Lead Case Targets Disney Attractions

M-i-c-k-e-y M-o-u-s-e is getting s-u-e-d over l-e-a-d.

Why? Because he is allegedly contaminating small, unsuspecting visitors to Disneyland, the “Happiest Place on Earth,” with the toxic substance.

‘Excessive Levels of Lead’

That is the allegation by the Mateel Environmental Justice Foundation, which has gone to court seeking to force the Disney company to post warning signs about the lead or to cover lead-laced surfaces throughout the 56-year-old theme park in Anaheim, CA.

The nonprofit filed suit in April against Walt Disney Parks & Resorts U.S. Inc., alleging that attractions and locations throughout the park are riddled with lead.

The suit, filed in California Superior Court - Orange County, alleges "excessive levels of lead in such commonly touched objects as the Sword in the Stone attraction," along with brass door knobs at Minnie’s House, stained-glass windows in a door at the entrance to a beauty salon in Cinderella’s Castle,” and other locations.

Injunction Sought

On Friday (Oct. 21), the group filed for an injunction seeking to compel the company to comply with the state’s toxic-chemical notification law. That motion is scheduled for a hearing Nov. 22.

“We are asking the court to force Disney to take steps that should have been taken when we first told them that children at Disneyland are in danger of illegal lead exposures," Mateel president William Verick said in a statement.

In 2010 and 2011, Mateel and the nonprofit Ecological Rights Foundation had individuals conduct "wipe testing" of various surfaces at Disneyland. An independent lab analyzed the test wipes using a National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health protocol, Mateel said.

‘Dozens’ of Locations

“During several visits to Disneyland beginning in June 2010, we found accessible lead at exposures above California safety standards in dozens of objects throughout the park,” Mateel reported. “Under the law, consumers must be warned of lead exposures of more than 0.5 micrograms per day.”

Tested locations showed up to 1,300 micrograms of lead exposure, the group said.

Mateel says it sent two legal notices to Disney, alerting the company to California’s Safe Drinking Water and Toxic Enforcement Act of 1986 (known as Prop 65), which requires “clear and reasonable” notification of consumers exposed to chemicals, including lead, known to cause cancer or reproductive harm.

It says the company ignored the notices.

Disney: ‘Full Compliance’

Disney says it is not violating the law. “We have not seen the papers that we are told are being filed, so we cannot comment specifically,” a Disney spokeswoman told the Los Angeles Times. “However, we believe that Disneyland Resort is in full compliance with the signage requirements.”

The Center for Environmental Health (CEH) has previously successfully sued Disney over lead in its retail products. Last week, CEH joined Mateel and a third organization at a news briefing about the current suit.

Said CEH Research Director Caroline Cox: “It’s disappointing that a $38 billion company like Disney can’t be bothered to clean up their parks so they’re safe for children.”

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National Lead Poisoning Prevention Week

October 23-29, 2011

Lead-Free Kids for a Healthy Future

Today, childhood lead poisoning is considered the most preventable environmental disease among young children, yet an estimated 250,000 U.S. children have elevated blood-lead levels. A simple blood test can prevent permanent damage that will last a lifetime. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), is committed to eliminating this burden to public health.

National Lead Poisoning Prevention Week (NLPPW)

CDC and HHS share the goal of eliminating childhood lead poisoning in the United States. NLPPW occurs every year during the last full week in October (Senate. Resolution 199). During NLPPW, CDC aims to:

• Raise awareness about lead poisoning;
• Stress the importance of screening the highest risk children younger than 6 years of age (preferably by ages 1 and 2) if they have not been tested yet;
  
• Highlight partner’s efforts to prevent childhood lead poisoning; and
• Urge people to take steps to reduce lead exposure.

During NLPPW, many states and communities offer free blood-lead testing and conduct various education and awareness events. For more information about NLPPW activities in your area, please contact your state or local health department.

Every year, CDC, in partnership with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), develops posters in observance of National Lead Poisoning Prevention Week (NLPPW). The posters are free for downloading by states and communities. In addition, we have developed a NLPPW Campaign Toolkit to encourage information-sharing, collaboration, and promotion of NLPPW and lead poisoning prevention in general.

improveit! 360 and Kachina Lead Paint Solutions Partnership!

