had a case of
0076
 1   a poisoned child.  Maryland also in addition to the
 2   stick, that is fines for non-compliance and others,
 3   offers a carrot and I think the EPA should consider
 4   some type of carrot to get more compliance.  I think
 5   it has worked in Maryland for the vast majority.  I
 6   don't care how strong a rule you put into effect you
 7   will not get one hundred percent compliance.  There
 8   are bad landlords as there are bad everything else.
 9   If they can't comply with 1018 and others, how are
10   we going to get them to do it.  I would like to say
11   having a carrot out there for compliance would be
12   quite helpful.  The compliance carrot in Maryland is
13   a tort limit.  The tort limit is $17,000 per child
14   and it includes basically moving the poisoned
15   individual out of the home and possibly some medical
16   remediation for that child.  And I believe it has
17   worked in nearly all cases and been very effective.
18   Number of states have come to us, I've spoken with a
19   number throughout the country to try to encourage
20   them to bring these rules for adoption in other
21   jurisdictions.
22             One of the problems is if you have workers
0077
 1   in multiple states they would have to get certified
 2   on a state-by-state basis, if there's uniform
 3   regulations for approved training courses I would
 4   hope that it would be overlapping and allow
 5   reciprocity from one state to the next.
 6             Number two, we would urge that the EPA
 7   also allow the use of ASTM approved dust testing
 8   cloths.  I don't think we have a problem with the
 9   testing process.  I think it's important that that's
10   done so they know that they've cleaned these
11   surfaces when there's been significant renovation.
12             The results of the cleaning verification
13   be kept for three years.  We are concerned about
14   that with respect to the 1018 disclosure
15   requirements.  Would we now have to make a complete
16   list every time we renovate or paint a unit, to add
17   that to the list that we would have to have
18   available for tenants, particularly in large
19   multi-family communities.
20             The docket for the rule is voluminous and
21   additional sources have been added since the rule
22   was proposed.  Due to the sheer volume of reports
0078
 1   and studies we have asked the EPA for an extension
 2   to the comment period to provide sufficient time to
 3   review all those materials.  This is a critical
 4   things.  It's going to affect obviously the lives of
 5   children, but it's also going to affect the
 6   availability of affordable housing, the availability
 7   of more and more homes we're seeing in a very hot
 8   real estate market and I believe here in the
 9   Washington area more and more apartment projects
10   converting to condominium and there's less and less
11   product available for those who need rental housing.
12             I did have one question and that is the
13   rule on the two square foot rule.  I don't know
14   whether this would 
15   continue to be on a component basis?  I would
16   agree with that because a lot of our renovations
17   particularly in large multi-family community is
18   merely painting.  There's very little has to be
19   done, but you're not tearing out and sanding and
20   doing a lot of heavy work.  So I accept that nod.
21             As I said, the Maryland plan has worked.
22   It's worked because there's been buy-in by the
0079
 1   industry, a buy-in by the proponents for prevention
 2   and all the people that do the work out there.  It's
 3   an interesting process.  It's worked in Maryland and
 4   hope you consider that exemption as I've requested,
 5   thank you.
 6        MS. MORTIMER:  Next up is Andrew Langer.
 7        MR. LANGER:  I'll be brief.  It's a pleasure for me to
 8   be here today.  My name is Andrew Langer.  I'm the
 9   manager of regulatory policy for the National
10   Federation of Independent Business.  NFIB is the
11   largest small business trade association with six
12   hundred thousand members nationwide.
13             By way of background, up until a few years
14   ago I also served as an adjunct policy analyst with
15   the environmental scientists laboratory at Brooklyn
16   College and spent a considerable amount of time
17   dealing with environmental regulations and their
18   impacts and regulations as an academic subject.
19             Who are NFIB members?  We have six hundred
20   thousand members nationwide, not just in
21   construction trades but in all manner of trade.
22   This rule will impact all of our members.  Our
0080
 1   average member size is five employees.  And I want
 2   to inject a little bit about the small business
 3   reality here.  It's refreshing for me to come to a
 4   place like this because you get a sense of the
 5   parochial nature of certain research areas, and how
 6   folks get so focussed on one particular area of
 7   expertise or one particular issue of study that they
 8   tend to forget that there are a lot of other things
 9   that are out there.  And I want to talk a little bit
10   about that from our perspective.
