By Nora Bosworth

Nobody asked Martin Rosenblatt to protect the schoolchildren at the Upper West Side’s P.S. 163, but he may have done just that. The story begins with a nursing home, one very informed citizen, and a lot of paperwork.

Since 2008, the elder care company Jewish Home Lifecare (JHL) has been planning to erect a 20-story nursing home alongside a public elementary school on the Upper West Side. The tower would be built on West 97th Street between Columbus and Amsterdam avenues, on a parking lot that is now part of the Park West Village apartment complex, which borders P.S. 163.

Over the last several years, community members have organized to resist the development project for a wide array of reasons: fear of sending children to study amid a noisy, long-term construction zone, objections to the noise, dust and debris of such a project, increased traffic the nursing home would bring, and the loss of an above-ground parking lot.

Residents listen to Rosenblatt explain the lead findings.

Jewish Home Lifecare says their planned facility will transform the hospital-like feel and architecture of many nursing homes to a place that will make elderly residents feel at home. They hope their construction will provide “dignity and privacy” to clients.

Up until April of last year, all of the opposition facing the nursing home plan has been relatively standard backlash for a development project of this scale– with, granted, the added concern of the school’s welfare. And, if all had gone as planned, JHL would probably be beginning construction in Spring of 2014.

Enter Martin Rosenblatt, a resident who lives across the street from the proposed development site and a retired investigator, experienced with the hazardous effects of lead dust.

After going to meetings about the nursing home’s plans, Rosenblatt decided to test the parking lot for lead, just in case the future demolition site was home to hazardous chemicals. It wasn’t a random suspicion. Until the Clean Air Act of 1996, lead was a legal component of gasoline. Thus, in the past, when cars turned on, their tailpipes would sometimes emit combustion dust that was contaminated by lead. Rosenblatt figured that because the parking lot had been around for over fifty years, it was worth assessing.
Rosenblatt hired Laurence Molloy, an authority on lead to analyze soil samples throughout the grounds, along with 11 other New York City Housing Authority lots. Despite the two men’s hunches, what they found still took them by surprise.

On Wednesday evening, around 150 West Siders gathered in the auditorium of the Holy Name School on 96th Street and Amsterdam Avenue, to hear Rosenblatt discuss his discovery of toxic levels of lead beneath the proposed site for the high-rise nursing home.

Out of 100 samples of soil, the highest lead level of all was found in a hotspot at the West 97th Street location. The level of lead was at 1,044 ppm (parts per million); to put this number in context, the Environmental Protection Agency’s limit for acceptable lead levels in soil areas on which children play is 400 ppm.

The health effects of lead exposure in children include behavioral disorders and learning disabilities. Lead becomes dangerous once unearthed, thus the proposed construction is a scare to many people.

“The soil definitely contains lead and is certainly a potential hazard to school children if blown onto the adjacent school grounds,” writes Molloy, in his letter testifying to his results from the Park West Village samples.

Rosenblatt also took it upon himself to send the lab results from West 97th Street to eleven different medical professionals, four of whom wrote back with their findings.

“According to the National Toxicology Program of the Department of Health and Human Services, as well as the CDC and the American Academy of Pediatrics, dispersion locally of these lead contaminated dusts, into academic and residential buildings nearby, can cause adverse health effects in children under 72 months of age, such as developmental-cognitive impairments, neurobehavioral disturbances, loss in IQ points and ADHD,” wrote John Rosen, a pediatrician and the Head of Environmental Sciences at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine. In his letter to Rosenblatt, he adds that pregnant women are also at risk, as lead can damage the developing fetus.

Avery Brandon, whose asthmatic 5-year-old daughter currently attends P.S. 163, called the results “terrifying.”

“If there’s lead in the soil and they break ground, we have to move,” she said.

Brandon is grateful to Rosenblatt for his research.

“Without Mr. Rosenblatt, I’m not exactly sure where we would be right now,” she said. Molloy voiced a similar opinion.

“The average citizen doesn’t know about lead in a parking lot,” Molloy said in a telephone interview. “Wouldn’t even suspect it.”

Rosenblatt believes that if an environmental impact study is conducted and lead is found, the costs of removing the lead would be enormous. He says it is unclear which party would cover what he estimates would be an operation in the hundreds of thousands of dollars. Moreover, according to Molloy, there is water beneath the lot, and if the water is also contaminated, then pumping it out would add greatly to the cost of cleanup.

As of now, it is unclear how the state and Jewish Home Lifecare want to proceed.

“JHL has adhered to all government regulations regarding site review and will continue to do so,” said Ethan Geto, a public affairs representative for JHL, in an email.

“Not having seen the analysis of lead contamination claimed in the study – or having it reviewed by an expert not associated with advocates for blocking the project – it is not possible to know at this juncture if any further environmental review is warranted.”

