Chicago water: In public reports, city silent over sex hormones and painkillers found in treated drinking water

Annual water quality reports mailed to Chicagoans this month didn’t say a word about sex hormones, painkillers or anti-cholesterol drugs, even though city officials found traces of pharmaceuticals and other unregulated substances in treated Lake Michigan water during the past year.

Like other cities, Chicago must notify the public if its drinking water contains certain regulated contaminants, including lead, pesticides and harmful bacteria.

But pharmaceutical chemicals, which have been detected in drinking water across the country, are not on that list. So Mayor Richard Daley is technically correct in stating that the “pure, fresh drinking water” pumped to 7 million people in Chicago and the suburbs “meets or exceeds all regulatory standards.”

Drinking water standards haven’t been updated for years, in part because little is known about how pharmaceutical concoctions might affect public health. But researchers and regulators are concerned about the potential effects of long-term exposure to these substances, which are designed to have an impact at low doses.

“We’re just scratching the surface with what’s been detected to date,” said Dana Kolpin, a researcher at the U.S. Geological Survey. “And we don’t have a clue about what these mixtures can do.”

Chicago officials didn’t start conducting their own tests until last year, after a Tribune investigation found small amounts of pharmaceuticals and other unregulated chemicals in samples of the city’s tap water.

The city collected samples of treated Lake Michigan water four times in 2008. According to results posted on the city’s Web site, the tests found small amounts of the sex hormones testosterone and progesterone; gemfibrozil, a prescription cholesterol-fighting drug; ibuprofen, an over-the-counter painkiller, and DEET, the active ingredient in bug spray.

The tests also found caffeine, nicotine and cotinine, a nicotine byproduct, all of which researchers consider to be indicators of pharmaceuticals from human waste.

Drugs end up in drinking water after people take medications and some of the residue passes through their bodies down the toilet. Conventional sewage and water treatment filters out some of the substances, or at least reduces the concentrations, but multiple studies have found that small amounts still get through.

Although treated sewage from the Chicago area drains away from Lake Michigan, more than 300 other cities put treated waste and untreated sewage overflows into the lake and its tributaries, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Chicago’s tests found tiny amounts of the antidepressant Prozac and sulfamethoxazole, an antibiotic, in untreated water collected from Lake Michigan intake cribs. But those prescription drugs weren’t found in treated water. Nor were most of the 71 other unregulated compounds the city screened for.

The Daley administration first promised to test for pharmaceuticals monthly, then changed course after the first tests turned up inconsistent results. Now officials plan to collect samples three times a year and send the water off to be tested by three different labs.

“We haven’t seen any patterns yet, so it’s tough to reach any conclusions,” said John Spatz, the city’s water commissioner. “But since it’s an emerging issue, we’re going to keep following it.”

As promised, the test results are available online. Yet it requires considerable sleuthing to find them on the Department of Water Management’s home page, and the drugs found in the water are not easily discernible amid six pages of numbers.

In the Tribune’s tests, conducted in March 2008, water drawn from a drinking fountain at City Hall contained trace amounts of cotinine; carbamazepine, an anti-seizure drug; and acetaminophen, an over-the-counter painkiller. The newspaper’s tests also found two unregulated industrial chemicals used to make Teflon and Scotchgard, neither of which the city tested for.

Even though such substances are turning up virtually every time researchers look for them, the EPA says it still doesn’t have enough evidence to limit pharmaceuticals and many other unregulated chemicals in drinking water — in part because cities haven’t been required to test routinely for the compounds.

The Obama administration’s top water regulator, Peter Silva, promised at his confirmation hearings to step up the government’s research efforts. Without direction from federal officials, cities across the nation have slowly begun to test their water for pharmaceuticals, prompted by studies in Europe and later by the U.S. Geological Survey.

Milwaukee, which also draws its drinking water from Lake Michigan, added dozens of pharmaceuticals three years ago to its annual testing for unregulated contaminants and posts easy-to-understand results online. Nothing turned up last year, according to the city’s site.

Water officials say not enough is known to justify spending millions of taxpayer dollars to upgrade treatment plants so they could strip the chemicals from the water. The most effective method, reverse osmosis, is expensive and creates a large amount of waste.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/health/chi-water-testing-14-jul14,0,4303601.story

Chicago Cameras On Every Corner??

