Artificial Turf: DANGER!

October 3, 2008

Honorable members of the City Council, Scott Stringer, Borough President of Manhattan and Board Member of Randall's
Island Sports Foundation (RISF) and Aimee Boden, the Executive Director of the RISF:

I appreciate your attendance or that of your representatives at the City Council Parks and Recreation Committee meeting on
Monday, September 22nd, 2008 entitled Oversight of the Randall's Island Sports Foundation and the NYC Parks
Department.

Dr. Crain - a psychologist, who has studied the impacts of lead ingestion by children on their development - provided
testimony that requires your immediate attention as he addressed the real dangers of exposure to lead in synthetic turf fields
in our city. It is therefore worthy of recapping to you.

In his public statements to you on the record (attached for your reference), Dr. Crain announced that the toxicity of
synthetic turf being used by both the Parks Department of Parks and Recreation and the RISF is significant having reached
dangerous levels of lead in both the polyethelene 'blades' and the pellets forming the base or cushion of the turf. A
peer-reviewed study to be published in the Journal of Exposure Science in November (also attached) provides more details
of these findings.

As Dr. Crain noted, esteemed heath scientists such as Philip J. Landrigan, Bruce Lanphear, and R.L. Canfield say there may
be no safe level of lead exposure. Even low levels can damage the child's developing nervous system. Dr. Crain called for
a moratorium on new installations until much more research has been conducted.

Public officials responsible for approving, monitoring or halting the use of synthetic turf also have the responsibility to take
actions to warn the public about this danger and should ensure at the very least that children under the age of 6 years are
kept from the fields until more is known.

Please take note that notice to you of such serious findings require immediate action for both legal and moral reasons and
that your positions as public officials do not insulate you from reckless actions you take in response to this new peer-
reviewed scientific data.

Would you please let me know what steps you are taking to inform the relevant city engineers and commissioners of this
matter and what steps they in turn are taking to remove this environmental threat to the health of those exposed to synthetic
turf?

Thank you for your good work.

Robert Jereski
Co-founder
New York Climate Action Group