NYCHA To Check For Lead At Buildings Where It Said None Existed

NEW YORK, NY — The New York City Housing Authority will run new tests for lead paint starting next week in two complexes where the toxic paint was thought to have been eradicated. New filings in a lawsuit last week reported lead paint at apartments at the Ingersoll Houses in Brooklyn and the Melrose Houses in the Bronx.

NYCHA says it ruled out lead paint at those developments in the early 2000s, but will now do new inspections in the apartments where a kid younger than 6 lives. NYCHA sent notices Friday morning to tenants of those nearly 400 apartments about the tests, which will start Tuesday, the housing authority said.

"Out of an abundance of caution, we are reconfirming that lead-based paint has been ruled out at these developments," NYCHA spokeswoman Jasmine Blake said in a statement. "We are taking immediate action to ensure the safety of our residents."

The new tests are the latest development in the continuing scandal over NYCHA's failure to conduct legally mandated lead inspections for four years, as a Department of Investigation report revealed in November.

Ingersoll and Melrose residents complained of lead paint in affidavits filed March 26 in the lawsuit against NYCHA by the Citywide Council of Presidents, a group of public-housing tenant leaders.

The Ingersoll tenant said Gov. Andrew Cuomo sent a team on March 21 that found lead in her apartment, which she said has been rife with peeling paint. The Downtown Brooklyn complex was among four in Brooklyn that the state Department of Health visited as it investigated NYCHA last month.

The Melrose tenant's affidavit said paint chips fell off a radiator into the mouth of her 2-year-0ld child, who had elevated levels of lead in his blood. She alleged that NYCHA has neglected her complaints about the toxic paint in her apartment.

NYCHA followed federal guidelines to "rule out" the presence of lead paint at Ingersoll and Melrose and got them exempted from the city's annual lead inspection requirements in the early 2000s, the housing authority said. Both projects were built before the city outlawed the sale of lead paint in 1960.

Certified NYCHA workers checked the Melrose apartment the day after the affidavits were filed and ultimately found lead in paint chips there, the housing authority said. The problem was set to be abated Friday.

The toxic paint was a color NYCHA doesn't use and may have been put on by a prior tenant, NYCHA said.

March 28 tests at the Ingersoll apartment by both NYCHA workers and an outside vendor found no evidence of lead paint on surfaces there, the housing authority said.

Blake said state officials did not tell NYCHA about the test it performed at Ingersoll. But Gary Holmes, a spokesman for the state Department of Health, said the department told NYCHA about its findings after the test.

NYCHA is doing its own analysis of paint chips from the apartment's ceiling but has not yet gotten the results, Blake said.

The state Department of Health did not respond to an email seeking comment Friday.

Jacki Rogoff, an attorney with At-Risk Community Services, which is suing NYCHA alongside the Citywide Council of Presidents, said there's a broad need for lead tests across NYCHA's building, not just in a select few.

"They’re covering their asses," Rogoff said.

"They got caught and they are just being reactive, and that’s not how a housing authority should run," she added.

(Lead image: The Melrose Houses are pictured in the Bronx. Image from Google Maps)