11             Being a small business owner means you are
12   responsible for doing every job that's related to
13   your business.  With five employees our average
14   member doesn't have a full-time regulatory affairs
15   person on staff to ferret out every regulation that
16   applies to them.  We know regulations impact small
17   businesses differently than large businesses.  We
18   know that once a business gets above 20 employees
19   regulatory costs drop by a third, we now know the
20   regulation costs to average small business is seven
21   thousand six hundred per employee per year.  If our
22   average member who brings in about $350,000 annually
0081
 1   you're facing a $40,000 regulatory cost right off
 2   the bat.  Really what the problem is when you get
 3   down to new regulations that produce new burdens, as
 4   this rule undoubtedly will, is that it is incredibly
 5   difficult for our members to figure out exactly what
 6   they need to do to comply.
 7             I want to talk briefly are the good actors
 8   out there.  The folks who have every intention of
 9   abiding by the law but for whom the way that our
10   federal regulatory regime has been created it's
11   almost impossible for them.  We're looking at 40 CFR
12   part 745, and if you think about what the code of
13   federal regulations look like I don't have a copy of
14   the fed reg on my wall, I now use a computer, but
15   the paper copy would stretch back to that wall 14 to
16   20 feet in length and my average NFIB member is
17   responsible for knowing every regulation within the
18   code, within the 14 to 20 feet, that applies to him
19   or her.
20             So as we move forward talking about this
21   and talking about adding these new requirements I
22   want you to consider that, consider that you're
0082
 1   going to be adding to a burden that many small
 2   businesses ill-understand right now and making it
 3   more complex and confusing.
 4             Lead is a lighting rod.  You think about
 5   lead, you hear about lead and it conjures all sorts
 6   of negative images in your mind and when we consider
 7   lead regulation we consider it from the standpoint
 8   of things like zero tolerance and the standpoint of
 9   not poisoning children.  We use a lot of rhetorical
10   arguments.  Lead is a bad thing.  There's no denying
11   that.  But we have to look at lead versus other
12   risks as well and not be pursuing lead at an ad
13   infinitum level.  Why is that?  Because once you
14   start prioritizing things that may not be as risky,
15   other public policy priorities fall by the wayside,
16   other negative health consequences are downgraded at
17   the sacrifice of something that may not be as risky
18   which is why I really wish we'd be doing this after
19   the new OMB IRA guidelines on comparative risk
20   assessment had been completed.  I think a new
21   regulation like this would have benefited from some
22   scientific understanding of how that risk compares
0083
 1   with other risk.  Like a lot of my colleagues today
 2   I believe in science, I believe in pursuing science
 3   and I believe there are some fundamental flaws
 4   scientifically with this new regulation.  I believe
 5   this new regulation will produce very marginal
 6   benefits in terms of protecting health of children
 7   while producing some very high costs.  And what do I
 8   mean by lack of science.  One of the things that was
 9   mentioned just before me, this two foot square rule.
10   This is two square feet.  It's not a large number.
11   It's not a large amount of space.  And yet we're
12   talking about kicking in hugely burdensome
13   regulations for that, for this.
14             I question that.  I can't find any
15   scientists that I've talked to so far, I've talked
16   to a number of them about lead, who can justify or
17   find some justification for setting a limit of two
18   square feet for the kick-in for this regulation.
19   Mr. Ryan, I have to appreciate the comments, I don't
20   agree with all of them, but I do agree that this are
21   needlessly confusing, as many regulations are.  One
22   of the things we talk about is trying to make
0084
 1   regulations conform to other existing standards that
 2   are out there.  I think we need to cut the red tape
 3   in this regulation, especially when you consider who
 4   is doing the work, folks who are not sophisticated
 5   when it comes to regulatory policy, not highly
 6   educated but doing some unskilled labor who can be
 7   trained to do that labor but nevertheless not
 8   trained scientists and any time EPA engages in
 9   situations where they prescribe behavior to a minute
10   level of detail is a very bad thing.
11             I'd like to use the example of OSHA coming
12   out with hazardous communications guidance standards
13   a couple years ago.  They came out with a
14   communications guidance that was this thick,
15   literally, about a telephone book of a major city.
16   That's a useless standard and why is that because
17   your average small business owner is going to look
18   at a standard like that and is going to blanch.
19   He's going to say there's no possible way given all
20   the other requirements that I have for me to
21   understand that.  So any time you get to that level
22   of detail it's a bad thing.
