Re: “Cleansing the El Marino Air – Not”
School Board President Nancy Goldberg seemed exasperated.
“This discussion can go on forever,” she said after Chapter 398 played out at Tuesday night’s School Board meeting in the community debate over the filthy 405 Freeway air that silkily slides onto the adjacent El Marino Language School campus. And contaminates.
Safety breathing measures are on the ledge of being installed indoors at El Marino.
Don’t ask about outdoors.
Handwringing continues, emptily, over students’ exposure when they play outdoors.
“I believe the School District has decided that the filtration is necessary for the children who are sitting inside,” Ms. Goldberg said.
“I don’t know how we will handle those accusations that while the children are running around outside, they will be exposed to more dirty air.”
To those who have suggested moving El Marino to a less vulnerable neighborhood, the School Board president rebuffs them this way:
“Let’s talk realities. There is a limited number of areas where we can put up a school. As you know, property values are going up dramatically.”
The Adult School on Overland Avenue cannot accommodate the largest elementary school in the District, Ms. Goldberg said, for two reasons:
- The building is not retrofitted.
- The building is too small.
“Something will have to be proposed,” she said.
“Certain people in the community think they have the answers because their children because they have gone through the school, as did mine.”
But, said Ms. Goldberg, “nothing I know of is going to give us a perfect situation.”
(To be continued)
Does This Situation Sound Familiar?
In a short film on the SCAQMD webite (http://datab.us/B1M894GH4q4#The Right To Breathe – Film) – there is a couple of short scenes starting just before the eleven minute mark, commenting on a quite similar situation that we find our children mired in at El Marino. An older teenager relates that her little sister is attending an elementary school whose playground is situated very close to a freeway. She says that some studies have shown that when children play in areas that are very bad (polluted) they can have what is called a “negative pulmonary function” from something (playing) that should be beneficial and good for them. In the next scene, there appears a Cedars-Sinai medical researcher/surgeon who describes some of their early findings that suggest when even short-term exposure to this type of pollution (particulates) that are found near busy freeways, it can activate genes in the brain that are genetically associated with cancer.
I agree with President Goldberg. Let’s be realistic, especially about the foul conditions at El Marino, first brought to the Board’s attention by Dr Subty-Daily. But let’s not be cheap about it when it comes to the health of our children. Get our El Marino kids out of harm’s way!