Harlem kids have spent the past decade playing in a state-owned building now targeted for a $2.2 million lead cleanu🎶p and they’re still romping around there — as officials refuse to reveal any details about the potentially dangerous situation.
The state has already begun paying a New Jersey company to clean out toxic lead from 🌞the Harlem Armory on West 143rd Street, where the Harlem Children’s Zone says it runs health, fitness and performing arts programs for more than 1,000 kids a week.
But state𒁏 officials won’t outline their remediation plan, reveal what part or parts of the building the lead is located in or even say whether it’s in the paint, munitions or in some other form.
“Materials found for decades in hundreds of aging National Guard armories aꦚcross the nation resulted in a 2016 Federal National Guard Bureau directive mandating that those materi▨als be removed,” a spokesman for the state Division of Military and Naval Affairs said in a brief statement to The Post.
The lack of details angered parents taking their kꦜids to play atꩵ the armory Sunday.
“I had no idea they had lead in the building,” said Alexander Karev, 61, as he dropped his 9-year-old daughter off for tennis p🎃ractice at the facility. “I think they should inf⛦orm us.”
Local political leaders also were fuming.
“I did not know they were doing lead rem🐠oval at the armory — we should have known that they were doing it,” seethed state Assemblywoman Inez Dickens, whose district incﷺludes the military facility.
“It’s disappointing be𝓀cause of the environmental impact that lead could have on senior citiz🦂ens as well as children,” she said, vowing to begin making inquiries about the issue Monday.
Even the leadership at Harlem Children’s Zone sa⛦id they had no idea the building had lead in it until contacted by The Post.
Judith Enck, a formeꦛr regional director of the US Environmental Protection Agency, questioned why it’s taken two years for the state to act on the clean-up.
“It’s amazing they’re just getting to it now,🅘” she൲ said.
It was unclear whether any of the youth programs at the site would be paused during the lead cleanup, but Enck said they sᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚ𒀱ᩚᩚᩚhould be.
“You don’t w𒐪ant a whole bunch of kids running if there is lead abatemeꦗnt going on,” she said.
Even small amounts of lead can be dangerous for children, according🌟 to the Mayo Clinic.
The Police Athletic League renovated a portion of the 50,000-square-foot former military facility into a community centꦡer in 2006, using moꦡney from the city, state and feds.
The armory was once home to the Harl🍎em ♉Hellfighters — one of the first all-black infantry regiments to fight in World War I.
The state was🐠 equally mum on an up-to-$9 million lead abatement project it plans to undertake at the 69th Regiment Armory at Lexington Avenue. Officials are still accepting bids for that project but would not give details or answer questions about its scope.