0085
 1             As a student of regulatory policy over the
 2   last decade I've noticed that when we start
 3   prescribing these behaviors it creates perverse
 4   disincentives.  As we heard from the folks of the
 5   home builders, this sort of a rule by increasing
 6   costs for individuals by 20 to 30 percent, I've
 7   heard varying estimates, it is going to lead to
 8   more-self renovations and who's doing this
 9   self-renovations, it's not retirees at home, folks
10   with no children in the home, it is going to be
11   parents with young children.  We don't want that
12   happening.  This is not the outcome that we want to
13   have happen.  It means more exposures for children.
14   It's going to mean greater exposure times as was
15   pointed out as we do our projects, they are going to
16   be left out and exposures are going to be allowed to
17   happen for greater durations of time and there will
18   be fewer renovations of pre-1970 homes as those
19   costs get driven up.  Folks would be much more
20   inclined to leave things alone as to seeing those
21   renovations done.
22             We've been hearing from our members about
0086
 1   this.  We are continuing to hear from our members
 2   about this, real small businesses with real
 3   experiences with regulation.  And because we're
 4   continuing to get those reports in we feel that we
 5   would be able to make more valuable comments if the
 6   comment period were extended between 30 and 60 days.
 7   So I would ask you to do that.  Thank you very much.
 8        MS. MORTIMER:  Steve Sides followed Amy
 9   McDonald.
10       MR. SIDES:  Thank you.  Steve Sides from the National
11   Paint and Coatings Association.  The members of the
12   National Paint and Coatings Association have
13   supported EPA's efforts to implement all aspects of
14   the Title 10 legislation and particularly we're
15   engaged in considerable voluntary efforts to promote
16   the lead-free renovation education rule and the lead
17   information hotline.  NPCA also helped launch the
18   CLEAR CORE which has a progressive 10-year history
19   of assisting at-risk communities with their proven
20   approach to lead hazard reduction.
21             In 2003 we forged a cooperative agreement
22   with 46 of 50 State Attorneys General taking on the
0087
 1   development and implementation of a nationwide
 2   community education and training program on
 3   lead-based paint hazards and that involved
 4   distribution of the EPA brochures at retail points
 5   of sale.  This program which is currently in year
 6   three of the original four year agreement has
 7   provided our industry with really a unique level of
 8   insight on the promotion and training on lead-safe
 9   work practices.
10             Now that you have decided to move out this
11   rule, we really feel it's important that you work
12   hard to provide uniformity.  States should not be
13   allowed arbitrarily deviate from the program
14   elements that you're trying to put in place and
15   eventually will have put in place.  Certainly take
16   the states concerns or issues or experience into
17   account as part of the rule making process, but once
18   you've decided on the best approach to go try and
19   contrive in that final rule a consensus that does not
20   allow the states to move out of it and others have
21   mentioned reasons why.
22             We've been promoting in the paint industry
0088
 1   lead-safe practice training in
 2   English and Spanish using the HUD/EPA curriculum
 3   that was developed at the time.  Sponsoring over 400
 4   free classes and training over 10,000 individuals.
 5   They're not just contractors.  We've had homeowners.
 6   We've had property managers, code officials and the
 7   like.  The training's open to anyone and we promote
 8   it in that way.
 9             This is a significant investment on the
10   part of our industry in fact all the people we
11   partner with to put this training on out in the 50
12   states of the U.S. the curriculum, as you know, does
13   not include the clean-up verification aspect that
14   are covered in this proposed rule but the training
15   does alert homeowners, residents, property managers,
16   to the concept of the HUD-type clearance testing.
17   What is stressed in the curriculum is that strict
18   adherence to lead-safe work practices including
19   careful clean-up keeps the work area free from
20   lead-based paint hazards and this should be the goal
21   for the rule as well.  The white glove test as it's
22   been characterized will remain controversial and
0089
 1   many advocates will stress for the clearance
 2   type testing as defined by HUD but we strongly
 3   believe that contractors who have the training in
 4   the lead-safe work practices curriculum but not
 5   necessarily the white glove test or clearance
 6   testing techniques should be acknowledged by EPA in
 7   the final rule as having met the proficiency level
 8   desired.  In short, don't require retraining people
 9   just to promote a white glove test.  And in our
10   instance we've put 10,000 potentially certified
11   people out in the marketplace to help provide
12   lead-safe housing.  We'd hate to see a final rule
13   preclude those folks from continuing to operate or
14   having to come back for some arbitrary additional
15   training.
