When Nancy Pavur received the National Lead Star Award two weeks ago, it marked a milestone on a long and painful road.

  The prestigious honor, one of 10 given nationwide by the National Lead-Safe Housing and Indoor Environmental Health Conference and Expo, was bestowed upon the New Orleans resident for outstanding service in working for lead-poisoning prevention. Now more than two years into her role as an activist, Pavur’s initial call to arms came from a tragedy at home. In the spring of 1999, she and her husband, Jim, contracted a painting crew to paint their home, a 75-year-old Faubourg St. John residence. When the sanding of the walls in preparation for the job began – in effect releasing microscopic particles of lead into their air – the problems also began. Their Labrador retriever mix, Hero, died of lead poisoning. Their three children, all under 6 at the time, were hospitalized and given lead-lowering treatment and are still regularly treated by physicians to monitor the lead’s lingering effect.

  Asked to sum up her emotions regarding the scope of events, Pavur says, "We’re ambivalent because not enough work has been done. The ordinance still hasn’t been enacted."

  The ordinance Pavur refers to is one advocates in City Hall and the community have been working to draft into law for more than a year and a half: a ban on sanding to help place further controls on hazards that contribute to lead poisoning. The issue is again drawing attention in the wake of a study conducted by Felicia Rabito, an epidemiologist at Tulane’s School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine. The results of the study, released in late April, revealed that 25 percent of children tested in New Orleans public health clinics carry toxic levels of lead in their bloodstream, a rate roughly six times the national average. Upon the report’s release, city officials – from City Attorney Mavis Early to City Councilman Eddie Sapir – promised to take action. Pavur is waiting.

The lead hazard is particularly acute in New Orleans. Similar to other older cities, the street design brings major thoroughfares into neighborhoods. With lead not banned in gasoline until 1986, five tons of lead per year were estimated to be emitted into the environment at major intersections. A large reservoir of non-biodegradable lead emitted from traffic remains, now settled in the soil of yards and other play areas, where it will forever remain. Another source of danger comes from paint, in which lead was banned in 1978. With an estimated 40 percent of the housing stock in New Orleans built before 1950, many homes here have lead-contaminated paint, a situation compounded by the condition of many of these homes, deteriorating and vacant dwellings with peeling paint.

  The threat of poisoning from microscopic, breathable particles of lead released from paint will be alleviated if Linda Calvert and her assembled crew of concerned citizens have their way. Calvert, director of the Mayor’s Office of Environmental Affairs, has coordinated the efforts of a consortium of citizens, composed of university professors, home builders, parents and nonprofit groups. They have worked informally under the loose title of "Lead Working Group," designing an amendment to the city’s existing ordinances regulating lead hazards. Their goal is to bring New Orleans to the protection level created with a ban on unconfined dry sanding in other older cities such as Boston and San Francisco, that share New Orleans’ lead problems with regard to an aging housing stock.

  "The dangers of lead have existed for hundreds of years," Calvert says. "But it’s a denial thing for most people; they don’t really realize or understand its huge effects. But when people hear Nancy’s story, or stories like that, it really grabs them and they become activists."

  The Mayor’s Office of Environmental Affairs, however, is a policy office, not one with the authority to create or enforce regulation. So, despite the efforts of Calvert and her peers, the group is confined to the role of making suggestions to the powers-that-be and waiting for action to be taken.

  The fine-tuning of the proposed amendment now rests in the office of City Attorney Mavis Early. Early is charged with the cumbersome task of evaluating the proposal in comparison with the established efforts of cities, and – more importantly – figuring out if the ban on sanding in private dwellings is feasible, enforceable and affordable. Would painters and homeowners follow the regulations? Is there available staff, funding and resources to enforce the ban? What city agency would be charged with enforcement? "You have to know what you can enforce," Early says, adding that these questions must be further explored before the amendment is drafted and that, right now, she favors a scaled-down amendment that can be enlarged periodically to deal with problems not yet realized. She is scheduled to make a presentation to the City Council at its June 21 meeting. "We hope to have something in final form by then," Early says, "but if not, we will at least provide them with a status report."

Lead affects young children the most. Vulnerable due to the lack of a fully developed brain and nervous system, lead-poisoned children suffer from myriad effects, including learning disabilities, violent behavior, lowered IQs, attention deficit disorder, reading difficulties, and seizures. The effects are permanent. To a lesser extent, adults are also susceptible to lead poisoning, with resultant health problems including high blood pressure, memory loss and impotence in males.

  Despite a lack of lead legislation, the city has been aggressive in educating the community on the dangers of lead poisoning. The latest bills from the Sewerage and Water Board contained a warning on the dangers of lead poisoning for children. Councilman Eddie Sapir, in addition to talks to school and community groups, is currently airing a show on local access television focusing on the dangers of lead poisoning, complete with extensive research and interviews with local experts.

