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Early next month New York City will introduce regulations aimed at inept workmen and careless landlords who are stirring a lethal cloud of asbestos. But the situation is likely to remain chaotic, saddling New Yorkers with a health hazard for years to come.
For one thing, critics charge that the city's asbestos law has already been watered down by New York's powerful real estate lobby. Then, there are the asbestos cleanup companies that are creating more perils then they solve. And, not surprising, investors and tenants are beginning to see buildings with asbestos as liability land mines.
City full of asbestos
From skyscrapers like One World Trade Center down to faceless apartment buildings, New York buildings are full of asbestos. "Since the turn of the century, 30 million tons of asbestos has been put into place," says Dr. Irving Selikoff, the nation's key expert on asbestos hazards. "It's a problem that's going to have all sorts of fallout."
State and federal agencies have been blind to much of the fallout, so last winter New York City approved ligislation to regulate asbestos work. Since then, city staff members have been drafting the law's regulations, which will take effect in December.
"The city has passed a law, but there are no real guts to it yet," says Edward Swoszowski, an in-door air-quality consultant based in Norwalk, Conn. "Asbestos is a ticking time bomb -- especially in New York because the architecture is so complex and the use of asbestos so varied."
Supporters of the city legislation, led by Carol Bellamy, former council president, lobbied for a sweeping survey to identify asbestos hazards across the city. But that proposal, opposed by Mayor Koch and real estate groups, was cut out of the bill.
The approved law dealt strictly with asbestos in renovation and demolition work. But as a concession, the Koch administration did agree to hire Dr. Selikoff to conduct an 18-month study of potential hazards caused by undisturbed asbestos in New York City buildings.
Now, however, Dr. Selikoff and his colleagues at Mount Sinai Medical Center are out of the picture. Instead, the city Department of Environmental Protection intends to seek proposals from anyone who wants to bid on the research project.
Certainly, the municipal corruption...