Mayor Bill de Blasio on Friday cast doubt on whether the 19 kids confirmed to have contracted lead poisoning in public housing between 2010 and 2016 got it from their apartments — directly contradicting findings by his own administration and the feds.
The New York City Housing Authority got blasted in a federal complaint this week for not inspecting apartments for lead hazards between 2012 and 2016 — as required by city and federal law — all while falsely claiming that they had been.
Amid a series of revelations about ethical failings at NYCHA that started with a scathing Department of Investigation report in November, the mayor has repeatedly defended its leadership and tried to minimize the fallout, including on Friday.
“We don’t know specifically what happened with each child, because unfortunately with lead [poisoning], there can be many sources,” he said on WNYC radio.
“There are a number of sources that have nothing to do with housing or lead paint, there are other sources that can be the cause for something and we just don’t know in each case what happened.”
But his bid to duck responsibility contradicts a fact sheet released by City Hall in November.
“Between 2010 and 2016, there were 17 documented cases requiring lead abatement at 18 NYCHA apartments where children with elevated blood lead levels lived,” read the fact sheet. “Four of these cases occurred after 2014.”
The administration later revised those numbers upward, admitting there had been six cases after 2014 — bringing the total number of impacted kids to 19.
The mayor’s claims also contradict what Deputy Mayor Herminia Palacio told reporters in November, acknowledging that under this administration, at least “two of the children were in apartments that had lead paint that should have been and weren’t [inspected].”
The federal complaint said the number of kids suffering from lead poisoning in public housing is likely much higher, because of holes in the city’s protocol for identifying cases.
Thousands of kids living in NYCHA units with lead paint are never tested, and the city’s threshold for requiring Health Department workers to inspect NYCHA apartments for lead hazards is notably higher than in some jurisdictions.
“Between 2010 and 2016 at least 19 lead-poisoned children were found to have been exposed to deteriorated lead paint in their NYCHA apartments,” the federal complaint said. “There is every reason to believe the true number of children with lead poisoning is materially higher.”
The mayor’s comments came the same day city officials revealed they’re reviewing previous cases of lead poisoning to ensure they were properly reported, and just days after investigators raided a NYCHA warehouse in Queens.
Federal law-enforcement officials think the seized information could reveal evidence of a slew of crimes.
“I think we’re really just getting at the beginning of it,” one source told The Post.