16             Revising the brochure, Protect Your Family
17   brochure, while helpful in creating a consistent
18   message really is not a priority in our opinion.
19   There are literally hundreds if not thousands of
20   brochures on lead-based paint hazards in circulation
21   throughout the country and while the brochure you
22   create would have the benefit of a regulatory
0090
 1   blessing, if you will, across the nation, it
 2   shouldn't be viewed as the exclusive source of
 3   information in our opinion.  The purpose of that
 4   brochure is to inform.  The past versions of Protect
 5   Your family have served well.  And let's say the
 6   contractors who have been distributing those
 7   brochures have been fully prepared to take on the
 8   follow-up questions that come from their customers
 9   when they put that brochure in their hands.  It's
10   important that the contractors be trained to handle
11   those questions to do lead-safe projects.  I don't
12   want to see a compliance issue centered around an
13   arbitrary change in that brochure.
14             Lastly, with filed comments you are likely
15   to get a considerable amount of data on worker
16   exposure and dust contamination levels associated
17   with typical renovation and remodeling tasks.  If
18   this data shows in a statistically reliable manner
19   that undertaking such tasks does not result in
20   appreciable exposure to the worker and does not
21   create workplace or residence contamination we would
22   expect you to acknowledge that in any final rule for
0091
 1   the beneficial reliance of all contractors and their
 2   customers who will be dealing with this rule.
 3             While we have been fully prepared and
 4   engaged to submit comments by the close of the
 5   comment period on April 10th, we have filed for an
 6   extension to better integrate what we believe will
 7   be particularly useful information and content
 8   derived from our national training program
 9   participants who we maintain contact with.  So we
10   support an extension for good and valid reasons, not
11   arbitrary reasons at this point.  Thank you for the
12   chance to talk.
13        MS. MORTIMER:  Amy McDonald.
14        MS. MCDONALD:  Good afternoon.  I'm Amy McDonald.  I'm
15   with the District of Columbia Attorney General's
16   Office and my comments are on behalf of the
17   Department of Health in D.C. with the Lead-based
18   Paint Management Program.
19             In general, the District does support the
20   EPA's renovation and repair rule.  We feel as the
21   rule is written right now there are several issues.
22   I'll briefly point out a few of the issues.
0092
 1             The first issue we have is with the
 2   phase-in system.  As it stands right now we feel the
 3   phase-in system is very confusing and we feel that
 4   it will inhibit trying to enforce the regulation
 5   because people are obviously going to be confused
 6   what they have to do.  The department will be
 7   spending more of their time trying to explain who
 8   this involves instead of spending time trying to
 9   find out who's doing it correctly.
10             Also with the phase-in system the goal
11   right now is to eliminate childhood lead poisoning
12   by 2010.  The phase-in system there's no way that
13   this can efficiently eliminate lead poisoning by the
14   deadline of 2010.  We also feel that the rule should
15   include all housing regardless of whether or not a
16   child lives there.  Other people have stated today
17   that they feel because of the fact that children can
18   visit because of the fact that eventually a child
19   can move in at a later date all housing should be
20   covered.
21             The second issue with the dust sampling
22   technicians.  We feel that this is a good idea to
0093
 1   have this new category of worker, the problem
 2   becomes that they're trained a little bit less than
 3   everybody else and because of that lack of training
 4   we feel that maybe they should be required to work
 5   under a certified risk assessor or certified
 6   inspector so that somebody with a little more
 7   training can kind of make sure they're doing their
 8   job correctly.
 9             We have a problem with the test kits.
10   There's no way to verify that these test kits would
11   be used properly and they are very rampant for
12   abuse.  There's no way to determine whether or not a
13   person is going to actually test the correct
14   surfaces, whether they're just going to pick a place
15   where there's no lead and use that to say there's no
16   lead components, therefore we don't need to comply
17   with everything.  So we think that if these test
18   kits will be used they should be required to be
19   completed by a disinterested third-party.
20             We have a problem with the notification
21   requirement.  EPA needs to promulgate some form of
22   notification requirements under this renovation and
0094
 1   repair rule.  Without a notification requirement
 2   there is absolutely no way you can enforce this
 3   rule.  If there's no notification requirement, the
 4   states have no way of knowing what projects are
 5   occurring and when they can go inspect those
 6   projects to make sure that they're being done
 7   correctly and safely.
