NEW YORK, NY August 27, 2003 — A recent report by the Inspector General of the federal Environmental Protection Agency has local officials feeling vindicated. That report said the EPA, under pressure from the White House, downplayed the potential air quality health hazards of the dust and debris caused by the September 11th attacks on the World Trade Center. And it has local officials renewing their demand for a building-by-building cleanup effort. WNYC's Amy Eddings reports.

For the 38 elected officials, environmental advocates and Lower Manhattan residents who stood together on the steps of City Hall yesterday, the EPA Inspector General's report was nothing new. Democratic Congressman Jerrold Nadler says his own study of indoor air quality, one month after the World Trade Center attacks, demonstrated that the EPA was misleading people by saying the air was safe to breathe.

Nadler: The only thing new in the IG's report, besides confirming everything that we knew, is that the White House instructed the EPA to lie. That's disgusting.

The Inspector General's report said the EPA did not have sufficient data and analyses to say, as EPA administrator Christine Whitman did one week after the attacks, that the air was safe to breathe. And the IG said that, under White House influence, the EPA softened its message in two press releases on indoor cleaning procedures, and on potential health effects of World Trade Center dust and debris. Democratic Senator Hillary Clinton says she's co-authored a letter to President Bush, asking him to give a detailed accounting of how those news releases were edited.

Clinton: I know a little bit about how White Houses work. I know that somebody picked up a phone, somebody got on a computer, somebody sent an email, somebody called for a meeting, somebody in that White House, probably under instruction from somebody further up the chain, told the EPA Don't tell the people of New York the truth. And I want to know who that is.

White House and EPA officials say it's too early to tell whether President Bush will honor her request.

In their response to the Inspector General's report, EPA officials have criticized it for focusing too much on news releases, rather than on the full range of efforts to communicate with the public, including media interviews and data that the EPA posted on its website. But Doctor Stephen Levin, with the Mount Sinai School of Medicine, who runs a health screening program for Ground Zero workers, says the EPA's initial statement one week after the attacks set the tone and there are people who are sick today because of it.

Levin: There are people who would have worn respiratory protection on that pile, but had been told, everything is okay. There were office workers who were required to come back down to this area by their employers, who said, The EPA has told us it's safe, you can come back.

The blizzard of demands sparked by the Inspector General's report includes a renewed call for building-by-building inspections of neighborhoods affected by the plume of debris and smoke, including parts of Brooklyn. Marianne Horinko, the EPA's acting administrator, says the agency has already cleaned and conducted follow-up tests on about five thousand downtown apartments. She characterizes politicians' new demands as armchair quarterbacking, two years later.

Horinko: We belive that our cleanup program was the best possible cleanup program we can devise. Remember, these were unforseen circumstances. EPA does not routinely clean people's apartments. And given that we are writing the textbook on this, I think we've developed a good and peer reviewed and defensible cleanup plan.

The federal government is not the only focus of local officials' ire. Democratic City councilman Alan Gerson, who represents Lower Manhattan, says the Bloomberg Administration was a partner in the response to the attacks, and should have checked on the efficacy of the EPA's work. He says public hearings will be held next month. And Congressman Nadler wants Mayor Bloomberg to add his voice to demands for a new cleanup effort.

Bloomberg spokesman Jordan Barowitz says the federal government, not the city, has the authority to oversee the EPA. And he points out that the mayor formed a downtown air quality task force in the spring of 2002 that cleaned and tested 4,200 homes. He says he's not sure what Congressman Nadler wants the mayor to do. For WNYC, I'm Amy Eddings.