This is National Lead Poisoning Prevention Week
by Suzanne Potter
California News Service
October has been Children’s Environmental Health Month and this week is National Lead Poisoning Prevention Week, so groups in California that advocate for children’s health are asking for changes to the state’s 10-year plan to replace lead pipes.
California could get up to $1.25 billion from the infrastructure bill to replace old lead water lines.
Kelly Hardy, senior managing director of health and research for the group Children Now, said a coalition of health and environmental groups has written a letter asking the California State Water Resources Control Board to “get the lead out.”
“We’re pushing that they use all the available funds to replace all of the pipes and to add filters, so that there’s not an increase in lead in the water when the pipes are being replaced,” she said, “and also, provide for systematic sampling of the water.”
The water board, in a statement, said that in order to receive funding water agencies will have to replace the entire lead line and provide filters and testing. Agencies have two years to inventory lead in utility-owned and customer-owned service lines. The state Division of Drinking Water has inventoried more than ten million water lines and found almost 11-thousand lead fittings but very few lead pipes.
Dozens of water agencies are currently replacing fittings. Hardy wants families to be notified when pipes upstream are undergoing work because just disturbing galvanized pipes to replace them can cause a spike in lead levels in tap water.
“We know that there’s no amount of lead that’s safe for kids,” she said, “and it can cause a whole host of problems: learning disabilities, impaired hearing, hyperactivity, delayed puberty and other health and behavioral effects.”
Maps from the California Department of Public Health show the Humboldt, Merced, Sacramento and Santa Cruz areas report high levels of lead in children’s blood, compared with other areas of the state. People can contact their local water district to ask for data on lead levels in the water as well as lead-abatement efforts.
Report: Electric Vehicles Jump in Popularity; Prices Leap, Too
CA Consumer Advocates Call for Price Cap on EVs Purchased with Rebates
Electric vehicles now make up almost 18 percent of the car-buying market in California. That’s up 42 percent from 2021, according to the latest data from the California Energy Commission.
Right now, low-income buyers can get up to $9,500 in grants and rebates. But Rosemary Shahan, president of Consumers for Auto Reliability and Safety, said these rebates become meaningless when dealer markups are out of control.
“Some of them are charging $50,000, $60,000 or even more, over the manufacturer’s suggested retail price, the sticker price,” she said, “and we’re concerned that whatever rebates people get can just be swallowed by the dealers.”
Consumers can look online at markups.org to find out which dealers are selling cars at the MSRP, versus which ones are jacking up the prices. A recent study by iseeCars.com found the hybrid models with the biggest markups include the Ford Maverick truck and the Lexus RX 450h SUV.
Proposition 30 on California’s November ballot would raise taxes on the wealthy to pay for more rebates on zero-emission vehicles, build more EV charging stations and fund wildfire prevention. But Shahan saif more rebates could motivate dealers to raise their prices even more, unless the California Air Resources Board moves to cap prices.
“If they want taxpayers to help fund those transactions, and assist low- and moderate-income consumers into getting into cars, to make them more affordable,” she said, “they have to be more affordable.”
Dave Clegern, a public affairs officer for the California Air Resources Board, said the agency expects EV prices to drop as the supply grows. Asked if the agency would consider price caps, he responded that it would have to “think carefully about the best consumer protection approach” if it became necessary to place a limitation on price above the manufacturer’s suggested retail.