 8             We also have the problem with the cleaning
 9   verification.  Why not clearance sampling?  Why
10   should there be less of a standard for a renovation
11   than an abatement when they create the exact same
12   hazards.  So we feel that since you're creating the
13   same hazards you should have the same standard and
14   simply taking a sample and comparing it to a card
15   that the EPA says it should look like this is way
16   too subjective and there's no way to ensure it's
17   done properly.
18             Perhaps most importantly the biggest issue
19   is with the prohibited activities, such as heat guns
20   over 1100 degrees Fahrenheit.  These should remain
21   prohibited.  Renovation and repair creates the same
22   lead dust that an abatement does and because of that
0095
 1   those prohibited acts should not be allowed here
 2   just as they're not allowed in abatement.
 3             In fact, renovation and repair can create
 4   even more hazards because of the lack of containment
 5   and other precautions that may be required as
 6   they're required in abatement and, therefore, they
 7   really have to be prohibited.
 8             There's an issue with enforcement.  As I
 9   stated, there's a problem with each and every one of
10   these issues of enforcing them.  If EPA promulgates
11   the rule as it is written now, states will have a
12   very difficult time enforcing the rule.
13             I'll leave you with one question.  We
14   understand that EPA is concerned for the renovators
15   and trying to decrease their costs to comply with
16   these issues, but shouldn't the ultimate goal be to
17   ensure that there's no children that are lead
18   poisoned no matter what the cost.  Thank you.
19        MS. MORTIMER:  Pat McLaine is up.
20        MS. MCLAINE:  My name is Pat McLaine.  I'm a doctoral
21   student at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg Public Health
22   in Baltimore.  I'm also an appointed member to
0096
 1   Maryland's Lead Commission and have been involved in
 2   lead research for more than 13 years.  My comments
 3   are my own.
 4             I remain concerned about EPA's failure to
 5   enact requirements to protect families from the
 6   dangers of renovation remodeling before this date in
 7   accordance with Title 10 requirements.  I think the
 8   proposed rule and requirements fall far short of the
 9   effort that we need to protect children and their
10   families from being lead poisoned.  In addition, the
11   failure to propose any solid recommendations to
12   protect families that renovate and remodel their own
13   homes rather than and in addition to hiring a
14   contractor increases the risk for many children who
15   are being lead poisoned throughout this country
16   because they think what they're doing is safe.
17             EPA's estimated that 4.4 to 4.8 million
18   paid renovations are completed every year in
19   pre-1978 housing.  I suspect the number of
20   do-it-yourself repair and renovation work far
21   exceeds this number.  Do-it-yourself home
22   improvements are part of the lifestyle of many
0097
 1   American families, even those who can afford to hire
 2   a contractor, certainly for work considered easy to
 3   do such as painting interior walls and woodwork or
 4   exterior siding, trim and porches.  Many families
 5   look forward to this work often done to accommodate
 6   new members or older family members or make new use
 7   of old space.  They save up money, take out loans to
 8   do this work.  Families wouldn't dream that
 9   repairing a ceiling that incurred a water leak might
10   put their children at risk, particularly at risk for
11   something as terrible as lead poisoning but because
12   many individuals don't use lead-safe work practice
13   when they do repair work in all their homes whether
14   they're contractors or do-it-yourselfers children
15   are being poisoned.  What's the evidence of this.
16   You presented some evidence in the proposed rule but
17   I want to share some more evidence.
18             In the national evaluation a HUD-funded
19   study of the experience of more than 3000 homes in
20   14 locations that were abated using HUD funds in the
21   late 1990's there was follow up with 2375 families,
22   more than 35 percent of these families indicated
0098
 1   that in their initial interview that remodeling and
 2   repair work had been done on their home in the
 3   previous six months.  Between grantees, the percentage
 4   of families whose homes had remodeling and repair
 5   work varied between 10 and 59 percent, a very high
 6   percentage.  A HUD-funded risk assessment study of
 7   229 families in Baltimore County Milwaukee and New
 8   York City conducted in 1998 found that 41.2 percent
 9   of participating families had been involved with
10   home maintenance in the 12 months preceding the
11   study.  This included remodeling, repairing and
12   renovating their home 32.3 percent, removing
13   paint from furniture 12.9 percent, and soldering
14   pipes or metal 8.3 percent.
