On fences outside many schools throughout St. Louis, signs warn of a potential lead hazard and say children should not play around the structures. On Tuesday, St. Louis Public Schools started to do something about the problem, beginning a monthslong process to take the potentially hazardous fencing down.
SLPS is spending about $2 million on the effort to remove more than 6 miles of chain-link fencing from 21 schools, or about a third of the district’s schools. SLPS says the fences were painted at some point before 1977, when the federal government significantly lowered the amount of lead that could be present in paint.
“It's been a huge problem,” said Antionette "Toni" Cousins, president of the board of education. “The district has really led the charge in that, because of our old buildings, we've known it to be an issue. We've worked with our environmentalists for over the past 10 years, really kind of hitting hard and focusing on our lead issues.”
On Tuesday, district leaders gathered at Columbia Elementary School to symbolically break ground in a section of fence that had already been removed. The chain-link fence separates the back of the school building from a shaded yard with picnic benches.
“This is just one more step forward in ensuring that we have healthy learning environments for our students and for our communities,” said Keisha Scarlett, the incoming superintendent of the district.
The lead abatement project will be paid for by a combination of state funding, federal funding that was passed in response to the pandemic and money that was approved by city voters in the 2022 Proposition S.
District leaders say they hope to finish the project by the fall, though they did say supply chain issues could slow things down. The work is starting in the north part of the city and moving south.
“Our north side tends to have the majority of our chain-link fences,” said Square Watson, deputy superintendent of operations. “And our southside schools still have some chain link fences, however, just to be somewhat intentional, and also strategic with where our schools are located, we're starting north and we're working our way south.”
SLPS officials said other school districts should consider looking for similar hazards if they have older facilities.
“There's so much beauty when I drive around and see the buildings, just the architecture here,” Scarlett said. “But that also comes with, people were doing their very best work back then, which included having different types of chemicals and materials. We just know more through science now and the impact of those things. So I do believe that these are important issues for many school districts.”
The district is also monitoring its drinking water for lead, and in 2020 it repaired and painted over wrought iron fencing that was also contaminated with lead, encasing the hazard instead of fully taking those fences down.
