Published Saturday, November 01, 2008

Many asbestos workers have false credentials

By Winston Skinner

The Newnan Times-Herald

A state EPD official who grew up in Coweta County says many of the people who work in asbestos removal have false documents.

Don McCarty, Northeast District manager for the Georgia Environmental Protection Division, told members of White Oak Golden K in Newnan that Georgia has a number of regulations regarding asbestos -- including a requirement for people who work at asbestos removal to complete certain training. A certificate program shows a person has completed that training, but McCarty told the group of about 70 at the Special Events Center that many of the people who can produce a certificate have not actually earned one.

He said that when the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency checked a site in Florida where 89 people were working, the EPA found a third of the workers had authentic certificates, a third were working with a bogus certificate and/or Social Security number and a third had certificates with the names of "people who were dead."

Fake certificates are sometimes made for illegal aliens, and sometimes workers have multiple false certificates from different states.

Exposure to asbestos has been linked to several diseases including asbestosis, mesothelioma and lung cancer. McCarty said he "didn't know too much about asbestos" when he was assigned to that EPD function. While he was working in that area, he remembered thinking, "I'm really, truly affecting lives here."

McCarty said many building products still contain some asbestos. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency issued a ban on asbestos in 1989. A federal court subsequently ruled EPD could not ban existing uses of asbestos.

Many people, McCarty said, heard about the ban but not about it being overturned. Because of the North American Free Trade Agreement, products can come from outside the United States that contain asbestos. McCarty showed a photo of an asbestos mine in Canada.

He said there are some 3,500 building products on the U.S. market that still contain asbestos. "There are some things that are absolutely banned, but most things are not," he said.

McCarty has worked with various programs during his 24 years at EPD. One project related to lead-based paint, which was banned for residential uses in 1978. Lead is still allowed in paint used for marine purposes.

"It's very durable. That's why it was used," McCarty said. Children sometimes would ingest paint flakes or chips, which can lead to developmental problems -- particularly in young children.