15             In this risk assessment study a number of
16   variables are found to predict the risk that a child
17   would have an elevated blood lead level.  This was
18   done in two cities in New York.  In New York City, the
19   odds of a child having an elevated blood lead level
20   were 8.3 times higher if the family reported
21   that paint had been sanded from the exterior of a
22   neighboring building.
0099
 1             In Milwaukee the odds of a child having an
 2   elevated blood lead level were 38.9 times higher if
 3   the family reported that a household resident worked
 4   in construction and significantly higher dust lead
 5   levels were identified in these homes where
 6   construction workers lived.  This suggests that
 7   there's a hazard to the workers, there's a hazard to
 8   the families who live with the workers and there's
 9   probably a hazard again to a family where renovation
10   work is being done.
11             A third study randomized community trial
12   of comprehensive education and home visiting by
13   registered nurses to 151 families with blood lead
14   levels living in Rhode Island funded by CDC
15   documented the results of family carpet removal on
16   dust and blood lead levels.  One of the families lived
17   in a rental property built in 1780 in structurally
18   sound condition.  They moved into the home in August
19   after removing some paint from the exterior.  They
20   stripped wallpaper, removed rugs and repainted
21   windows and window wells in a parent's bedroom and
22   an office.  One month later they did interior paint
0100
 1   repair but no structural renovations.  Floors
 2   throughout the home had been cleaned several times
 3   before their 14 month old child had an elevated
 4   blood lead level.  During routine testing later that
 5   month all dust lead levels in the home were found to
 6   be above federal standards ranging from 40.4
 7   micrograms per foot in the play room to 1,866
 8   micrograms per square foot in the office where this
 9   kind of work had been done.
10             Special cleaning with TSP multiple times
11   enabled the family to decrease these levels to 852
12   micrograms per square foot and bring the living room
13   levels below standards but it took six months of
14   repeated cleaning to bring the child's bedroom floor
15   levels to a 27.3 microgram per square foot and the
16   family was unable to significantly reduce floor dust
17   lead levels in the office or parents' bedroom for
18   nine and a half months until the floors were
19   completely refinished, even then floor dust lead
20   levels remained above the current clearance
21   standard.  A second family removed carpeting in
22   their rental home built in the early 1900s this
0101
 1   resulted in an elevation of dust lead levels from an
 2   average of 10 micrograms per square foot to an
 3   average of 376 micrograms per square foot, with a
 4   794 microgram per square foot in the play room and
 5   228 on the bedroom floor.  These are floor dust lead
 6   levels, not sill or well.
 7             The levels returned to federal standard
 8   after new vinyl tile was installed throughout the
 9   home, but not before a three year old's blood lead
10   jumped from a 12 to 24 microgram per deciliter after
11   the carpeting had been removed.
12             This winter I managed a community health
13   rotation for eight BSN students from Johns Hopkins
14   School of Nursing located in Baltimore City Lead
15   Poisoning Prevention Program.  The students visited
16   10 children with elevated blood leads who had been
17   reported to Baltimore City's Program with elevated
18   blood lead levels.  Three of the 10 reported
19   exposure to remodeling and renovation work in the period
20   before their children became poisoned.  Two reported
21   ongoing remodeling work for the family by the family
22   in their owner occupied home, but the third whose
0102
 1   elevated blood lead level was reported seven months
 2   after the fact noted that the houses on either side
 3   of their rental property were renovated top to
 4   bottom with extensive removal of paint and painted
 5   components.  The family reported dust was everywhere
 6   in their home despite measures that that family took
 7   to keep the house clean, and the windows closed
 8   during the July heat in Baltimore.  The family
 9   noticed they had a change in their 18 month old
10   child's behavior at that time, a change that only
11   intensified after a bedroom ceiling collapsed in
12   their home two months before the child was tested.
13             These studies and these scenarios
14   suggested efforts to control renovation and remodeling
15   contractor work should follow established practices
16   for keeping homes safe when work is ongoing that
17   we've learned from lead abatement.  If these
18   standards are followed and enacted this will be the
19   industry standard and I think do-it-yourselfers will
20   soon follow these practices.
21             We should see requirements to prohibit
22   work practices known to create lead dust hazards,
0103
 1   including open flame burning, heat guns burning over
 2   1100 degrees, volatile chemical strippers, machine
 3   power sanding, power blasting, dry sanding, dry
 4   scraping.  We don't need to relearn the lesson and
 5   less hazardous alternatives are already proven.
