Brooklyn Borough President

BOROUGH PRESIDENT DEMANDS THAT STATE STOP IGNORING ENVIRONMENTAL AND HEALTH CRISIS IN BROOKLYN

Photograph by Kathryn Kirk
Pictured – left to right - Dr. Daisy O’Gorman, Principal of P.S. 274, Craig Wilson, Associate Director of Environmental Health, American Lung Association of the City of New York, Borough President Markowitz, Dr. Edward Fishkin, Medical Director of Woodhull Hospital and various parents and students from P.S. 274.

Fragile lungs and dirty air . . . why doesn’t anybody in Albany care?

Borough President Marty Markowitz, along with parents, educators, and environmental and health experts, visited P.S. 274 in Bushwick today to ask why New York State fails to monitor ozone levels in Brooklyn and demand that ozone monitoring begin immediately. Ozone is a dangerous and potentially deadly pollutant, especially to those suffering from asthma. Due to ozone and other pollutants, Brooklyn neighborhoods, such as Bushwick and Williamsburg, suffer from asthma hospitalization rates three times greater than New York City as a whole, yet Albany sees fit to make Brooklynites rely on ozone readings taken in Staten Island or Queens. There are five ozone monitors in New York City, but none in Brooklyn since 1996. Borough President Markowitz has sent a letter to Governor Pataki asking that this inequity be immediately rectified.

“This is an outrage because Bushwick, and other communities in Brooklyn, suffer from some of the highest asthma rates in the city. With fragile lungs and dirty air in Brooklyn, why doesn’t anybody in Albany care? Governor Pataki and the State Department of Environmental Conservation should act immediately to ensure that Brooklynites can know when ozone levels are at their worst,” Borough President Markowitz said. “We have a responsibility to do everything we can to protect our children and all Brooklynites. I will do everything I can to get Brooklyn’s ozone levels monitored and to ensure that the New York City Department of Health gets this vital information out to those Brooklynites most at risk. No one should ever die from an asthma attack that could have been prevented.”
Health professionals know that ozone inflames peoples’ air ways, which can cause and worsen asthma attacks. Ozone levels depend on weather conditions, industrial emissions and fuel combustion. Even though the city-wide levels of some pollutants have decreased in recent years, the health situation in Northern Brooklyn has gotten worse because the level of ozone and other airborne pollutants has risen. Some suggest that this is due to the amount of fuel burning industry and the large number of commercial garbage trucks that travel daily to waste transfer stations in North Brooklyn.

Given the great variability of ozone production in various neighborhoods, monitoring ground or low level ozone in other boroughs cannot provide the kind of information Brooklyn parents and physicians need to plan activities and manage asthma and respiratory symptoms. “Ozone monitors in other boroughs are not close enough to provide the necessary information,” said Dr. Edward Fishkin, Medical Director of Woodhull Hospital and the founder of the North Brooklyn Asthma Action Alliance. “Numerous studies have correlated asthma symptoms and emergency visits directly to ozone levels and other air pollutants. So it is critical for kids and parents to know when neighborhood ozone levels are high.”

P.S. 274, where at least 13% of its students have asthma, has one of only two New York State air quality monitors in Brooklyn, but the State chooses not to monitor for ozone here or anywhere else in Brooklyn. “With more people living in Brooklyn than any other borough, Brooklynites shouldn’t have to guess each summer day about the safety of the air they are breathing,” said Craig Wilson, Associate Director of Environmental Health, American Lung Association of the City of New York. “Without an air monitor in Brooklyn, people cannot securely know when their neighborhoods have dangerously high ozone levels.”

Unless we take action to fight dangerous ozone levels, we may be setting the stage for even more kids getting asthma. Recent research suggests that ozone can also make non-asthmatics more sensitive to allergens, and may cause new cases of asthma; a potential explanation for why asthma rates are nearly double in cities, and even higher still in neighborhoods such as Bushwick. “A great deal of students in my school have asthma. Even my PTA president and her children suffer from asthma. This is a frightening situation for the entire community,” says Dr. Daisy O’Gorman, Principal of P.S. 274.