The first workshop, titled Recovering Lead Contaminated Sites, focused not only on preventing future exposure to this toxic metal, but also getting these sites back into productive use in order to contribute to the economic health of their neighborhoods. The issues addressed in the workshop involved requirements for cleanup, the laws and regulations upon which cleanups are based, and some current innovative clean up strategies. Tools, such as Geographic Information Systems (GIS), useful for assessing neighborhood and community exposure were discussed. Recommendations were made in several categories. The categories were multi-contaminated sites, "how clean is clean," alternative technologies, future contamination, environmental justice and community participation, and community involvement.

Recommendations on how to deal with multi-contaminated sites are:

• Identify sites.
• Immediately stabilize and isolate lead contaminated sites in order to prevent as much exposure as possible.
• Fences or other barriers to the site can serve as interim solutions but those responsible must plan for long term maintenance.
• Regulations should promote long term maintenance of interim solutions through Performance Bonds, or money up-front, and deed restrictions to upkeep interim solutions.

• All exposure sources and different combinations of exposure sources should be considered to allow standards that are flexible to different situations.
• Specific sources known to contribute to the majority of exposure should be prioritized.
• Activities, outreach and education to foster individual responsibility for minimizing lead exposures should be promoted by policy.
• Activities, outreach and education should incorporate business/corporate involvement.
• Considerable thought should be given on how to promote community meetings and local involvement in clean up and regulatory processes.

• More research is needed on alternative technologies for sites contaminated with lead and especially for the more commonly occurring multi-contaminated sites.
• More research into exposure sources and pathways are needed in order to establish safe clean up levels and to determine "how clean is clean."
• Research is also needed to make sure clean up levels are fully protective of health and scientifically defensible.
• Recommendations to prevent future contamination are:

• Develop criteria, e.g. Phase I Assessment Reports, for prevention that include land use considerations, community input, master planning, and land use restrictions.
• Educate the community about preventing future contamination and create a library of materials on environmental quality including information on prevention, clean up, regulations, standards, et cetera.

• The most important and fundamental policy is to involve the community in every aspect of the process of identifying and cleaning up lead hazards in their neighborhoods.
• Use environmental justice and community participation as a policy context for discussing of the Brownfields issue, lead exposure problem, and achieving healthy and sustainable communities.
• It is essential that people in a community be involved in decisions about what to do with lead contamination.
• Any redevelopment strategy must be thoroughly examined to ascertain its guiding vision and potential pitfalls in order to prevent redevelopment strategies another generating hazardous sites or ecologically unsustainable or socially unjust development.
• The debate over clean up standards, environmental regulations, and liability safeguards must proceed from a realistic understanding of the environmental health and safety characteristics of the urban environment.
• Agencies involved in assessing lead exposure or involved in clean up procedures need to institute policies and performance measures that encourage program personnel and policy makers to spend substantive time in neighborhoods as a regular part of their work.
• Thinking of creative community education solutions such as exhibits and fairs is strongly recommended.
• The role and participation of youth in the community can be a very important factor in education about lead exposure, development of strategies for community clean up, and in developing the political will and cohesion within the community to creatively deal with Brownfields problems.
• The NJDEP, NJDOHSS, NJDCA, USEPA or any other agency involved in the issue of lead assessment and clean up should acknowledge community-based planning as a critical methodology for environmental protection and promote its use both inside and outside the agency.
• Through the Brownfields Initiative, agencies can integrate environmental activities and career development with targeted environmental justice and urban revitalization strategies.
• Business and industry could play a more positive role in clean up of Brownfields sites; perhaps corporate involvement could be enhanced by an "Adopt a Site" program, much like clubs and other entities are asked to volunteer to clean up a stretch of highway or beach.
• There is a need to identify creative ways to schedule and to promote community involvement in the regulatory process from the very beginning of clean up activities that may affect them.
• Education is certainly a tool in achieving community involvement. Such education needs to be comprehensive, well thought out, and included in all grade levels.

