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Toxic Lead Paint Found in South Slope Day Care Center

By Leslie Albrecht | October 16, 2014 8:47am
 The Shirley Chisholm Day Care Center on 14th Street tested positive for lead-based paint and asbestos.
Lead Paint Found at Shirley Chisholm Day Care Center
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PARK SLOPE — A South Slope day care center that's served low-income children since 1995 contains dangerous levels of lead paint, according to a recent building inspection obtained by DNAinfo New York.

Inspectors found lead paint — a toxin that can cause health problems and harm brain development in very young children — on walls, windows, doors, railings and radiators inside the Shirley Chisholm Day Care Center at 14th Street and Sixth Avenue, the report by a private environmental testing firm shows.

Readings taken at the day care building in February 2014 revealed nearly 60 places where the amount of lead was "well above" the level allowed under state and federal laws, according to the inspection.

The toxic paint was discovered in a room marked "infant's closet," in a children’s bathroom, on door frames in the building's lobby and in a kitchen, among other places, according to the report.

A spokesman for the Administration for Children's Services, which contracts with Shirley Chisholm Day Care to run the facility, said the paint doesn't pose a threat to children or adults because the building owner and day care center operator have kept the paint intact.

Lead paint that's intact, meaning that it's not peeling, isn't considered hazardous.

But the recent inspection still raises concerns, experts said.

While inspectors found intact lead paint on the center's walls, they also found it on door frames and window frames. Opening and closing doors and windows creates friction that can cause paint to flake and turn into dangerous dust, so such surfaces present a potential hazard, lead abatement specialists told DNAinfo.

“Even if everything is intact, if there's lead on the door frames and window frames, that should be replaced,” said Roy Sarin, a lead abatement supervisor with NY Lead Paint Experts.

“I would recommend, as someone in the industry, to remove those, because it's a friction area [and that can create lead dust]. Who knows what could happen?”

The report on the Shirley Chisholm Day Care Center warned, "Lead dust, when ingested or inhaled, can have an adverse affect on a person's health, especially a child 6 years of age and younger."

Under city law, lead paint on friction areas in child care centers must be "immediately remediated," even if it's not peeling.

But a spokesman for the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, which licenses the day care and inspects it annually, said the Shirley Chisholm Center is in "full compliance" with city law.

"There is no risk to children," the spokesman said.

The two-story, 16,000-square-foot building has housed a day care facility since 1972, according to an analysis of the building's history obtained by DNAinfo New York. Since 1995, it's been the home of the Shirley Chisholm Day Care Center, which serves low-income kids between the ages of two and five under a contract with ACS.

Buildings built before 1976 are presumed to have lead paint and child care centers that operated before 1997 aren't supposed to be relicensed unless they undergo lead paint abatement, according to New York City health codes.

City law requires landlords of older apartment buildings to "identify and fix" lead paint hazards in homes where young children live. Day care center operators are required to inspect their buildings annually themselves and report chipped paint to the Department of Health.

The Health Department spokesman said Shirley Chisholm's annual surveys showed that paint surfaces "have generally been maintained and inspections conducted in September, last February and last August did not cite any violations for peeling paint."

Officials at the facility did not respond to a request for comment.

The day care center is closing in December because the building is being torn down and replaced with condos and townhouses.