 6   Make clearance lead dust testing a requirement
 7   following renovation and remodeling work to achieve
 8   EPA/HUD standards in all rooms where renovation took
 9   place, regardless of whether the floors are
10   carpeted.  Visual assessment isn't good enough.
11             In another study where children were
12   relocated to housing identified as safe by visual
13   inspection 53 percent of the homes actually had lead
14   dust levels above the current federal standards.
15   Visual inspection is unlikely based on research to
16   be good enough to protect a child.  Renovators
17   should be required to report clearance test results
18   to the owner and occupant.  The diminimous
19   requirements should be looked at closely.  HUD
20   guidelines indicate that removing one square foot of
21   lead-based paint in a room could result in lead dust
22   levels of 9300 micrograms per square foot and would
0104
 1   be very unlikely to be able to clean that to
 2   clearance standards.
 3             Standards should be followed in all older
 4   homes regardless of whether or not a child under six
 5   is living there.  Children visit families, they go
 6   in and out, they move and stay with families for
 7   various reasons.  This standard will not protect
 8   families unless it applies to all homes.  I feel
 9   that local and state public health authorities
10   should be notified immediately in situations that
11   are deemed to be an emergency to help the contractor
12   determine what should be done to protect the health
13   of the public because emergency requirements are
14   mentioned in this standard.
15             We also need to provide for meaningful
16   enforcement and penalties for non-compliance and
17   ensure that all persons working on the renovation and 
18   remodeling jobs, not just supervisors, receive
19   effective training in lead safety.  Safeguards are
20   urgently needed to protect children and I hope that
21   you will consider this in enacting a rule that will
22   be sufficiently strong to help us meet our goal of
0105
 1   eliminating childhood lead poisoning by 2010.
 2             MS. MAYBERRY:  Good afternoon.  My name is Astrid
 3   Mayberry.  I'm a certified property manager
 4   candidate, direct of education for the Greater
 5   Metropolitan Washington IRA Chapter 8.  The
 6   Institute of Real Estate Management is an affiliate
 7   of the National Association of Realtors.  The
 8   Institute is the only professional real estate
 9   management association serving both multi-family
10   commercial real estate sectors.  With 81 U.S.
11   chapters and eight international chapters IRA is the
12   international organization that serves as an
13   advocate on issues affecting the real estate
14   management industry.  IRA members manage more than
15   6.5 billion square feet of commercial space.  I have
16   a background in both commercial and residential and
17   retail property management.  I'm here to speak about
18   the proposed lead-based paint rule.  The proposed
19   rule requires that a certified renovator supervise
20   each and every renovation defined as any activity
21   that disturbs more than two square feet of paint.
22   IRA believes that such a requirement will result in
0106
 1   a disincentive for property owners to conduct
 2   regular maintenance on their properties.  This could
 3   result in deferred maintenance of target housing
 4   possibly creating greater lead hazards.  Due to
 5   increased expense, administrative burden and time
 6   involved in complying with the rule owners may be
 7   forced to defer small maintenance until they are
 8   forced to deal with the bigger problem.
 9             The proposed rule would require that
10   signed and dated records be kept describing the work
11   practices, containment,
12   and cleaning for every job.  EPA expects its
13   recordkeeping burden to take no more than five hours
14   per year.  IRA would strongly argue this
15   recordkeeping will be far more time consuming than
16   the EPA believes.  The proposed rule requires that a
17   certified renovator be present at the work site on a
18   regular basis to oversee work practices but EPA
19   requests comment on whether this individual should
20   be physically present at the work site at all times
21   and whether they should prohibit this individual
22   from being assigned to more than one job at a time.
0107
 1   IRA would argue that such a requirement would be
 2   unnecessary.  Providing oversight by the certified
 3   renovator on a regular basis would be sufficient for
 4   quality control over the project.
 5             The proposed rule does not require EPA be
 6   notified prior to beginning all renovation jobs but
 7   requests comment about whether or not they should
 8   be.  IRA strongly argues that requiring EPA
 9   notification prior to all disturbances of paint over
10   two square feet would be infeasible and result in
11   property owners deferring all maintenance until such
12   time they could take care of all their jobs at the
13   same time to consolidate notification.  We urge EPA
14   to stick with the proposal to not require such
15   notification.