PRESS RELEASE

improveit! 360 and Kachina Lead Paint Solutions Announce Partnership to Help Remodelers Stay RRP Compliant; Avoid Fines

improveit! 360 integrates Kachina RRP compliance forms in its business management application for easy compliance with RRP federal/state laws and regulations.

Columbus, Ohio – October 3, 2011 – improveit! 360, the nation’s premier web-based business management application for remodelers and contractors, announced its partnership with Kachina Lead Paint Solutions. This alliance was formed to make it easier for home improvement businesses to comply with RRP regulations, receive expert help and maintain the use of the most updated RRP forms.

Kachina Lead Paint Solutions, nationally accredited by the EPA to provide resources and training in lead-safe practices in all 50 states, sought a partner to help home improvement companies gain access to guidance as well as the latest forms needed to be RRP compliant. With extremely busy schedules, it is easy for contractors and remodelers to miss regulations passed that affect the industry, and the steps to take to make sure those laws are followed. “We were looking for an effective way to extend our reach into home improvement companies to assist more remodelers to keep up with regulations, make it easy for them to get the forms they need to be compliant, and maintain these important documents in one place. Our answer was improveit! 360,” said Paul Toub, Vice President of Marketing for Kachina Lead Paint Solutions.

improveit! 360 offers home improvement companies a simple and streamlined approach to tracking and maintaining all mandatory lead paint compliance paperwork. improveit! 360 can easily track important compliance details such as:
-Which staff members are certified renovators;
-When RRP documents are received on a sale;
-When RRP compliance is required based on the age of the structure.

By integrating Kachina’s RRP forms into improveit! 360, remodelers can be confident that all RRP compliance documents and certifications will be organized and easily accessible, leaving them with one less item to worry about so they can focus more on their business. Customers can opt to use the premier support service, which gives them access to Kachina compliance experts to answer their questions, and the opportunity to receive discounts on additional items related to compliance, such as Renovate Right pamphlets.

Kachina’s RRP documents can be easily stored on the customer record within improveit! 360 so compliance information is centrally located and easily available should an audit occur.

“Our Business Management application already lowers the cost and time required to manage RRP compliance. Integrating Kachina’s forms and guidance takes compliance enforcement and tracking to a new level, not to mention helps to prevent costly fines, lawsuits, and headaches. As two companies that started by contractors for contractors, Kachina and improveit! 360 are looking out for the best interest of home remodelers.”

About improveit! 360

Developed by home improvement industry experts for remodelers and contractors, improveit! 360 is a total business management application designed to control chaos, accelerate growth, lower costs and improve operational efficiencies. With improveit! 360, home improvement companies are able to close more leads while reducing their marketing costs, automate communications, track every customer interaction from one centralized location, and get a 360^o view of their operation for better decision-making. Built on the force.com platform, the application is remotely accessible via the web, highly secure, reliable and scalable. For more information and a free trial, visit http://www.improveit360.com or email info (at) improveit360 (dot) com. To see improveit! 360 in action, watch our webinars at http://www.improveit360.com/Webinars.

About Kachina Lead Paint Solutions

Kachina was founded as a one-stop resource for contractors to be in compliance with the lead paint laws from classroom training to real-world implementation. In addition to training over 40,000 contractors since October 2009, Kachina has developed a copyrighted version of the EPA’s Renovate Right Pamphlet. This allows contractors to be in compliance with the law while using the pamphlet as a marketing tool. Kachina also has all of the equipment and supplies contractors need to follow Lead Safe Work Practices. The company’s copyrighted forms ensure Lead Safe Business Practices and are widely used by contractors of all sizes. For more information, visit http://www.kachinaleadpaintsolutions.com or call 1-888-800-5224.

Contact

Traci Snyder

improveit! 360

Phone: 866-421-3360

Email: tsnyder@improveit360.com

Berenson LLP Gives an Understanding the Recent LRRP Changes

Understanding the Recent LRRP Changes

On October 4, 2011, the latest changes to the EPA’s Lead Renovation, Repair and Painting Rule (LRRP) go effective. Finalized last month, this latest round of changes continues to showcase the inability of the EPA to understand their own law or the industry to which the law applies. That said, here is a brief summary of the changes most relevant to the remodeling and home improvement industry:

Proposed Dust Wipe Sampling. The previously proposed change to LRRP that would have required a new dust wipe clearance test by a new specially licensed worker -- to be performed after the lead-safe work practices were completed -- has been cancelled. Despite claims by certain trade organizations that this was the result of their lobbying efforts, the fact is that this proposal was dead once the Congressional makeup changed last fall. A number of states had warned the EPA against enacting this “super cleaning” requirement as being unnecessary and unduly burdensome, even threatening to support a defunding of the EPA budget in regard to lead paint regulations.

