GALVESTON —The city of Galveston will soon start testing all of its parks for lead contamination in response to recent scrutiny of the island’s high numbers of lead poisoning cases.
The parks and their aging play equipment were tested in the mid-1990s. Officials closed two parks in 1993, Menard and Crockett, after soil samples tested positive for high levels of lead.
Problematic equipment was replaced, and all lead contaminated soil was covered with clean soil or grass.
But after flooding and heavy rain, lead can leach back up to the surface, once again giving officials cause for concern.
“We are trying to be proactive,” said Lloyd Renderer, assistant city manager. “We take this seriously.”
Local officials first learned about the island’s lead contamination in the early 1990s. A report released by Houston’s Baylor College of Medicine late last year showed that 20 percent of Galveston children tested still had elevated blood lead levels.
The toxin causes permanent brain damage in young children and has been linked to learning disabilities and attention deficit disorders.
Galveston’s lead contamination was caused mostly by lead-based paint. Two-thirds of the island’s housing stock was built before 1978, when the federal government banned lead in residential paint.
When paint peels off the exterior of a building and falls to the ground, it can contaminate the soil.
Renderer told the city council on Thursday he also planned to make sure the city’s code compliance officers were keeping an eye out for violations of the city’s lead-based paint ordinance.
The regulations, also adopted in the mid-1990s, require people removing exterior paint to get a permit from the city’s planning department. Workers must use drop cloths and cannot do any scraping or sanding in the rain or when wind speeds exceed 15 miles per hour.
City officials said last year they had no record of issuing any permits or handing out any citations for violating the ordinance during the past 10 years.
While the city can regulate exterior paint removal, City Attorney Susie Green told the council she was not sure about the extent of the city’s authority to regulate working involving interior paint, which is likely the biggest source of the poisoning cases.
A subgroup of the city’s lead task force has discussed the possibility of requiring property owners to provide a lead-safe certification before getting city water service. The group also suggested a goal of having all island child care centers tested for lead by 2009.
Although it was not a formal recommendation, task force members also suggested the Galveston Independent School District test at least its elementary campuses for contamination.
When asked whether the district intended to test its properties, Mary Patrick, the district’s executive director of special services, would only say that she would give a report on the issue at the group’s next meeting.