16             The proposed rule talks a lot of fees for
17   applicants' training.  IRA urges the EPA to make the
18   training for certified renovators free for some
19   period of time to help with the creation of this
20   type of worker.  EPA and HUD have provided free
21   training for many of their other rules which have
22   been helpful in gaining compliance.  IRA urges the
0108
 1   EPA to do the same with this rule.  The proposed
 2   rule does not require dust clearance sampling after
 3   each renovation project.  IRA fully supports the
 4   reason EPA has used not to require this testing.
 5   Dust sampling is very expensive and time consuming.
 6   While waiting for test results the renovation area
 7   would have to remain unoccupied creating a
 8   tremendous burden on property owners and residents.
 9   Such requirement would absolutely result in deferred
10   maintenance and deteriorating properties.  We
11   strongly urge EPA to stand by their decision to not
12   require dust clearance sampling on renovation jobs.
13   Thank you for your time.
14             MR. LIVINGSTON:  I'd just like to make a minute of comments
15   just to clarify some things.  We're not talking
16   about abatement.  We're talking about maintenance
17   practices.  Abatement is a different subject.  If we
18   are talking about abatement, abatement means
19   removing all of the lead paint.  What we're talking
20   about is maintenance.  It is not true by any
21   measurement that doing lead-safe work practices
22   increase the cost of a job by 20 or 30 percent.
0109
 1   It's absolutely not true.  I've done hundreds and
 2   hundreds of jobs and what I'm doing is exactly what
 3   I did before using different tools and creating a
 4   situation where I have much less clean-up at the end
 5   because I'm cleaning up as I go and I'm masking
 6   areas that will absorb dust, so my clean-up costs go
 7   down, my safety goes up, and I wind up costing
 8   approximately the same thing but maybe four or five
 9   percent more, maybe four or five percent less, but I
10   guarantee there's no 20 or 30 percent unless you
11   compare maintenance with abatement and we're not
12   doing that.
13             I wrote the book for the National Parks
14   Service on lead-safe historic restoration.  There is
15   no historic restoration process that demands burning
16   or unvacuum attached sanding.  We don't need to make
17   exceptions.  As a matter of fact, there's a bunch of
18   new techniques that include benign strippers, steam
19   stripping, closed planing with vacuums, sanding and
20   infrared removal that are far superior, far safer
21   and far cheaper.  So these are not adding a burden
22   of cost and they are very simple and I would plead
0110
 1   for you to turn this document you've written into
 2   English.  It's very simple.  Don't burn or machine
 3   sand, contain your mess, clean-up your mess and
 4   measure how well you've cleaned it up.  That's what
 5   this is about.  That's all this is about.
 6   Exaggerating these things doesn't serve anybody.
 7   And by the way, the people who go to the visual
 8   inspector training get more training, more training,
 9   by about four fold of doing dust tests than the
10   people who are inspectors because there's so many
11   other things they do.
12             This is a very, very simple way of
13   basically making maintenance of older houses safe
14   for workers and for the occupants and we don't have
15   to move everybody out of every house every time we
16   do this.  These are all straw men.  This isn't the
17   real world.  We just want to train the workers to
18   work more cleanly.  This is what your mother would
19   tell you.  Thank you.
20        MS. MORTIMER:  Anybody else wish to speak at
21   this time?
22        MS. DOA:  Well, again, thank you so much for
0111
 1   your time and for the comments that you've provided.
 2   I think quite a number of issues were brought up for
 3   EPA to seriously think about and of course we're
 4   going to think about all the comments very
 5   seriously.  Again, right now please get in your
 6   written comments by the 10th of April and if there
 7   is an extension there will be a Federal Register
 8   notice and check our website and if you have written
 9   copies of anything to give it to Amy that would also
10   be great.  Thank you very much.
11               (The meeting was adjourned)
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0112
 1              CERTIFICATE OF NOTARY PUBLIC
 2   
 3         I, TEAGUE GIBSON, do hereby certify that I
 4   reported in shorthand the proceedings had at the
 5   meeting aforesaid, and that the foregoing is a
 6   true, complete, and accurate transcript of the
 7   proceedings at said meeting as appears from my
 8   stenographic notes so taken and transcribed under
 9   my personal direction, this 29th day of March, 2006.
10   
11         TEAGUE GIBSON, Notary Public in and for
12         the State of Maryland.
13         _____________________________
14   
15         My commission expires:  October 1, 2007