• Solutions and creative approaches to encourage community involvement where the community faces problems such as poverty or unemployment must be explored. Some examples are
• To overcome problems of logistics in attending meetings, choice of a centralized and convenient site is important.
• Arranging for transportation, such as by car pool, and for childcare on site, perhaps by having parents take turns or by providing payment to teens from the community, can be helpful.
• Providing resources to residents of the community, such as for postage, phone, fax, paper can be necessary for increasing involvement.
• Programs that address clean up of urban neighborhoods need to do everything possible to include jobs and job training for residents.
• Trained workers from the community could do much of the work in remediating sites.
• Project coordinators should include people hired from the urban community
• It is essential that material prepared for the community be "user friendly" and actually sensitive. Agencies need to make sure that information is appropriate, and should use an interpreter if this helps to improve communication.
• Rehabilitation of urban contaminated sites cannot be done in isolation of the multitude of problems in the inner cities. Thus, environmental and health agencies must work closely with other agencies that address social issues and crime problems.
• Overcoming fear and antipathy to outsiders offering advice and help with clean up can be fostered by cultivating local leaders, by being especially sensitive to cultural differences, by being aware of other models of local involvement and approaches that encourage participation.
• Sometimes the costs for residents to participate may be underwritten by grants, private donations, paying for certain tasks to be performed. It is possible for the community to raise some resources through fund raising activities.
• Time can be a problem for some individuals who may have many commitments. Here it may be necessary to make sure that workloads are shared, that meeting times are set with flexibility of schedules for all parties.
• In order to keep interest up, set short-term goals and milestones, be realistic about projected time frames for the process, and keep red tape to the absolute minimum.

Recommendations for training requirements for supervisors and workers are:

• Coordination between EPA and OSHA is needed on the curriculum and amount of training necessary for supervisors and workers to ensure competent work and safe practices during lead abatement of steel structures.
• There is a need for EPA to move quickly to clarify the requirements under Title X. The EPA needs to ensure compliance for air, soil, and water emissions.
• Components of the OSHA Lead in Construction Standard need to be further clarified, such as the credentials, amount of training, and relevant experience of the competent person, supervisors, and workers on lead remediation jobs.

• Potential conflicts between the EPA’s role of protecting the environment and the general population from lead contamination differs from OSHA's responsibility for protecting worker health should be addressed.
• Existing engineering controls, missing from many sites, must be implemented to reduce the high lead concentrations found inside the containment.
• Continued research on state-of-the-art control technology and innovative worker protection techniques is needed to protect both the worker and surrounding environment.
• Related safety and health issues should be considered such as prohibiting certain work practices (i.e. silicosis hazard in sand blasting).
• It is important that research and data collection done by non-regulatory organizations (i.e. Steel Structures Painting Council) be considered by state and federal agencies as they engage in the rule making process.

• OSHA should lower the blood-lead level needed to remove an employee from a lead hazard work site and revise the suitable level at which an employee can be returned to lead work, to reflect the more recent research findings on lead toxicity.
• More frequent testing of workers than the current two-month interval is seen as a necessity for construction activity that is frequently of short duration.

• Modular training is a recommended due to the fact that it involves dividing the courses into discrete levels or "modules," so that additional training for individuals can build on their prior course training without repeating content from a course previously taken.

• Reciprocal agreements between states are needed to standardize regulations and certification requirements and to provide fair competition between states.

• The various responsibilities of the owner of the structure and the contractor in adhering to regulations for preventing environmental contamination and providing for worker safety need to clarification.
• The role of safety supervision and compliance with regulations should be included in the contract specifications.
• The owner, whether a private entity or public agency, should perform an assessment of the structure for the presence of lead. Testing results would facilitate communication to all affected parties, including the surrounding community.
• A history of the structure, including its previous painting and remediation practices, is needed to fully evaluate potential exposure.
• The knowledge, experience, and competence of those who prepare the contracts is extremely important when dealing with lead work practices and requirements for environmental exposure prevention and worker safety.

• Wider dissemination of information on work practices and about lead hazards is needed to help both the workers and the communities understand the situation and how to protect themselves. Print, video, and the Internet are some media to utilize in dissemination.

• Workers need to be involved in their own safety. One way of accomplishing this would be to have a worker with advanced training in lead practices act as a liaison to management.
• Safety committees comprised of both management and workers should be formed and utilized at the job site.

• Liability, insurance and bonding are of great concern will be a focus of the last workshops titled Brownfields: Issues of Liability, Insurance And Finance.