*I won’t be going back to Chicago anytime soon *

Mayor Daley has argued that security and terrorism won’t be an issue if his Olympic dreams come true because, by 2016, there will be a surveillance camera on every street corner in Chicago.

But even before that blanket coverage begins, the “Big Brother’’ network is being put to better use.

Call takers and dispatchers now see real-time video if there is a surveillance cameras within 150 feet of a 911 call, thanks to a $6 million upgrade to the city’s “computer-aided dispatch” system.

When live video appears, call takers can pan, tilt and zoom those cameras to get the best possible view of a crime or disaster scene.

“As a first responder, I can’t tell you how important it is to have a set of eyes on an emergency scene prior to your arrival. The valuable information they provide from the camera network can ultimately mean the difference between life and death,” said Ray Orozco, executive director of the city’s Office of Emergency Management and Communications.

“Whether you send one ambulance or three, two squad cars or four, it all depends upon the information we are able to gather from the 911 caller,” said Orozco, a former fire commissioner.

During a December test, live video was used to catch a petty thief in the act of sticking his hand in a Salvation Army kettle outside Macy’s on State Street.

But, the crime-fighting potential is “limitless,” said Police Superintendent Jody Weis.

“You know what the suspect’s vehicle might be. It can give us instant leads. . . . We may get some information from that where we may not even respond to that location. We could actually get ahead of it and go to a place where that vehicle maybe was last seen or the individual might be running to,” Weis said.

And, “If we can warn our officers of any dangers they’re facing ahead of time, it’s a tremendous advantage.”

Although the city’s vast surveillance network includes cameras installed at private businesses, universities and homes, Orozco said civil libertarians have nothing to fear.

“We do not and we will not take access to any camera inside of a building,’’ he said. When the city accesses private cameras, workers only see “what you would see if you were sitting on a park bench in front of that building,” he said.

In 2004, City Hall used a $5.1 million federal homeland security grant to install 250 cameras at locations thought to be at high risk of a terrorist attack and link them and 2,000 existing city cameras to the 911 center.

Chicago then launched “Operation Virtual Shield,’’ by linking 1,000 miles of fiber cable to a unified “homeland security grid’’ — complete with hundreds of additional cameras and sensors to monitor the city’s water supply and detect chemical and biological weapons.

On Thursday, Orozco refused to say how many cameras are currently linked to the 911 center. But, he reiterated Daley’s earlier promise.

“We’re going to grow the system until we eventually cover one end of the city to the other,” he said.

http://www.suntimes.com/news/politics/1440402,mayor-daley-emergency-surveillance-cameras.article

City To Cut Back On Plowing Snow On Side Streets

CHICAGO (CBS) ― Your neighborhood could look very different this winter. Mayor Richard M. Daley said Tuesday that city crews will cut back on plowing side streets this winter in an effort to save money. The mayor said the city will only plow side streets during weekday union business hours this winter, rather than during overtime hours. But as CBS 2′s Derrick Blakley reports if there’s one city service Chicagoans demand, it’s outstanding snow removal.

“I expect for the streets to be cleaned for my tax money,” said Chicago resident Sarah Lockhart.

“That’s the kind of spending we need to maintain,” said Chicago resident Madeline Norris.

During the snowstorm on Monday, the city Department of Streets and Sanitation was tested for the first time this season under extremely tight budgetary constraints.

City Department of Streets & Sanitation Commissioner Michael Picardi, according to the release from Streets & San, pointed out that Monday’s moderate snow, which brought 2 1/2 inches to the North Side and 1 1/2 inches to the South Side, still cost $490,000 to clear because of high costs for equipment ($143,000), salt ($295,000) and workers ($51,000).

“Our full route system covers 9,456 lane miles and during a full snow program is patrolled by 274 snow-fighting trucks which use gasoline, spread salt and are operated by salaried drivers, so costs will naturally mount whenever we go out,” Picardi said. “Our challenge is to find as many ways to provide this important service while still working to reduce costs.”

