by John Boyle
NARRATION:
A twenty-story apartment building sits on 53rd and Eighth Avenue. It houses a restaurant, a nail salon, two hundred forty apartments and a dry-cleaner.
TAPE:
I call it living in PERCATORY.
NARRATION:
Dr. Judith Schreiber is the chief scientist at the Environmental Protection Bureau of the New York State Attorney General's office. In the mid-1990's, Schreiber was the lead investigator of a study that analyzed indoor air contamination in residences above dry cleaners.
TAPE:
They think they have a nice lovely home to live in but unbeknownst to them most of the time they are living also with this chemical, PERC.
NARRATION:
A resident from the building is asked if he is aware that the dry-cleaner in his building is using a hazardous substance.
TAPE: Isn't it against the law to use perchloroethylene in multi-use buildings?
Well they shouldn't be using it
Cause I know my drycleaner across the street isn't using it
I think most of them in the area are not using it
But I could be wrong
But certainly they shouldn't be using it if that's true.
NARRATION:
Go behind the counter of the dry cleaner, past the racks of plastic covered suits, dresses and shirts, past the steam presses and step into a room that is designed to be airtight to prevent any escaping vapors from the big washing machine that looks like it has water in it.
But this clear liquid is Perchloroethylene, better known as Perc. It has caused liver and kidney cancer and leukemia in studies of rats and mice .
As a result, the EPA has classified Perc an animal carcinogen and a probable human carcinogen.
And if you have a small leak or even a drip, it disappears into the air immediately and is sucked up throughout the building.
TAPE: PERC.Schreiber.1.145.
The elevator shaft is almost like a piston … sucking up air from the lower parts of the bldg, and pulling them upstairs.
NARRATION:
They discovered that residents had significant levels of Perc in their blood, urine and breast-milk. The mothers asked Schreiber if they should stop breastfeeding their babies.
TAPE: PERC.SCHREIBER.2.47.
What I tell them is not so much that you should reconsider breastfeeding or not, but you should reconsider the quality of the air that you're breathing, in other words maybe you shouldn't be living in this apartment.
NARRATION:
As a result of Schreiber's report, regulations in New York State have become so strict that dry-cleaning machines using Perc must now be sealed in those air-tight chambers that cost about ten thousand dollars. But the chamber can only do its job if it's used properly.
And in this dry-cleaner, the doors are left wide open. In fact, the owner himself uses the room to treat stains while the machine is in progress.
TAPE: Schreiber.294
I believe that is considered a violation of part 232 because in order for the vapor barrier room to be effective the doors must of course be closed.
NARRATION:
On top of that, Perc has been getting bad reviews. Last year, Consumer Reports compared some of the newer, environmentally friendly cleaning methods with PERC.
TAPE: DAVID HEIM. 87
Ironically, the old standby, PERC, gave the worst results.
NARRATION:
David Heim is the Deputy editor of Consumer Reports.
TAPE: DAVID HEIM. 87
The lambs-wool jacket came back pilled, the pleated skirt shrank almost one whole size and our silk blouse faded.
NARRATION:
Contrast that with the scene at the Polaris dry-cleaner on the first floor of a twenty-six story office building on Park Avenue and 38th street.
Go past the racks of plastic covered suits, dresses and shirts, and there, right in the middle of the room, out in the open, sits the future of dry-cleaning in New York,
One of the machines custom designed to use an organic and biodegradable solvent.
Manufacturers claim that in lab tests, Rainbow trout thrive in its wastewater.
Sung Yung Ann, a co-owner of Polaris, says that this new solvent is a big improvement over her seven years of working with Perc
which she says used to make her dizzy.
TAPE:
SUNG YUNG ANN in Korean which fades under and out …
NARRATION:
A co-worker translates.
TAPE:
She feels wonderful working here cause she doesn't have to smell that chemical.
NARRATION:
The new systems are double the cost of a PERC machine,
But, clothes look cleaner, feel softer, with no chemical smell.
Dry-cleaners using them are exempt from the expensive yearly safety inspections
And the ten thousand dollar airtight chambers,
While New Yorkers who live above these dry-cleaners can breathe deeper.
For Columbia Radio News, I'm John Boyle.