At the meeting, Rosenblatt and the director of the Park West Village Association, Maggi Peyton, urged attendees to sign a petition that demands an environmental impact study. Residents at the meeting expressed hope that these latest findings will make a difference, along with a determination to be heard.

“In terms of politicians,” said Patricia Loftman, a resident of Park West Village for the last forty years, “I don’t think we will ever forgive them if they don’t do the right thing on this issue.”

UWS residents line up Wed. night to voice their concerns to Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer. (Photo Courtesy of @scottmstringer)

At a packed town hall meeting on the Upper West Side last night, Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer fielded questions from concerned residents of the West 90s and 100s. The community came out in full force, pressing Stringer, City Council Member Gale Brewer and a panel of officials representing various city agencies to address their complaints and fears about various neighborhood issues.

Between 100 and 150 residents attended the forum, and the line of people waiting to step up to the microphone to say their piece stretched to the back of the room for the entire two-hour meeting. Armed with literature and, sometimes, un-concealed anger, community members and self-identified local activists pressed their elected officials for answers and action.

Stringer, a contender in the Democratic primary for the 2013 mayoral race, addressed concerns ranging from construction to hydrofracking to rat infestation.

The most-discussed issue of the night was the proposed construction of a Jewish Home Lifecare center on West 97th Street. JHL, an organization that provides health care and support services for the elderly, seeks to build a new, 20-story high-rise nursing home next door to P.S. 163, an elementary school. Although the New York City Planning Commission approved the application, Community Board 7 and local activists have continued to fight against the project.

Avery Brandon, who lives near the 97th Street site and whose kindergarten-aged daughter will be attending P.S. 163 for the next several years, spoke out vehemently against the new building at the meeting.

“A huge construction project like this can have untold effects on the health of our children,” Brandon said. “With the noise levels, and the mental stress that this construction will cause, how will our children be able to learn?”

Brandon and various other residents also cited increased congestion, dust and debris and decreased access to the block for emergency responders as potential negative consequences of the project.

Later, on the issue of fracking, the focus of the conversation centered around the contentious Spectra Pipeline, a proposed natural gas pipeline intended to expand the delivery of natural gas to areas in New York and New Jersey. The project, which was approved by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission in May, is slated to run along the coast of New Jersey and cross the Hudson River into Manhattan, bringing gas from the Marcellus Shale — acquired through the process of hydraulic fracturing — to New York City homes on the West Side.

Residents at the meeting last night voiced opposition shared by many critics of the controversial method, citing in particular what they said are particularly high levels of radon and other radioactive material in Marcellus gas. They emphasized the dangers of using radon-infused gas in New York City kitchens, which tend to be small and often not well-ventilated, as well as the potential effects exposure to fracked gas could have on children in the neighborhood.

Attendees also complained of a growing rat infestation on Upper West Side streets — a problem which Council Member Brewer assured would be tackled next month in a block-by-block effort conducted by the Department of Health — and the New York Police Department’s ever-contentious Stop and Frisk policy, which NYPD representatives declined to discuss in detail last night.

Presented by New York Family Magazine, the event will include a ballerina show from Twinkle Parties and a surprise visit from Freckleface Strawberry. The show is open to the public and is the first in a series of MARTE events that will take place every Saturday at the school. Proceeds raised help to support the P.S. 163’s vital after-school program.

For more information, visit www.theMARTE.com.

By Mirva Lempiainen

When students’ eyes light up and get that “aha!” expression, that’s when Randi Toll realizes how much she loves her job.

“These are the moments I enjoy the most,” she said.

Luckily for Toll, who teaches 1st grade at P.S. 163, “it happens a fair amount.”

Dual-language teacher Randi Toll became fluent in Spanish while working as a nanny in Chiapas, Mexico.

“First grade is really a year when the kids make a huge jump in reading and writing,” she said, adding that literacy is her favorite subject to teach.

A former nanny and product of the New York City Teaching Fellows program, Toll has been teaching for seven years now, three years at P.S. 163 and four at P.S. 153.

“I always wanted to work with kids,” she said.

As a nanny, Toll spent six months in the state of Chiapas, Mexico, which helped her become fluent in Spanish. She now uses those skills in her dual-language classroom, where students study in English on Mondays and Wednesdays, and in Spanish the other days. Some students are Spanish-dominant, some are English-dominant and some are fully bilingual.

“It’s a challenge. We have kids from all different backgrounds,” she said. “They are a very cohesive group so it ends up working well.”

Franziska Castillo, the parent of one of Toll’s students, thinks Toll is a big part of that equation.

“Ms. Toll is so kind and loving that she knows how to help all the children in the class become a unit,” she said. “At home, my daughter notices fractions around the house, and uses vocabulary that surprises her aunts and uncles. It’s all because of Ms. Toll.”

