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Posted on 09/29/2009 5:13:13 PM PDT by sbMKE
Nov. 29, 2006 – In the ongoing battle to eradicate lead poisoning, state and local governments have begun targeting the companies that sold toxic paint before it was banned for residential use in 1978. This week, grassroots activists are taking that fight to the streets. Toolbox Email to a Friend Print-friendly Version Add to My Morning Paper
Even though lead-laced pigment was taken off the market almost three decades ago, about one in four homes in the US still contains deteriorating lead paint or dust, according to the US Department of Housing and Urban Development.
"The federal government has provided money over the past ten years to help clean up the mess," said Ralph Scott, a director of the Alliance for Healthy Homes, an organization that works to eliminate home hazards like carbon monoxide and lead.
Scott noted the millions of dollars homeowners have spent to remove lead from their properties and the untold number of children poisoned by the substance. "Everyone is paying the price except one stakeholder," he said, "and that’s the pigment companies."
To pressure paint companies to increase funding for lead-paint clean up, the national grassroots group ACORN plans to protest at the offices and stores of paint giant Sherwin-Williams. The demonstrations will take place Thursday in cities including Little Rock, Arkansas and Atlanta, Georgia and Hartford, Connecticut.
The group said protests will also be held in Toronto and Vancouver, Canada; Tijuana, Mexico; Lima, Peru and Buenos Aires, Argentina. "Everyone is paying the price except one stakeholder, and that’s the pigment companies."
ACORN is demanding the company establish lead-cleanup funds in cities where housing has high rates of lead hazards. The group also insists Sherwin-Williams provide lead-detection kits to households in high-risk neighborhoods.
Additionally, ACORN wants the company to comply with a 2003 attorneys general agreement requiring paint retailers to provide customers with information about safely repainting and repairing homes that are already painted with lead. ACORN says its own investigators found that 15 out of 40 stores surveyed did not carry the notices, disobeying the agreement.
Sherwin-Williams did not return requests for comment.
"We want better information at the point of sale," said Reverend Gloria Swieringa, who chairs the Maryland branch of ACORN. "We want them to reach into those deep pockets [to help clean up lead-based paint], or we’re going to be encouraging the state to pressure companies, and if necessary, litigate."
According to the Centers for Disease Control, the number of children with elevated lead blood levels has steadily decreased from 122,000 in 1997 to 42,000 in 2004. Black children still have higher rates of lead poisoning than white and Latino children, though the disparity has also decreased over the past decade.
High levels of lead can damage kidneys and the nervous system. Lead exposure can also lead to learning disorders, mental retardation and sometimes death. Lead poisoning primarily affects children because their systems more readily absorb the heavy metal,and they are more likely to be exposed to lead particles on the floor or ground.
In recent years, many states and municipalities have sued paint manufacturers over lead hazards.
In 1999, Rhode Island sued various paint makers, including Sherwin-Williams and DuPont, for not only selling lead paint long after they knew about the substance’s hazards, but also for attempting to cover up the threat of lead poisoning.
In February of this year, a Rhode Island jury ruled the paint manufacturing companies were a "public nuisance" for selling lead-based paint and ordered the companies to clean up homes with lead hazards.
This month, California counties San Mateo and Santa Clara joined in a class-action lawsuit against several paint makers on behalf of public entities that have invested in lead cleanups.
The City of Milwaukee is suing National Lead Industries and local company Mautz Paint in a case going to trial early next year.
Paint-manufacturing companies, however, deny responsibility for the lead problem.
"Litigation is not the answer,'' Bonnie Campbell, a spokesperson for several paint companies including Sherwin-Williams, told the San Jose Mercury News. "These companies are not responsible for risks today from a product made long ago."
But Scott from the Alliance for Healthy Homes has a different take. "They’re the ones that made money off of this and manipulated the public opinion and political system and spent lots of money doing it," he said. "So it seems fair they should be part of the solution."