  Currently, the city’s most aggressive arm in combating the problem is the Lead Poisoning Prevention Program, headed up by Program Director Connie Daniels. Daniels says that, since 1972, the department has been active in the community, holding free blood lead screenings and workshops and seminars in schools, churches and community groups, as well as in the city’s seven well-baby clinics. When a child is discovered to have an elevated level of lead in their bloodstream, Daniels says, the city "immediately and automatically" performs a home investigation, removing the lead hazard while educating the parents to the problem.

  Despite the city’s extensive campaign to combat lead poisoning, there seems to have been one lapse. In 1992, the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) passed its Title X, which was hailed by supporters as the most comprehensive lead poisoning prevention legislation in decades. Title X banned dry sanding in housing supported by federal funding and has since enacted grant programs to assist cities to meet their lead-free standards. According to the National Center for Lead Safe Housing (NCLSH), a private, nonprofit advocacy group based in Washington, D.C., HUD established training assistance grants in September 1999 as part of this process, with a deadline of September 2000 for cities to apply.

  According to NCLSH, the Housing Authority of New Orleans (HANO) – unlike agencies in 600 other cities – failed to apply for the grant, though New Orleans is ranked 13th on NLCSH’s list of cities with the biggest threat of lead poisoning for children. Andreanecia Morris, a HANO manager, says that although she is unaware of the training assistance programs, HANO "is in complete compliance with all of HUD’s regulations."

  For now, New Orleans’ activists stand as the most effective source of combating the problem. Perhaps most distinguished among them is Howard Mielke, a professor of environmental toxicology at Xavier University. An internationally recognized expert in the field, Mielke has written extensively on the subject and has testified before the United States Senate. He began to study the problem after performing research for the state’s Department of Health and Hospitals studies in the early 1990s and went on to form Lead Lab in 1992, a New Orleans-area activist group. Mielke believes that in many areas of the city, the rate of children with toxic levels of lead in their blood hovers around 30 percent, above the 25 percent discovered in Rabito’s study. "We have a serious problem here in New Orleans," he says. "If a city isn’t safe for children, then it isn’t safe for anyone."

  Mielke adds that, along with legislation and education, new technology is being developed that would eliminate the necessity of dry sanding. Global Encasement Inc., a New Jersey-based firm, has patented what they dub "LeadLock." This technology presents a tough, non-toxic applied coating of paint that requires no sanding, instead providing a waterproof seal suitable for interior and exterior painting. Its adhesive quality seals in all the lead-contaminated paint already applied to the surface. According to a company representative, Global Encasement was given the contract for renovation of the state-owned, 150-year-old Pontalba Apartments. Since rotary sanding is prohibited by the Vieux Carre Commission to help preserve the historic building’s architectural definition, the Global Encasement product was ideal. Mielke says this process has the approval of the Environmental Protection Agency and is durable, coming with a 20-year guarantee. He adds that while the paint is more expensive (roughly $40 a gallon compared to the standard $25), the lack of prep work needed saves in labor costs. Soon every major paint company will offer such paints, Mielke predicts.

Stuck in the middle of this controversy are painters, who strive to deliver homeowners the lowest price for a project, but could now face a law that would require a labor intensive and costly process. Scott Coulombe, executive vice president for the Home Builders Association of Greater New Orleans and an active member of Calvert’s Lead Working Group, says there is great potential for abuse if the legislation is not carefully drafted.

  "What we don’t want is to have a knee-jerk reaction that would make the process so cost-prohibitive that no one could afford to remodel their home," Coulombe says. "We’re not trying to put anybody out of business; we’re trying to raise awareness of the issue."

  Coloumbe works to achieve his goal through the education of homeowners and contractors. The Remodeler’s Council affiliated with his group performs a specialized area of construction, and those members are constantly educated on new techniques to help make sanding practices safer. Such methods include attaching a vacuum to the sander and covering the work area with tarps to prevent the particles from entering the outside environment. Members are also required to provide homeowners with a form informing them of the lead-based paint in their home and the potential dangers involved with dry sanding.

  One potential problem Coloumbe anticipates with a ban on sanding is with unaffiliated remodelers who win the contract of home but might not follow the required, and more costly, techniques. He adds that Orleans Parish does not require a license for remodeling, and that Jefferson Parish is the only one in Louisiana that does, and that’s for a job of $2500 or more.

  A lack of concern and education are major barriers to action being taken against lead poisoning prevention, Coloumbe says. He tells a story of a meeting of Louisiana home builders where he was addressing the group on the danger of dry sanding and the need to further implement training to help painters develop other, safer methods. After his talk, a group member responded, in all sincerity, with her opinion that the ban on lead paint was part of a government conspiracy to help assist satellite spying of private homes.

  Coloumbe says such ignorance is still a major part of the problem. "People need to understand that nobody is making this up," he says. "We have to change the perception of the homeowner and let everyone know that you simply cannot dry sand your house. Children are the issue. Children are being poisoned." .