Ellen Schorr, another parent, thinks Toll is everything a 1st-grade teacher should be: smart, creative and fun-loving. Schorr likes that Toll brings creativity into lessons, like making buildings out of marshmallows and using cooking to learn how to measure. But a sense of order always pervades.

“While very warm and affectionate toward the children, she is no pushover,” Schorr said. “She has perfect command over her classroom without ever yelling, threatening, or belittling.”

Toll believes her respectful attitude toward children has something to do with her success in the classroom.

“I connect pretty well with the kids,” she said. “I like to try and talk to them like they are people, not kids.”

Parents also appreciate Toll’s enthusiasm for literature.

“Her love of reading and books rubs off on the kids,” said Carrie Reynolds, a parent. “My daughter is now an avid reader who first learned to read in Spanish before she learned to read in English.”

Reynolds appreciates that Toll celebrates each student’s birthday in class, and even signed the children up for yoga in the classroom.

“Everybody loves her,” Reynolds said.

Toll, too, feels like she is in the right field and cherishes being a teacher.

“There are never any moments when I feel like I should be doing something else,” she said.

–
Randi Toll
1st grade, P.S. 163

“Nursing Home Help For Crowded School” (April 1) raises disturbing questions about a misguided approach to solving overcrowding at P.S. 163, on West 97th Street. The article states that P.S. 163 and Jewish Home Lifecare are discussing the construction of a sheltered walkway between P.S. 163 and a new Bloomingdale Library branch, to be located inside a Jewish Home Lifecare building proposed for West 100th Street. Money for the project might come from Borough President Scott Stringer and Assembly Member Daniel O’Donnell.

We ask why our elected officials will not allocate the same taxpayer funds simply to build a walkway between P.S. 163 and the existing branch of the Bloomingdale Library—a far less disruptive alternative to constructing a 22-story nursing home building.

The most straightforward solution to this muddled situation is to convince the Department of Education and the School Construction Authority to build new classrooms for P.S. 163 behind the school, where temporary classroom trailers are located; to require Jewish Home Lifecare and the Chetrit Group to utilize the zoning carve-out that was given to Jewish Home Lifecare to enable it to modernize its 106th Street campus; and to abandon the wrong-headed idea of building a 22-story nursing home on a street that is already overburdened.

It is troubling that P.S. 163 and Jewish Home Lifecare have kept neighborhood residents in the dark about negotiations that may result in a profoundly negative affect on our quality of life. We need our elected officials to guarantee the transparency of what ought to be a public discourse, and to take a public stand on the critical land use issues that confront the residents of the Park West Village neighborhood.

Paul S. Bunten and Hillel Hoffman
President and vice president of Westsiders for Public Participation, Inc.

Letters have been edited for clarity, style and brevity.

Jewish Home Lifecare, based on West 106th Street, generated some controversy last year when administrators announced the construction of a new state-of-the-art nursing facility on West 100th Street. The organization originally planned to renovate the facility on its current property, but when the economic downturn made it difficult to find a partner developer, Jewish Home swapped its West 106th Street property with Joseph Chetrit, a developer who owned the West 100th Street parcel that will soon become the organization’s nursing facility.

Planning ahead, P.S. 163 school officials and parents are looking to Jewish Home Lifecare for needed space. Photo by Andrew Schwartz

Parents are concerned that the hundreds of new residential units built near the school in the past decade could bring in new students to a building that is overcapacity. Students are already using trailers behind the school for additional space.

“It makes a nice space for now, but we’re looking 10 years down the road,” said Carrie Reynolds, co-president of the school’s Parent Teacher Association.

One development proposal would include constructing a new Bloomingdale Library branch inside the nursing facility. A sheltered walkway behind the school would allow P.S. 163 students to get from their building, at 163 W. 97th St. between Amsterdam and Columbus avenues, to Jewish Home’s planned facility on West 100th Street.

“It would be a natural situation to take full advantage of that library,” Reynolds said. “I know the library is very excited to work with a school closely.”

The new library would be built partly on the current parking lot, abutting the existing library branch. Moving the footprint of the library away from the parking lot would allow for more open public space, according to Ethan Geto, a spokesperson for Jewish Home Lifecare.

In another proposal, the new facility could be used for pre-K programming, kindergarten classes or music and art rooms, though the library proposal is the frontrunner.

“We’re ready to do it, we can do it in this building, but we’ll have to look together to see where we can get the public funding,” Geto said.

The plan is only in the discussion stage. Exactly how much and what kind of space Jewish Home can provide to students has yet to be determined. But it’s clear that Jewish Home and the P.S. 163 community will have to do this without money from the Department of Education. The department has not allocated funds to the northern part of the school district, which is underutilized compared to the heavily crowded southern part. But that could change when capital funding plans are updated each year.

Money for the project, however, could come from local elected officials, including Borough President Scott Stringer and Assembly Member Daniel O’Donnell. Both are supportive of working with Jewish Home to find more space for the school. n