Earlier this month, Gov. Ned Lamont proposed House Bill 5045, which is designed to tighten standards for lead concentration in the blood of children while making available funds from the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) to help cities cover resulting costs.
The ARPA funds will come from a proposed investment of $70 million in the 2023 Fiscal Year budget. It is intended to cover the municipal costs of complying with the new standards, and funds will also be made available for property owners and landlords in vulnerable communities to pursue abatement and remediation projects.
An additional $150 million for finding and replacing lead pipes for drinking water is slated to arrive from the federal infrastructure bill, with allocations spread over the next five years.
“For too long, Connecticut has failed to address the problem of lead poisoning in our children, a problem that impacts most deeply minority families and disadvantaged communities of our state,” Lamont said in a press statement announcing the proposed legislation. “Childhood lead poisoning has catastrophic impacts on health and development, including irreversible learning and developmental disabilities. Two years ago, 2,994 young children had enough lead in their blood that the CDC would have recommended an investigation of their homes.”
Despite the high number of children with blood concentrations of lead at or exceeding federal recommended levels for investigation, state law only required 120 investigations. According to the governor’s statement, nearly 2,000 of the cases did not require parental notification per state statute.
The proposed legislation, if passed, will lower mandated parental notices of high lead concentrations to 3.5 micrograms per deciliter of blood ( μg/dL) starting next year. Onsite inspections will be required at 10 μg/dL instead of the current 15 μg/dL in 2023, and at 5 μg/dL from 2024 on. Epidemiological investigations of lead in children’s blood, which are currently triggered at 20 μg/dL, will be lowered by 5 μg/mL until 2025 when the maximum allowed will be only 5 μg/mL.
The Business Community’s Input
Lead has many applications across industries, but it is also highly toxic and is particularly dangerous to children. According to the CDC, it can cause brain damage, stunt growth and cause a combination of lowered IQ and increased aggression. Some researchers say these factors increase the likelihood of criminal behavior in those with lead exposure. Those researchers attribute declining crime rates starting in the 1990s to the phasing out of lead as a gasoline additive.
However, lead piping and lead paint were popular construction materials for many years and their presence can still be found in many older homes and buildings.
“We do a lot of testing for people who are worried about mold, asbestos, other types of compounds and chemicals,” said Steve DiNapoli, the president of Big East Environmental, a Norwalk-based environmental project management and consulting firm. “But from what I’ve seen, lead probably has the most significant and immediately noticeable impact on people. Especially for children.”
DiNapoli anticipated that the new regulations could lead to an increase in demand for both testing and remediation services. “I would say on average, —and we’re not one of the largest firms, —we probably get one call a month for a lead-poisoned child incident. We routinely find a lot of lead.”
According to DiNapoli, after New York City implemented a similar set of more stringent rules in 2020, legislation along the same lines was anticipated for Connecticut. He said that many businesses that test for and remove lead, along with the health departments of larger cities that do their own testing, had already recalibrated their equipment to detect the lower concentrations.
“This was a big change,” he said. “We had to send our X-ray fluorescence guns into the manufacturer to recalibrate them to be more sensitive. But we saw demand for lead-based inspections in New York skyrocket. So, we’re glad we were already investing in recalibration.
“Lead has a significant impact, especially on children,” DiNapoli added. “But lowering the standards is going to help everyone.”
