Yesterday, Mayor Mamdani made good on his commitment to establishing an online portal with 170,000 internal City documents that date back to the Giuliani era and the aftermath of the 9/11 World Trade Center attack. That's when former New Jersey Governor, then EPA Administrator issued a press statement crafted by the Bush White House that the air in lower Manhattan was safe to breathe despite testing that showed just the opposite---a lie told to ensure that Wall Street opened back up quickly.
As a consequence, thousands more people have died due to illnesses and cancers contracted by breathing the poison air than died in the terrorist attack itself. Scientists estimate 400,000 first responders, students, commuters, government workers and downtown residents were exposed to the toxic air but just 145,000 people are actually enrolled in the 9/11 World Trade Center Health Program which has extended life for thousands. Yet, it is flawed in that first responders have a much easier time getting access to care than survivors like the close to 20,000 former public school children, now adults who were ordered back into the hot zone as Giuliani and Bloomberg made their full court press for a return to so-called normalcy.
At the time, WBAI was located at 120 Wall Street, just blocks away from the attack. We will be playing the question and answer session from yesterday's landmark City Hall press conference covered by veteran WBAI reporter Paul DiRienzo who asked city officials if anyone would be held criminally responsible for the thousands of subsequent deaths from WTC diseases contracted after the EPA made it’s false claim the air was safe.
Council Member Gale Brewer, who authored the legislation that got the disclosure ball rolling, said the “good news” was that under her bill the NYC Department of Investigation, which has prosecutorial powers, would be conducting a probe.
“The very least our city owes the families, survivors and first responders whose lives were forever changed by the September 11th attacks is transparency and accountability. That is why I am proud that our administration has launched the City’s first public records portal dedicated to the environmental and health impacts of 9/11 and reached a settlement in these lawsuits,” said Mayor Mamdani. “For too long, New Yorkers have had to fight for access to records that should have been available to them in the first place. This portal is part of our administration’s enduring commitment to honor those we lost, care for those living with lasting health consequences and give thousands of New Yorkers the answer they’ve been asking for.”
“For years, survivors and families have been asking for more transparency from their government,” said Corporation Counsel Steven Banks. “We have heard them and today we are launching this portal to give the public access to information and documents related to the City government’s response to the September 11th attacks, documents that were never previously made available to the public and that are essential to understanding the City’s actions and decisions, both during the months after September 11th and in the subsequent years.”
“The release of City Hall’s files related to the aftermath of 9/11 is a long-overdue reckoning. My colleagues and I who represented Ground Zero and the surrounding communities immediately warned local and federal officials of the health risks posed by toxins in the air at the time. Our warnings were not heeded, and now we and the public know that City Hall, led by former Mayor Giuliani, predicted that thousands of responders and community members would face devastating long-term health impacts from these toxins,” said Congressman Jerry Nadler. “Giuliani's intentional obfuscation of the truth is a slap in the face to the heroes and community members who were exposed at Ground Zero and in schools, offices, and homes throughout the surrounding area. By hiding the truth, he prolonged our fight in Congress for funding to take care of victims’ health needs, and cost the lives of other victims through unnecessary delays in healthcare interventions. While the damage to victims’ health cannot be erased, I am grateful to the Mamdani administration for releasing these files so victims and their loved ones can have the transparency they deserve and officials who misled the public can be held accountable.”
“For 25 years, first responders, survivors, families, and people who lived, worked and went to school in Lower Manhattan have lived with the health consequences of 9/11 while critical pieces of the City’s own record—HOW they got sick—remained out of reach,” said Council Member Gale A. Brewer. “On the Council, I fought for an independent DOI investigation (using a city charter provision for the first time, that’s now fully funded thanks to Speaker Menin and my colleagues) because New Yorkers deserve to know what their government knew, when it knew it, and what decisions were made. This portal is a great first step toward giving the public access to that record, one that has been denied them under previous administrations until Steve Banks, Corporation Counsel, and Mayor Mamdani got involved.”
