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April 10, 2002
PSC pair honored for their safety vigilance
Profs are monitoring CUNY air quality, construction
See also: NYSUT Health and Safety Resource Center
A pair of faculty health-and-safety sleuths has earned an award from the New York Committee for Occupational Safety and Health for their work tracking and solving problems at the City University of New York - particularly in areas affected by the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
Dave Kotelchuck and Joan Greenbaum, Health and Safety Committee co-chairpeople for the Professional Staff Congress, received honors at the NYCOSH annual awards celebration in New York City in April. Their work took on urgency in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks on New York City, when the 47-story No. 7 World Trade Center toppled into the side of Fiterman Hall at the Borough of Manhattan Community College. Fiterman Hall, the largest classroom building at BMCC, was severely damaged and remains closed. Since then, Greenbaum and Kotelchuck have been involved in uncovering many health concerns at that site.
Their credits also include building a membership structure with active health and safety committees on CUNY campuses. Addressing indoor air quality and problems with construction have kept them busy.
PSC President Barbara Bowen said the pair has "taken our efforts in this area beyond where I ever imagined or hoped - and of course no one could have anticipated how they would be called on by the catastrophe of Sept. 11. What accounts for their success, I think, is that they've found intellectual as well as a political urgency in their work."
She noted that both have called on their academic training in public health and environmental design "in order to become fierce, informed advocates for our members."
Kotelchuck is an associate professor in the environmental health and safety department at Hunter College. Greenbaum is a professor in the computer information sciences department at LaGuardia Community College.
Fiterman Hall has not reopened while CUNY decides whether to clean and rebuild it, or raze it and start anew.
Dioxin in Fiterman Hall
Dioxin has been detected, in some cases at high levels, in Fiterman Hall, said Kotelchuck, who also serves on the NYCOSH board. Dioxin is a cancer-causing substance found in herbicides, produced by incineration of chlorine-containing plastics, as may have happened in the intense fires at the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, Kotelchuck said. He and Greenbaum have found many BMCC members experiencing physical problems and psychological stress. They helped PSC initiate action with four other unions to urge the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health to study several workplaces, including Stuyvesant High School and BMCC. Preliminary results are expected in May.
Elsewhere in the CUNY system, problems are monitored by committee members who are "our eyes and ears on every campus to find out about problems and resolve them," Kotelchuck said.
"We are receiving many reports of problems such as air ducts which have not been cleaned in years; construction being done during working hours, and leaks and molds," Greenbaum said. "All of these problems are serious as they affect our members' difficulties in trying to go about their normal teaching responsibilities." The committee is also monitoring repairs at Queens College, new ventilation diffusers in teacher offices at Brooklyn Educational Opportunity Center, and mold remediation in a LaGuardia photo lab.
The NYCOSH award, Kotelchuck and Greenbaum said in a prepared statement, "is a recognition both of the greater level of these activities by our union, and the accomplishments of our campus and CUNY-wide health and safety committees during the past two years, under our new union leadership."
- Liza Frenette
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