Lead poisoning is an issue that hits me close to home. I grew up in a small town where the soil tested in our yards contained lead contamination at levels exceeding the World Health Organization's standards by 10 times. I now have a 1 year old daughter and rent an apartment in one of our city's many pre-1978 houses (I'm not sure how I'll deal with the guilt if my daughter becomes another lead poisoning victim).

I'm wondering whether the young victims lead poisoning disproportionately live in rental properties? I have a strong suspicion that the answer is yes. I'm also guessing that the quality of the housing stock for renters in the area is older (more likely to contain lead) and is in worse condition (and therefore more likely to have flaking lead paint or lead pipe plumbing).

Where are the readily available resources for renters to hold their landlords accountable? Lawsuits are an unlikely to cause systemic change because they're likely to fail ( it's very difficult to prove that a victim consumed paint from the walls of the house owned by that specific landlord + the landlord was negligent).

The EPA, under the Toxic Substances Control Act, does have some useful powers in this area. They can issue fines up to $37,500 to landlords or their contractors for each time and for each day they violate the rules on safe renovation practices ( for a summary see: www.epa.gov/lead/pubs/sbcomplianceguide.pdf ).

Does anyone know the number of violators we've punished in our communities? How does that number compare to tens of thousands of children who have been poisoned in Greater Cleveland since the EPA had the authority to act?

Starting right here, right now is a campaign to capture as much evidence of violations against the TSC Act. We'll provide the EPA video evidence and as much additional information as possible so that they can easily punish violators. Important: Bringing the EPA to bear on a landlord is likely to result in the landlord stopping renovation work on someone's home and may also result in rent prices going up because of the costs of removing lead safely. Here's my take: even low income parents have a responsibility to provide their innocent children a lead safe environment; so either get the renovations done right or take a range of no cost / low cost options to minimize risk such as ample door mats, removing shoes at the door, regularly cleaning floor areas and especially around windows and play areas.

Follow GCBL for future posts to find out how you can participate in this campaign or better still, start your own campaign!