Robert Gulack's Statement at Ground Zero, Sept. 10, 2007

Written by: Lewis Miller on Sep 18, 2007 8:29 AM EDT

Linked to groups: DFA Radio

Robert Gulack was a DFA Radio guest on September 11, 2007. He recommends visiting 9/11 Environmental Action for more on what you can do to address the problem he discusses below in his talk at the Ground Zero press conference.

STATEMENT OF ROBERT GULACK, SENIOR ATTORNEY,

U.S. SECURITIES & EXCHANGE COMMISSION,

FOR THE SEPTEMBER 10, 2007 DISCOVER PRESS CONFERENCE AT GROUND ZERO

FOR MORE INFORMATION, CONTACT:
Robert Gulack, (201) 794-9322

D-Day, June 6, 1944, has become known as the “longest day.” But September 11, 2001 has lasted even longer. As long as the World Trade Center contamination remains in our offices and homes, claiming more victims for al-Qaeda, September 11, 2001 is not over.

My name is Robert Gulack. I am a senior attorney at the SEC, but I make this statement, not as a representative of the SEC, but speaking on my own behalf and on behalf of the SEC’s bargaining unit. I am an example of a Manhattan office worker who has permanent lung damage because of exposure to uncleaned World Trade Center debris in an office building in southern Manhattan. I am an example of someone who is the victim of the EPA’s failure to follow the law – of the EPA’s refusal to see to it that the office buildings affected by the terrorist attacks were properly cleaned. My illness has been confirmed by CAT scan and metacholine challenge testing. I have suffered not only permanent lung damage but permanent reactive airway disorder. During the period when I was regularly exposed to this debris, I suffered half a dozen episodes of bronchitis and pneumonia. The SEC’s air intake rooms turned out to be contaminated with asbestos at eight times the level necessary to declare an emergency -- more than 400 times the background level before the attacks. The air in one SEC air intake room was found to exceed EPA standards by over three times. The fact that I was harmed by this World Trade Center debris has been officially confirmed by the U.S. Department of Labor.

One of the recommendations of the EPA Inspector General four years ago was to test office buildings. The EPA has never tested a single office other than their own offices. We have to clean our office buildings so that we stop creating additional victims. The U.S. General Accountability Office report from last week brushed aside the EPA’s illogical excuses and specifically confirmed the need for the EPA to test office buildings. But the need to test offices was obvious to everyone six years ago. The EPA simply ignored the need to protect officeworkers, and the blood of the officeworkers is on the hands of the EPA. [1]

Newly recruited firefighters are coming down with World Trade Center cough from the World Trade Center contamination in our firehouses, which the EPA refuses to clean. These are people who had no exposure to the World Trade Center debris on September 11. They are being exposed now, when they come to work at contaminated firehouses.

Four years after Pearl Harbor, we had defeated our enemies in both Europe and Asia. Six years after Sept. 11, we have not even begun the initial testing advocated by the EPA Inspector General. For some reason, it was easier to get the Nazis out of France then to get the EPA into Brooklyn. It was easier to rout the Japanese Empire out of Iwo Jima, Tarawa, and Guadalcanal, then to get the EPA to test a single office in New York City other than their own.

We should moving, on an emergency basis. We should be testing in Brooklyn. We should be testing in New Jersey. We should be testing workplaces and schools and firehouses and police stations. Then, at last, after six years of unbearable cruelty and delay, September 11, 2001 will be over.

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[1] In order to continue to endanger New York City, the EPA has had to fire many of their own people. When, in the fall of 2001, the EPA’s asbestos consultants warned the EPA that they were ignoring 90% of the World Trade Center asbestos, the EPA fired their asbestos consultants. When the EPA Ombudsman tried to warn about this crisis, he was fired and his office shut down. When the EPA’s own Inspector General denounced the EPA four years ago, the EPA ignored her report and forced her out of the government. One expert panel hired by the EPA accused the EPA of conscious fraud. Another expert panel hired by the EPA unanimously denounced the EPA’s fraudulent clean-up proposals and was fired by the EPA more than a year ago.

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