Parents at a Brooklyn elementary school claim they were never adequately told about spiked lead levels in the water — including a classroom drinking fountain with 1,000 times the federal safety limit.
Each of the roughly 50 moms and dads polled at PS 289 in Crown Heights on Wednesday morning said they knew nothing of any tainted taps — which were all taken out of service — until a Post report this week.
“I try my best not to lose my cool, but any parent, when it comes to your child, your first instinct is to be protective, and it made me angry to know that the level of lead in the school is so high,” said mom Thomasina Austin.
A fountain in Room 222 at the school had a lead level of 15,000 parts per billion in a December test, 1,000 times the allowable level and three times the amount considered toxic by the EPA. It was higher even than the top reading of 13,200 ppb registered at the peak of the Flint, Mich., water crisis.
Department of Education spokeswoman Toya Holness said a letter explaining the situation was given to students to hand to parents after the readings emerged. But a parade of moms and dads scoffed at that approach Wednesday, noting their kids shouldn’t be entrusted with the delivery of such important paperwork.
“I don’t understand why would you trust a 5- or a 6-year-old to bring something like that home when we are still trying to work on them to bring homework home,” said parent Roni Oakley, 30.
The DOE stressed on Wednesday that all relevant information — including lead-reading levels — has always been posted to the school’s Web site for parents to check.
The department posted an updated note to PS 289’s homepage Wednesday on remediation efforts. It also passed out physical copies to parents in front of the school.
The note reported that the Room 222 drinking fountain and another that tested above the 15-ppb federal threshold had been remediated and placed back into service.
The DOE has staunchly maintained that any contaminated taps are removed and fixed before ever being made available for use.
The Post reported this week that roughly one out of every 20 elementary-school taps registered lead levels high enough to require removal and repair.
Mayor de Blasio ripped The Post’s coverage of the matter Wednesday. He focused his critique on comparisons to Flint’s water crisis, calling them “absolutely unfair and inaccurate and alarmist.”
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