An Open Letter From Castlegate Development UPDATED

The following was submitted as a comment, but I believe it deserves its own post. Again, I am embarrassed to admit that I live in a community that counts garbage cans, but pays little attention to environmental hazards and toxins.

This is a member of Castlegate Development. I just want to let you know we really do appreciate that you care and we feel for you, too. We know Mt. Lebanon Commission is a dead end, but we will continue to show up. We are still seeking environmental groups in Allegheny County to help us and we continue to work closely with ACHD, our councilperson and her office, and every politician who will listen. We are worried not only about lead-
bad enough, right? But a hundred years ago, asbestos was also used in paint, and we worry about that, too, and whatever other nasty hundred year old toxins might remain.

These buildings are/were immediately across the street from our homes, separated by about fifty feet. In addition to the pollution we've had to breathe in for over a month while they demo-ed without water or without enough water, at one point laughably using a garden hose (!) the debris of the multiple buildings has been sitting everywhere on the lot for over a month, as well, drying out in the sun, settling in with the land, polluting our air further every time the wind blows. Our houses and yards and cars are covered with soot, dust, insulation, no matter how many times we clean them.

We believe the next phase of the demolition is this: With Mt. Lebanon's approval, once this part of the demo is finished, if the debris is removed without environmental safeguards as the demo was done, we will have another exposure event. Or--a potentially even more dangerous and likely scenario, Residential Resources, Sota Construction/Green Construction (who wins awards for being green!!!), will have Continental Enterprises or some other low budget company dig out all the bricks, mortar, walls, cement that have been dropping into the basement foundations during demo or left in tremendously large piles all across the land and they will move and pollute and grind everything up in grinders on site--again releasing even more toxins into the air and earth and environment--and then use them as fill on this lot. Unbelievable. All this directly across from where people live.

Already two neighbors have had a son and a daughter with pneumonia since this started, another kid has epilepsy, previously well controlled, and her seizures have increased. 10 out of the 12 closest homes have had continuous headaches and/or lung and eye and nose and respiratory symptoms. Another neighbor who is due to give birth any day has been told by her doctor that it's probably not safe for her to stay here. Yet, this is where we all live. All this approved by Mt. Lebanon Commission and backed by their demo permit. They could rescind the permit. Residential Resources could fire the whole lot of them. Sota Construction/Green Construction could make sure basic safeguards are in place and/or fire Continental Enterprises. But none of them have shown the least bit of concern in our month long pleas for safety. They didn't even put up tarps until less than a week ago, after a month of exposure and we offered to buy and hang them ourselves! Instead, the whole group of them all prove that their own agendas and profits mean more than human lives or air or earth.

And then get this-- after all this is over--three more buildings remain-- awaiting funding for another round of demo and then clean up. And they'll get the funding. You know they will, just like we know it. They are poisoning our neighborhood and poisoning our kids, and then they will do it all over again, just like they did to yours with that turf. They don't care. I don't know how they sleep at night, the whole lot of them. Sorry for taking up so much space on your page. Just to let you know, even if it's not worth much of anything, we stand with you, too. Neighbor to neighbor.

Update April 14, 2017 5:50 PM Keith McGill strikes again. In the PG's Mt. Lebanon hears concerns about toxic dust at demolition site, 

Mt. Lebanon manager Keith McGill said the municipality doesn’t have air quality requirements as part of its demolition permitting process.

I'm confused. We just tore down almost half the high school, and we don't have air quality requirements?  

A little lead is OK...UPDATED

I just received Addendum #3 from Gateway Engineers. The "safe"lead limits in the specifications are:


1. Changes to specifications:

1.1. Changes to Specification Section 02900- Artificial Turf, Section 1.4 Quality Assurance,

Item C. Lead and other metals. REQUIRED PRIOR WITH MATERIAL

SUBMISSIONS: Add 1. Lead content in synthetic turf fibers must be less than 8 ppm.


1.2. Changes to Specification Section 02900- Artificial Turf, Section 1.4 Quality Assurance,

Item C. Lead and other metals. REQUIRED PRIOR WITH MATERIAL

SUBMISSIONS: Add 2. Lead content in rubber infill must be less than 50 ppm.

2. Clarifications:

2.1. The synthetic turf materials are to be tested prior to delivery to the site and must contain less than 8 ppm of lead for fibers and less than 50 ppm of lead for crumb rubber. This limit falls well within the ASTM, EPA, and CDC threshold for lead levels.

Note to Commission and Municipal Staff: THERE ARE NO SAFE LEAD LEVELS

Update June 19, 2014 7:59 AM: The following editorial appeared in The Almanac on June 18, 2014. Keep Mt. Lebanon's field turf natural

Published Jun 18, 2014 at 6:34 am (Updated Jun 17, 2014 at 11:04 am)

I n November 2013, Mt. Lebanon commissioners approved a conceptual plan for the natural grass turf on Mt. Lebanon Park’s Middle and Wildcat fields to be replaced with artificial turf. The price tag is estimated at a cool $1 million, $750,000 of which would come from the municipality’s unassigned fund balance and the remaining $250,000 to be raised from private donations – ergo, this project should not result in a tax increase.

For months, a literal turf war has been going on in Mt. Lebanon, with those who oppose the project mainly concerned about safety. A recent meeting featured turf experts who were on hand to educate the public and answer their questions – questions that were not permitted to be asked vocally, rather, that were written on cards for the experts to address at the end of the meeting.

Chemicals in the crumb rubber turf – including alcohols, acids, ketones, esters, lactones and sulfur, to name a few – are one concern, while potential injuries from the harder surface are another.

The environmental impact is yet another issue that residents have been worried about from the time that the project was announced – they are concerned about the potential for flooding due to the removal of natural soil, and pollution from that runoff ending up in local streams. In early May, Dr. Tracy Bank, a geologist, told Mt. Lebanon commissioners that artificial turf cannot match environmental benefits of natural grass. “(Turf manufacturers) are basically strip mining the ground,” she said.

Truly, Mt. Lebanon Commissioner Kelly Fraasch, the lone commissioner opposed to the project, hit the nail on the head when she said that “Artificial turf is an issue that’s evolving, with potential health concerns for children, pregnant mothers and adults. We can’t look back at years of use and say it’s safe because everyone is using it. There are numerous examples of items we thought were safe and clearly aren’t today.

To rip up perfectly usable natural fields and replace grass with artificial turf is just another example of the current trend of local communities wanting to “keep up with the Joneses.” It’s frivolous, unnecessary spending, even though those who are for the project site increasing the fields’ usability by 60 percent, because it will remain playable for longer seasons.

For years, sports have been played on natural grass fields. Leave paradise alone, and don’t pave a proverbial parking lot.