By The TimesELedger
The news is good for parents of children attending PS 65 in Ozone Park. Tests indicate that there is nothing in the air at this school that might be making their children sick.
Thanks to an adjustment in the school’s ventilation system, carbon dioxide levels are below 1,000 parts per million, the benchmark for public comfort. More importantly, the level of all toxins in the air, while slightly higher than some schools, is far below the level of minimum risk.
Although chemicals from a nearby factory that closed years ago contaminated the groundwater 35 feet below the foundation of the school, it is nearly impossible that these chemicals have had any impact whatsoever on the air quality inside the building. “It is not the way things happen,” said Joel Forman, clinical director of pediatric environmental health at Mt. Sinai Hospital in Manhattan.
Unless the officials involved in the testing are part of a vast and complex conspiracy, the test results should be enough to end the controversy that has disrupted this school for more than two weeks.
But there are some people who continue to believe that the air in the school is dangerous, even though all the evidence points to the contrary. The officials recently held a meeting at which they attempted to address the rumor that something in the air at PS 65 is making the children sick. At one point, security guards removed a Channel 2 reporter who, in their opinion, was being disruptive. This was evidence to some parents that the school had something to hide.
Officials promised to do more testing when school lets out at the end of June. This will force the school to bus summer school students to another school.
All this for what?
There never was any evidence that the children at PS 65 are any less healthy than the students at any other elementary school in Queens. No one could ever explain how chemicals in the groundwater far below the school could have an impact on air quality.