• The members of the local community need to be notified as soon as the planning begins for remediation of structures that might present a lead hazard.
• The responsibility for notification rests with the owner of the structure or those acting on behalf of the owner.
• Timely and adequate notice of intent to go forward with a remediation project is of paramount importance.
• A suggestion is for the owner or their representative to notify the county clerk, municipal clerk and community of their intent to prepare and repaint a large steel structure that may be coated with lead paint during the time when the plans are being developed and specifications are being written.
• The notice should specify the structure being worked on, the scope of the project and how long it is expected to take.
• Responsible parties must allow the community time to respond.
• Copies of the current guidelines should be made widely and readily available to the residents and community officials.
• Base line lead levels should be gathered from the surrounding area and included in the notification. This data should be compared to similarly gathered data at the end of the project to enable evaluation that the structure was properly repaired and repainted without an increase of lead in the area.
• Large-scale projects require substantially more than simply notifying the community around the project that the renovation is going to take place. The public may need to be consulted and involved more directly in the decision process about the project.
• For large-scale projects it may behoove the owners to bring in experts in community outreach and risk communication.
• Risk communication is very important. Listening to the concerns, fears, and suggestions of the public is the first step in building a relationship of trust. Trust is crucial to the collaborative process.

Recommendations dealing with the Brownfields process are:

• Brownfields must be separated from Superfund in order to expedite clean up.
• Brownfields coordination program in Region II should be developed.

• Identify and categorize Brownfields sites.
• As the sites are being identified, the Brownfields program should look at the possible impacts on surrounding communities as well as the site-specific assessment.
• A systematic plan is that includes a time line with beginning steps, milestones to monitor progress as well as make revisions, and end points for assessing clean up and providing project closure is needed.
• Assess the site using methods that save time and are more cost effective, such as doing using on-site-field techniques as the clean up progresses.
• Upon a project’s completion, proper deed documentation of the site’s clean up level is required and should be verified in order to protect future purchasers, and prevent accidents and misuse of sites in the future.
• Requiring that upon project completion, the developers demonstrate that it is cleaned up can monitor the final quality of the clean up
• From the onset through concluding a project, policy should promote stakeholders to work in a partnership and look at various aspects and perspectives.
• Laws should promote increased cooperation among all stakeholders. Increased cooperation among governmental agencies is also strongly encouraged.
• Grants need to be looked into to create partnerships and bring stakeholders together to jointly work in a structured body like in a Brownfields task force.
• Creative solutions need to be further explored and presented. More input from public/private partnerships can provide more choices for policy decisions and steer policy in a more promising direction for more stakeholders.

• Research is required to find out what insurance products are available.

• Seminars and workshops should be held to educate the real estate industry, the banking industry, the developers and government about insurance products and options
• The following incentives should be examined for implementation: revolving loan funds, targeted tax credits for successful clean up, and federal tax credits.
• Policy should continue to encourage clean ups through incentives and also do forward planning through looking into creating a tax on hazardous materials with a dedicated fund. The tax would be on the manufacturers and users of the hazardous material products. The money collected from the tax can be used to fund grants.
• Policy makers need to revisit how the clean up level is defined. The standard setting clean up of a site should move from being based on intended use to a more health-based standard.

Policy should address the effects of hazardous pollution on our country’s children through their developmental stages.

Due to lead’s widespread historical use in farming, industry, and in gasoline, it is one of the most commonly found toxic pollutants in the many contaminated sites in New Jersey. To explore strategies for dealing with lead contamination in abandoned industrial and waste sites, known as "Brownfields," for minimizing exposure when remediating bridges and other large steel structures painted with lead-based paint, and for investigating liability and insurance issues and innovative financial incentives for cleanup of lead, the Interagency Task Force convened a series of three workshops. These forums, managed by the Ecopolicy Center of Rutgers University, involved a cross section of community leaders, health and environmental scientists, experts in lead toxicology, agency officials, and others from private industry and labor, interested in the prevention of lead poisoning.

The report, titled Brownfields and Steel Structures: Strategies for Addressing Lead Clean up, summarizes discussions at the workshops and presents recommendations on issues related to lead contaminated sites, simplifying government requirements and clarifying standards for training remediation workers and for determining "how clean is clean," the role of the community, and needed changes or new initiatives in policy. The report was written collaboratively by Robert K. Tucker, Sally Henry, Joan Cook Luckhardt, and Sheri Seminski. This executive summary briefly introduces the topics discussed and presents the recommendations from each of the three forums. The report and executive summary have been made possible by a grant from the Office for Prevention of Mental Retardation and Developmental Disabilities at the Department of Health.
 
 

It is in society's long term best interest to come up with creative solutions to address strategies for clean up of contaminated sites and steel structures. An easy fix to overcome the challenges of the present and the future does not exist. By recognizing and addressing the issues and recommendations presented in full policy report titled Brownfields and Steel Structures: Strategies for Addressing Lead Clean up, lead clean up of Brownfields and steel structures can continue to improve and move forward into the future.