The applicable statement from the EPA was as follows: "After carefully weighing all available science and considering the public comments, EPA has concluded that the current lead-safe work practices and clean up requirements will protect people from lead dust hazards and therefore it is not necessary to impose lead-dust testing or clearance requirements in the Lead Renovation, Repair and Painting rule (LRRP).”

Lead Paint Lab Analysis. Certified Renovators, instead of conducting their own lead paint test, may submit a lead paint chip to an independent laboratory for analysis. The EPA will be providing details on how this may be accomplished, but in the real world this is unlikely to be of much use to the majority of the industry, given the increased cost, complexity, and time that such a procedure will require when compared to the test kits currently available.

What Is a Painted Surface? For a number of years our firm has sought to defend certain clients under EPA audit by asserting that the job(s) in question did not actually involve a “painted surface”. The concept was that the EPA had never defined what a “painted surface” was, and by its plain meaning that term should only apply to a surface that has paint on it (as opposed, for example, to a sink or tub or gutter, which are not generally painted). Apparently in an effort to close down this possible loophole, the new changes to LRRP now state that the term “painted surface” includes any “surface coating”, not just paint.

Unfortunately, the EPA has failed to explain what is meant by a “surface coating” and this is not as simple as it appears. Is an enameled surface on a gutter or downspout a surface coating? What about an enameled tub being pulled on a liner job? Adding further potential confusion into the mix, the EPA’s web page reported some time ago that the EPA would not consider the glaze on ceramic tile to be either a surface coating or a painted surface – and therefore ceramic tile is not subject to LRRP. Yet any tile manufacturer can tell you that glaze is either sprayed or painted on to a ceramic tile, not unlike the manner in which some types of enamel are applied.

Vertical Containment Systems. Vertical containment “or equivalent extra precautions” must be used as part of lead-safe work practices for exterior renovations that affect painted surfaces within 10 feet of the property line. The “or equivalent extra precautions” now means that a contractor is allowed to use almost any type of vertical containment system, from a commercial box structure to scaffolding to a make-shift plastic sheeting lean-to, so long as it contains the dust being created from the renovation. Moreover, as long as the floor containment is tightly sealed to the vertical containment, the floor containment can stop where it meets the vertical containment system, even if that is before the current 6-foot standard for interior floor containment or the 10-foot standard for exterior floor containment.

What to do if conditions are too windy to safely construct or maintain a vertical containment system? EPA helpfully advises the contractor to “reschedule the renovation for a more clement day”.

Of some note for contractors is the fact that the EPA has once again changed the content of the lead paint informational pamphlet, now known as “The Lead Safe Certified Guide to Renovate Right”. Having lost count as to how many times in the past four years the pamphlet has changed, we will simply note that page 10 has been rewritten to better explain what lead-dust testing is to the consumer. There should be no concern, however, about using up your existing stock of pamphlets before going to the newest version.

Finally, as an aside, we are often asked by window clients if second- and third-story window replacements mean that a projecting roof outside the window needs to be covered with plastic sheeting? The answer is no, LRRP does not require that roof surfaces be covered by plastic sheeting. Apparently it is OK for lead dust to sit on a roof, to then be blown around or washed onto a lawn.

Visit www.BerensonLLP.com or www.HomeImprovementLaw.com to learn more!

University to Pay Penalty, Replace Windows in EPA Lead-Paint Case

Washington University, St. Louis, has agreed to pay a $2,778 civil penalty and spend at least $24,998 to replace old windows in its married-student housing units to settle allegations that it failed to disclose the presence of lead-based paint or lead-based paint hazards to tenants prior to the leasing of some of its other housing units.

Under a civil consent agreement filed by the Environmental Protection Agency’s Region 7 office in Kansas City, Kan., the agency said Washington University leased three apartments near its main campus to student tenants in 2008, 2009 and 2010, without disclosing to the tenants that the City of St. Louis Health Department had previously cited the university for lead-based paint violations at those properties in 2000 and 2006.