“That was only 1.5 inches, 2.5 inches of snow. It’s almost half a million dollars just like that,” Mayor Daley said.

So cutbacks are necessary and the side streets will feel it first. They’ll still be cleared, but not using Streets & San workers on overtime.

“Let’s say we’re on the main streets till 9, 10 at night. We’re gonna wait until 7:00 the following morning to attack the side streets,” Picardi said. “So there’ll be a period when the side streets will be covered with snow.”

On Monday, Snow Command helped cut costs by using state-of-the-art technology to track the storm and coordinate deployment of the snow-fighting fleet to just before the actual storm system arrived. They also avoided extra overtime charges by promptly pulling the fleet off duty at 3 p.m. once side streets were cleared.

“We have literally become victims of our own success,” Picardi said, “because residents always expect to see main streets fully cleared and grow impatient when side streets aren’t cleared immediately, but everyone needs to know that this high standard of snow removal comes at a very high cost. We ask our residents to be patient during snow clearing operations and to drive with caution on our side streets until we get to them.”

“While safety remains our number one concern,” Picardi said in a release, “cost containment is also very important in this age of shrinking revenues and increasing costs.”

“That’s not an area I’d like to see services get cut in because it would affect a lot of people,” said Chicago resident Howard Williams.

It was voters’ anger over the city’s inept reaction to the snowstorm of 1979 that swept Michael Bilandic out and Jayne Byrne into the mayor’s office.

Ever since, snow removal has been a budgetary sacred cow with mayors spending whatever it takes. And voters’ attitudes haven’t changed.

“It could be a little dangerous, politically speaking,” said Chicago resident Angie Shansky. “The people of Chicago want their streets cleared.”

The city is also asking your help regarding side streets: keep your sidewalks shoveled, dig your car out and throw the snow on the parkway, not into the street.

There is one area where the city’s saving big-time on snow removal costs: salt. Suburbs are paying $140 a ton for salt. The city’s only paying $40 a ton, because it signed a two-year contract before prices skyrocketed.

http://cbs2chicago.com/local/snow.removal.costs.2.877966.html

Daley To Shut Down City Government To Save Cash

CHICAGO (CBS) ― Mayor Richard M. Daley said Tuesday he will shut down “non-safety related city services” for six days abutting holidays over the next two years to save millions of dollars.

CBS 2 Political Editor Mike Flannery reports that Mayor Daley says he’s facing a budget shortfall of nearly a half-billion dollars. He’s already moved to cut 2,500 jobs from city hall’s payroll. Now he’s going to shut it down – along with other non-essential facilities on the day after Thanksgiving, Christmas Eve and New Year’s Eve. That will save $20 million.

The mayor’s announcement Tuesday followed behind the scenes bargaining in which labor unions rejected the idea of taking unpaid days off while city services continued as normal. So Daley made an end run around them. He said all but the most essential city functions would shut down – and city workers would not be paid – on three days during the upcoming holiday season.

“The economic crisis in this country is getting worse and worse every day, and that’s what you see in every headline in any major newspaper – locally, nationally and internationally,” Mayor Daley said. “And it’s gonna get worse next year.”

City employees downtown at Harold Washington Library were very unhappy at the prospect of a 1.2 percent pay cut hitting right at the holidays.

Members of the tax-paying public were divided.

“This is a time for tough cuts, people aren’t gonna like it, but what else can he do? He’s gotta take it a step at a time,” a taxpayer said.

“I understand the reasoning behind it and saving money, and that’s very necessary, but if there are other ways to cut city spending besides taking money from their employees,” another taxpayer said.

Some union leaders promised a court fight claiming Daley does not have the power unilaterally to furlough their employees for three days. They are also preparing for a public relations battle.

“When you see $35 million being spent on public relations, consultancies,” said Roberta Lynch, ASCME union official. “We think that kind of money is really not appropriate.”

“No one wants to lay off anyone,” Mayor Daley said. “No one wants to do that.”

The mayor will formally present his 2009 budget recommendations to the City Council Wednesday morning framing the entire document as a response to the economic crisis. No real estate tax increase – but look for increase in parking tax and amusement tax on sporting events and theater.

http://cbs2chicago.com/local/city.services.shutdown.2.840064.html