Op-Ed: Why neighborhood parents need to speak-up for a safer Petworth Playground
/Poured-in-place surface (photo: DGS)
by Elanor Starmer
guest opinion contributor
Like many families, my kids and I spend a lot of time at the Petworth Playground on 8th and Taylor Streets NW. It’s where my boys, now 5 and 2, practiced crawling, walking, and kicking a soccer ball. One of my two-year-old’s first “sentences” was uttered there: He sat next to a crumbling section of the playground surface, grabbed a pile of the little rubber crumbs, looked at me with a mischievous grin, and said “Mama, eat!”
He was signaling something that many parents know well: these rubber crumbs are fascinating to kids. They put them in their mouths, in their pockets, and carry them home in their shoes. I find them all the time around our house.
Large holes in the playground surface at Petworth Recreation Center playground (photo: Elanor Starmer)
So like many parents, I was shocked to see news reports surfacing this past spring that independent testing had found extremely high levels of lead in the synthetic rubber “poured in place,” or PIP, playground surfaces at several DC schools – the same type of surface my kids play on at Petworth Park.
Following outrage by parents, DC’s Department of General Services, which maintains playgrounds and other public facilities, announced over the summer that it was testing the PIP at playgrounds at 87 DCPS schools. (There has been no testing at charter schools or rec centers like Petworth Park.)
Its preliminary report, released in September, found lead in the PIP at almost all of the playgrounds tested, along with lead from other sources. Seventeen playgrounds showed extremely high levels, including Bancroft, Height and Truesdell, though only six were temporarily closed. We are still waiting on actual testing data, no PIP has been removed, and parents feel in the dark.
DGS has downplayed the results, saying most of the findings are below “actionable levels.” But when I looked closer at the data, I saw that DGS standards are far weaker than lead guidelines from the federal government and leading health organizations for children’s products. These weak standards mean that playgrounds with lead levels far higher than we’d allow in toys aren’t getting cleaned up.
I’m not the only one who is concerned.
In early October, I attended a DC Council hearing on the topic. More than 25 parents, scientists, educators and ANC commissioners testified about their concerns with PIP; only one person testified in favor of it. I learned that children’s health groups have been sounding a PIP alarm in DC for several years – and not just about lead.
A letter sent to the Council in 2017 from NIH-funded researchers at Mt. Sinai Medical School reviewed the chemical components of synthetic rubber used on playgrounds. It found neurotoxins and carcinogens. Their conclusion: These materials should be banned in kids’ play spaces.
A letter signed by 25 organizations to the Mayor and Council in 2018 made the same argument, citing a range of scientific studies, and DC no longer allows crumb rubber as an infill on synthetic turf playing fields. But the ban doesn’t apply to its use in PIP playground surfaces.
At the hearing, I also learned that toxicity is not the only concern. Like any rubber, PIP gets hot in the sun – very hot. One parent at the hearing showed photos of a laser thermometer reading at a DCPS playground this past summer; the PIP surface was 180.1 degrees. In Petworth, where the playground is adjacent to a splash park, the risk of burn injury from running barefoot onto a burning surface is very real. It has happened in DC before.
An example of EWF surface (photo: GameTime)
Parents and experts at the hearing emphasized an alternative surface already used on playgrounds across the country: Engineered Wood Fiber (EWF), a natural surface that is ADA accessible and approved for DC playgrounds by DGS. (Here’s an example of what it looks like.)
Which brings us back to Petworth Park.
In mid-October, the Department of Parks and Recreation held a community meeting about the Petworth Park renovation, part of a months-long process of community input, and attendees advocated for EWF. Toward the end of the meeting, DPR put several decisions, including the new playground surface, to a vote; it was 7-1 in favor of EWF. A noncommittal DPR encouraged the community to weigh in through email. According to a FOIA request by a concerned parent, at least 90 parents from Petworth weighed in over email in favor of EWF.
In December, I joined as DPR reconvened the community to announce final decisions about the park’s new design. They acknowledged that email input was “overwhelmingly in favor” of EWF, with parents expressing concerns about heat, lead, and other issues – but the new surface would be PIP anyway. DGS and DPR directors overruled the community, despite the risks to our children.
Yet across the city, in Foxhall near Georgetown, parents also requested EWF for their playgrounds – and got it.
A slide from a presentation by DPR & DGS on the Foxhall playground, showing the approved EWF surface. Why not Petworth?
To us, the agencies argued that it was too difficult to maintain EWF. We know DGS has a maintenance problem: just look at the crumbling PIP at most DC playgrounds. But shouldn’t the solution be to overhaul its maintenance protocols? And why are they capable of maintaining it in other communities, but not ours?
Ward 4 Councilmember Brandon Todd recently wrote a letter to DGS in support of the community’s position on an EWF playground. Before that, multiple Councilmembers signed a letter to the Mayor pushing her to be more transparent and thorough in the lead testing of PIP surfaces throughout DC. The city hasn’t said if it’ll honor these requests.
The opportunity to change course is now. Email Mayor Muriel Bowser, DGS Director Keith Anderson, and DPR Director Delano Hunter and ask for EWF at Petworth Park. Copy our Councilmembers.
There are a lot of things we can’t control as parents. We often rely on health and safety regulations to reduce risks, but in this case, federal and city standards are lagging far behind the science. With the Petworth Park renovation, we have an opportunity to make a change for the better. It’s time for Mayor Bowser, her agencies, and the Council to act in the interest of our kids.
Let’s speak up to make sure they do the right thing.
About the Author
Elanor Starmer first moved to Petworth 20 years ago and now lives just south in Park View with her two kids. When she's not working or wrangling her kids at local playgrounds, she is the president of the Park View United Neighborhood Coalition, the civic association for northern Park View.