The settlement alleges that Washington University indicated, in lead-warning statements attached to those property leases, that it had “no knowledge of the presence of lead-based paint or lead-based paint hazards in the units,” EPA said.

EPA said the university also failed to provide tenants with records and reports of the city’s citations of the units.

Those actions violated of the Residential Lead-Based Paint Hazard Reduction Act of 1992 and the Toxic Substances Control Act, which require landlords and sellers of properties built before 1978 to disclose certain types of information about lead-based paint hazards to tenants and buyers prior to a lease or sale. The federal government banned lead-based paint from housing in 1978.

As part of its settlement with EPA, Washington University has agreed to perform a supplemental environmental project that will involve the replacement of approximately 103 old windows in other married-student housing units.

EPA said lead-based paint on surfaces subjected to regular friction, such as windows and door jams, commonly results in the deterioration of the paint and an increase in the presence of lead-paint dust. The project, which will eliminate that particular source of lead-paint dust in these residences, is expected to cost between $24,998 and $31,000.

Click here to learn more!

Lead Paint Laws: Protect Your Remodeling Business

While April 22, 2010 marked the start of the EPA’s law requiring contractors who work in pre-1978 homes that could have lead paint to be certified, many have not. In reality, if you’ve ignored this law, you are at risk. The fines are ruinous – up to $37,500.00 per day, per violation. And in some cases, there can be imprisonment if your actions are proven criminal.

Now, many of you did certify your firms and did take the eight (8) hour course. And, many of you are following “lead safe work practices.” But, believe it or not, you may still be risking these fines and penalties.

Here's why: The registering of your company is relatively simple and only costs $300. The cost of training is also reasonable ($250 as a national average). And, the process of protecting the homeowners and workers with the right equipment and supplies is not necessarily going to break the bank. But, more often than not, we are finding contractors not documenting everything that they’re doing. And without the proper paper trail, all of your good efforts may not help you avoid the penalties.

It is critical that you give every homeowner a copy of the new Renovate Right pamphlet and get a signed acknowledgement form as proof. Keep that on file for six (6) years. And then, there are the forms that you need to complete. The homeowner must receive copies of certain of these forms in a timely manner.

As mentioned above, what is taught in class are “lead safe work practices.” That’s a good 50% of the equation. The other half is “lead safe business practices.”

If you’re not following the law, in whole or in part, don’t risk your business. While the EPA and/or certain states are now beginning to clamp down, you could also be at risk from a civil standpoint – getting sued by a customer or worker.

Author: Paul E. Toub

Paul E. Toub is Vice President of Marketing for KACHINA Lead Paint Solutions and is available to answer any questions about lead paint laws and solutions from Remodeleze members.

Click here to learn more!

Lead Paint Laws: Protect Your Remodeling Business

While April 22, 2010 marked the start of the EPA’s law requiring contractors who work in pre-1978 homes that could have lead paint to be certified, many have not. In reality, if you’ve ignored this law, you are at risk. The fines are ruinous – up to $37,500.00 per day, per violation. And in some cases, there can be imprisonment if your actions are proven criminal.

Now, many of you did certify your firms and did take the eight (8) hour course. And, many of you are following “lead safe work practices.” But, believe it or not, you may still be risking these fines and penalties.

Here's why: The registering of your company is relatively simple and only costs $300. The cost of training is also reasonable ($250 as a national average). And, the process of protecting the homeowners and workers with the right equipment and supplies is not necessarily going to break the bank. But, more often than not, we are finding contractors not documenting everything that they’re doing. And without the proper paper trail, all of your good efforts may not help you avoid the penalties.

It is critical that you give every homeowner a copy of the new Renovate Right pamphlet and get a signed acknowledgement form as proof. Keep that on file for six (6) years. And then, there are the forms that you need to complete. The homeowner must receive copies of certain of these forms in a timely manner.

As mentioned above, what is taught in class are “lead safe work practices.” That’s a good 50% of the equation. The other half is “lead safe business practices.”

If you’re not following the law, in whole or in part, don’t risk your business. While the EPA and/or certain states are now beginning to clamp down, you could also be at risk from a civil standpoint – getting sued by a customer or worker.

Author: Paul E. Toub

Paul E. Toub is Vice President of Marketing for KACHINA Lead Paint Solutions and is available to answer any questions about lead paint laws and solutions from Remodeleze members.

Click here to learn more!