How much of this money has been shuffled off to ACORN offices in Milwaukee?
Milwaukee city attorney Grant Langley appears to have advised against city and class action suits against the paint companies, yet the city chose to force the issue - under pressure from ACORN?
Remember, Milwaukee is home to aldermen running crime and extortion rings (Michael McGee), Congresswoman Gwen Moore's (D) family running around slashing GOTV van tires in 2004, and many thousands of false voter registrations courtesy of the same ACORN.
A hotbed of corruption.
Like a shakedown of companies.
Phony outrage. It was legal when they made it. They quit making it 30 years ago.
Still, somehow they manage to whip themselves into a fever on demand in hopes of blackmailing somebody into giving them some money for free. Some company, some agency, will put up a pot of money. Somebody like Acorn will get the contract to administer the program. They’ll hire a bunch of folks to study the problem. They’ll paint a few houses. Some of the lawyers will pocket a fat commission. No one will be able to trace where the rest of the money went.
FReep mail me if you want on/off the list.
Hmmm I smell a government conspiracy!!!
;)
"...lead poisoning to “result in significant and serious impairment of academic success, specifically a seven fold increase in failure to graduate from high school, lower class standing, greater absenteeism, impairment of reading skills sufficiently extensive to be labeled reading disability and deficits in vocabulary.."
;)
Pelosi even slipped when she called protestors "astro turf". There was lead found in "astro turf"!
Just sayin'......
absolutely a shakedown
and their next one is pcb’s in caulking
Precisely, nothing but extortion. Milwaukee has been an economic basket case for years. Gotta find some billpayers.
Of course, lead has been used in paint for eons. Nobody knew there was a problem until it became an issue in the 70s. I expect that a lot of the homes in “poor” neighborhoods came into disrepair and the stuff began to peel off the walls. Families ingested it from the dust and/or kids eating it.
When the issue became apparent the paint companies found new formulas and lead was eliminated (except for the Chinese).
So now the lefties want to go after people who made stuff that was perfectly legal at the time it was sold and for which there was no evidence of a lead issue.
Does this sound familiar? We have Onada trying to prosecute CIA interrogators for using “agressive” methods to extract info to keep America safe. And they are doing it simply because they don’t like the techniques—not because it was illegal.
Thanks for posting. I can’t tell you how brave I think you are for still living there. We left in 1970 and never looked back.
Look for ACORN in ‘The People’s Republik of Madistan’ to follow suit.
Guess I kind of jumped out of the frying pan and into the fire, LOL!
If you’re so worried kids will be eating lead paint chips, the inner city folks need to set aside a little cigarette, alcohol and lottery money to buy their kids at least ONE damn meal a day. Lord knows the public schools are giving them breakfast AND lunch for free. Probably an after school snack too.
This whole blame others for stuff done by other companies or for paint done 50-60 years ago is insane. If that paint is still in those buildings, wouldn’t the landlords at least be more responsible than the paint companies? If we have to point fingers at someone? Not saying I would. But do we all have to look at the world like trial lawyers and always automatically go for the entity with supposedly the biggest pockets?
That gif is soooooo good, LOL!
Hey, here’s an idea feed and supervise your kids and they won’t eat paint.
If you are living in a place that hasn’t painted in the last 30 flippin years, you are either a worthless deadbeat, or too stupid to infect the gene pool anyway. Most people paint at least every 10 years or so I would think.....and if you need a paint bid, call 1-555-555-5555.
Do you still have bluegills swimming in lead and pcb-infested waters in Wisconsin? If so, I want them. All of them. Please quick-freeze them, pack them in dry ice and ship to:
I LOVE BLUEGILLS
Po Box: I Ate Wisconsin Bluegills as a kid & Survived
Greenville SC 29654
ps - A big, fat Wisconsin cheesecake sprinkled with AO Smith lead would be a nice touch, too
Thank you.
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