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From the Baltimore Sun
Park's safety questioned
Parents ask about threat to children from arsenic at Swann Park
By Nicole Fuller
sun reporter
April 23, 2007
Could exposure to arsenic contribute to medical conditions such as
chronic asthma, bronchitis or sleep apnea? Could high school football
players pounding on contaminated dirt six days a week in practice, then
eating sunflower seeds out of their dirty hands, have ingested enough
of the poisonous chemical to worry about unforeseen health consequences?
Those were some of the questions raised yesterday afternoon at Digital
Harbor High School, where about 25 people attended an informational
meeting on the closing of South Baltimore's Swann Park because of
arsenic contamination in the soil.
Swann Park, which the city Health Department closed Thursday, sits next
to an industrial site where the former Allied Chemical Corp. used
arsenic to manufacture pesticides before it closed in 1976. The company
merged in 1999 with Honeywell, which disclosed the recent findings of
arsenic levels more than 100 times higher than considered safe.
Officials including Mayor Sheila Dixon and the city health
commissioner, Dr. Joshua M. Sharfstein, attempted to reassure the
audience of neighborhood residents and representatives from the school
- which has for decades held many of its sports teams' home games and
practices on the field at Swann Park - that answers will come from a
three-pronged investigation into the possible health implications,
environmental consequences and the nondisclosure of the contamination
for more than 30 years.
"We need to get to the bottom of it," said Dixon, who added that
environmental tests would be performed on other city parks as a
safeguard.
Dixon would not rule out future legal action on behalf of the city.
Tanya Smith's concerns were more immediate. For the past four years,
the baseball diamond at Swann Park has served as the grounds for
practice and games for her son, John Smith III, captain of the baseball
team at Digital Harbor.
She said her son practiced at the park the day before the city closed
it; she would like him to be tested for arsenic.
"They play hard. They eat dirt. And they get cut constantly. ... And
the cleats are bogged down with soil, so it is a great concern for all
of us," she said.
The city has asked an agency of the U.S. Department of Health and Human
Services to investigate risks posed by the arsenic. Tests by Honeywell
this month, and turned over to the state April 19, showed arsenic
levels of up to 2,200 parts per million.
The park was closed in 1976 when the pesticide kepone, manufactured by
Allied, was found in the soil. But a panel of federal, state and local
health officials allowed the park to be reopened that year - even
though tests showed high levels of arsenic there.
Experts say arsenic can cause cancer and lower IQs in children with
prolonged exposure, and kepone is a toxic nerve-damaging agent.
The testing of the park's soil this month was prompted by 31-year-old
Allied company reports turned over to the state this month as part of
negotiations for a new cleanup of the factory site on nearby Race
Street.
The confidential internal reports show that Allied tested the park in
1976 and found arsenic levels of up to 6,600 parts per million behind
home plate of a baseball diamond. But according to a memo obtained by
The Sun, the state health director at the time wanted discussions about
the pollution kept quiet.
Honeywell, which merged with Allied's successor in 1999, turned over
Allied's documents about the pollution site to the state and city April
4.
Allied Chemical manufactured pesticides at 2000 Race St., just north of
Swann Park and beside the Middle Branch of the Patapsco River, from the
1930s until 1976. In 1958, it dumped 200 tons of chromium -
carcinogenic waste from a chrome plant near Fells Point - next to the
park. The Race Street factory closed in 1976, and the city bought the
land in 1977 to facilitate construction overhead of Interstate 95.
Sandra Meyers lived at 213 W. Macomb St., adjacent to the park, from
1987 to 1999 and said she remembers receiving letters from the
Environmental Protection Agency about every two years alerting
residents that soil tests were being performed, and if anything turned
up, the federal agency would let them know.
Meyers, attending the meeting, said she called the EPA once about 12
years ago, when her son, Ryan, was 4 and doctors said his chronic
asthma and bronchitis might be "environment-related."
"We never heard back from them," Meyers said. "The flier said we could
be contacted if there was any problem, and we were never contacted, so
I thought everything was OK."
nicole.fuller@baltsun.com
Copyright © 2007, The Baltimore Sun