An attack on mold and mildew in schools is being launched in the Florida Legislature, where two bills address the persistent health problem.
mflannery@herald.com
Feb. 29, 2004
When a child suffers, lawmakers frequently seek to prevent more pain through legislation that bears its martyr's name: Amber, Megan, Jimmy Ryce -- and now, perhaps Kyla.
During the late 1990s, as an elementary school student in northern Palm Beach County, Kyla St. Mary had multiple bouts of pneumonia and other opportunistic infections. Her parents, who settled a more than $1 million lawsuit with the Palm Beach County School District and its insurers last year, argued that mold in their daughter's classroom had made her sick.
''Kyla was unable to go to that school for more than an hour -- she'd come home with double ear infections,'' said Denise Karpinia, president of the Palm Beach County-based HealthyLiving Foundation. ``This is a child who actually died on the table -- she flat-lined during a lung biopsy.''
CLEAN-AIR BILLS
Kyla recovered her health, but many parents in South Florida say their children's schools remain sick. Two bills this year -- one filed by two Broward County Democrats and the other, Kyla's Law, expected from the House Education Committee -- would require Florida school districts to adopt federal clean-air standards and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's program to improve campus conditions.
Mold and mildew, common intruders in moist South Florida, have been plaguing schools for decades -- since the advent of air-conditioned schools eliminated open windows. The problem gained attention last year when a Broward grand jury called for reform and parents and teachers filed mold-related lawsuits.
STANDARDS `OVERDUE'
Broward School Board members included air-quality standards on this year's legislative to-do list. They have also thrown their weight behind the bill sponsored by Democrats Sen. Skip Campbell of Coral Springs and Rep. Nan Rich of Weston.
''Basically, what we're trying to do is put some standards into the law,'' lobbyist Georgia Slack said. ``. . . We think they're long overdue.''
An air-quality law would fulfill one of 31 recommendations of the grand jury, whose scathing assessment said the School Board's effort to remove potentially hazardous mold and mildew was too slow and too sloppy.
Since then, the Broward district has committed nearly $100 million over five years to mold removal -- an amount that should remedy existing problems, Deputy Superintendent Jim Notter said. Also, the district has adopted the EPA's prevention program, called Tools for Schools, in more than 30 of its 200-plus schools.
Still, some parents say the district isn't moving fast enough.
Indian Trace Elementary School was cleaned, but it still has mold, said parent Mary MacFie, one of 22 plaintiffs in the September lawsuits. Similarly, at Sunland Park Elementary School in Fort Lauderdale, a $1 million mold-
removal project jumped to $2.4 million, and contractors told board members last month that they still smell mold there.
''We're trying to hold them accountable,'' said Charlotte Greenbarg, president of The Broward Coalition, which supports an effort by Miami Rep. Ralph Arza, a Republican, to introduce Kyla's Law as a committee bill.
PENALTIES ENVISIONED
A draft of Arza's bill, which Karpinia and MacFie helped write, calls for independent contractors, not district employees, to administer air-quality tests, and would levy $1,000 fines for each deficiency. If a school fails twice, its certificate of occupancy would be revoked.
Moreover, if anybody on campus reports air-related health problems for three consecutive days, students and staff members could transfer out.
''I asked some of the advocates in the area, and they told me [Rich's] legislation wouldn't go far enough,'' Arza said.
But those kinds of penalties wouldn't create systemic change, Notter said. ''It's not punitive actions that cause reform, it's regulatory actions,'' he said. He likes the aspect of Campbell and Rich's bill that requires all new school designs to meet ventilation standards.