This year marks the 30th anniversary of the Love Canal crisis during which a Niagara Falls elementary school situated next to a former toxic dumping site was closed and bulldozed to the ground due to contamination. You’d think that such an event would have signaled federal and state lawmakers to create and enforce guidelines preventing schools from being built near sources of pollution. Think again.

To date, few such laws exist. In fact, as of 2006, one study found that 23 states have no regulations or guidelines regarding school siting and environmental hazards.  School officials are free to build schools wherever they want regardless of proximity to pollution sources. This is particularly frightening when you consider how vulnerable children are to chemical exposure.  Their immune systems are still developing, and while they run around outside in the schoolyard and explore their environment, they are breathing in more air than normal, touching the ground and things that they find, and often eating without first washing their hands.   When children are exposed to toxins in the environment, they can be at risk for cancer, learning disabilities, asthma, and other illnesses.

This issue is finally inching its way into the spotlight, and change seems to be on its way. Last December, USA Today did a series on air contamination and schools in which they used an EPA computer model to map out the potential path of toxins released by industries across the country, and then checked to see where schools fall in relation to those paths. (Why didn’t the EPA do this themselves in the first place?!) The results they reported are downright scary.

As many as 435 schools are located in places where the surrounding air is likely saturated with chemicals at dangerously high levels. Ten percent of these schools are less than 10 years old.

This past week, the EPA announced that they will begin air testing outside 62 schools in over 22 states. (Hopefully this is just the beginning!) The EPA is also going to release national school siting guidelines that state and local governing bodies should follow. And according to a post on Change.org, coming up on April 28 in Washington, DC,  The Center for Health, Environment, & Justice, American Federation of Teachers, Global Community Monitor, and Natural Resources Defense Council are sponsoring a briefing called “Sources of Pollution and School Siting.” Well it’s about time!

One USA Today article makes a good point: President Obama is focusing on renovating schools and making them environmentally friendly, but what about considering the impact of a potentially toxic surrounding environment on the schools? Shouldn’t that come first?

takepart and take a moment to sign Childproofing Our Communities’ Principles For Safe School Siting. Also, check out the EPA’s Toxic Releases Query Form that allows you to retrieve data from the Toxic Release Inventory database regarding facility information and chemical reports for your area.

(Photo: akeg’s flickr photostream/Creative Commons)