FILE - A lead pipe is shown after being replaced by a copper water supply line to a home in Flint, Mich., July 20, 2018. (AP Photo/Paul Sancya, File)

By DAN POMPILI

Staff writer

YOUNGSTOWN — Mahoning County continues to spend its state and federal funds to reduce lead hazards, but funding reductions in Washington and Columbus could make it more challenging in the near future.

Mahoning County commissioenrs regularly have approved items placed on the agenda by Phil Puryear, head of the county’s Department of Lead Hazard Control.

In just the past month, the board has approved 16 projects across the county, totaling roughly $430,000, for remediation of lead-based hazards. The work is funded through a U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s Lead Hazard Reduction Grant and Healthy Homes supplemental funding.

“The incidence of lead poisoning is high here,” Puryear said. “These are competitive grants based on need and the ability to spend the money, and fortunately we’ve been granted a lot of money to remediate these lead-based paint hazards.”

The county received the four-year, $5.7 million award in 2022, and it will expire at the end of 2026. The grant required at least $500,000 in local matching funds and Puryear said the application ultimately included nearly $700,000, including $500,000 from the City of Youngstown in the form of Community Development Block Grant dollars, and $160,000 from the county. Puryear said landlords who benefit from the program also pay into it, which counts as matching funds.

The overall funding for lead hazard remediation through the grant and matching dollars will be closer to $7 million by the time it is completed next year.

He said that through the first quarter of 2025, the county has used about $486,000 of the matching funds and drawn about $2.46 million against the $5.7 million award.

Puryear said the program supports low-income families with children. Children are more susceptible to the dangers of lead and can be exposed through any number of channels. Puryear said wet basements can lead to flaking of lead paint, and glazing on windows in houses built in the 1950s and 1960s often puts lead-contaminated dust into the air as the windows open and close.

He said $5 million of the grant funding is specifically for lead-based paint remediation, which limits the scope of the project to only items that are painted or varnished with lead-based products. He said the rest of the funding is through HUD’s Healthy Homes program, which gives them more room to address other issues.

“We can address issues like water infiltration, carbon monoxide detectors, electrical hazards, and other things that will make the house less safe, as well as things that will increase the risk of lead exposure,” he said.

The program also allows for collaboration. For example, the county sometimes helps the City of Youngstown with projects such as mold removal. One item on the April 24 agenda included a contract with Galloway Construction & Restoration Inc. for mold remediation in the amount of $12,740.

“We don’t typically deal with mold through this project,” Puryear said. “But the City of Youngstown gives us a lot of matching funds for our lead grant, and from time to time when they have issues that arise that they have no method of dealing with, they will ask us to help facilitate some projects for them,” he said.

Likewise, the county will at times petition the city, on a case-by-case basis,to use the grant to fix a roof or demolish a garage. All of those projects are completed through a CDBG grant agreement, whereby the county pays the contractor and the city reimburses the county.

“All of our contractors are licensed and bonded in lead abatement and certified through the EPA and the city doesn’t have that capability at this point,” he said.

Ian Beniston, executive director of the Youngstown Neighborhood Development Corporation, said his organization’s partnership with the county and city — and the funding that supports it — has been critical to its mission for about the past 15 years.

“In the City of Youngtown, where we do most of our work, most of the housing stock predates federal lead paint laws,” he said.

Beniston said YNDC regularly benefits from the HUD programs, through the county, to replace old lead-contaminated windows with vinyl windows, replace attic vinyl siding, and eliminate other points of lead exposure.

“I view that as highly important work. In America, we face a housing shortage and so in addition to building new housing, we also need to preserve what we have and that means modernizing our current housing stock to make it lead-safe,” he said.

Beniston said the risks from lead are clear.

“We know that we can tie it to all kinds of things through scientific evidence, whether it’s predisposition to violence or developing an inability to learn, we should all be making our best efforts to allow for better conditions in our communities,” he said. “Mahoning County has done a tremendous job of chipping away at the lead hazard problem in the city and the county.”

Puryear said the county submitted a list along with the grant application for 170 projects, Puryear said. So far, approximately 87 projects have been completed and he expects that by the end of June, it will be more than 100, out of 170 proposed.

“The good part is that I have 165 properties as we sit here today,” he said.

The bad news is that it is unclear what the future holds for that program.

The nonprofit website Unleadedkids.org summarized the problem this way in March of last year: Congress cut HUD’s FY2024 appropriations for its Lead Hazard Reduction Grant Program by 31%, from $290 to $200 million $65 million less that what HUD requested $265 million for the program. HUD’s overall FY24 funding was cut by 1.9%.

The National Low Income Housing Commission reported on March 17 that the House of Representatives’ continuing resolution to keep the federal government funded for another year does maintain $345 million for HUD’s Lead Hazard Control and Healthy Homes grants, identical funding to last year. However, it also cut $3.29 billion from HUD’s community development fund, which supports the grants that Youngstown and Mahoning County used to provide the matching funds for the lead remediation and healthy homes grant.

Additionally, Puryear said, they face potential cuts from the state.

“The state had $10 million set aside for lead-safe housing, but that did not make it through the house version of the budget,” he said. “That is disheartening.”

Puryear said that using ARP funds, Ohio mounted a $150-million campaign to train contractors through a capital assistance grant program.

He said $96 million of that $150 million was directed toward training contractors in lead hazard remediation, and that Mahoning County received a $500,000 grant through the Ohio Department of Development, released in July 2023 for contractor training. That grant ends in March 2026.

“We want people to think in terms of lead safety when doing renovation,” he said. “The county is an accredited trainer. Thousands of contractors have been trained but there are still 1000s more that have not been trained.”

Puryear and Beniston both say they hope governments in Washington and Columbus will consider the value of the programs for public safety and ensure funding is renewed.

Puryear said he has reached out to Ohio Sen. Al Cutrona, R-Canfield.

Cutrona said this is the first week the senate has been able to review the house’s budget proposal, but lead hazard remediation funding is one issue on his radar.

“I know I had a meeting with the county commissioners, and this topic was brought up.

It’s an issue I’m looking at deeply, because lead abatement is very important to our local community,” Cutrona said. “We’re right now in deliberation and everything is up for discussion, but I know this is a priority for many folks, not just in the county, but across the state. I’m doing what I can to get some funding put back into some different areas. Everything from Medicaid to safe homes. That’s what we want to see, is something that’s fiscally conservative but is still taking care of much- needed areas in our community.”

State Rep. Lauren McNally, D-Youngstown, castigated her house colleagues for a budget she calls an insult to Ohioans and an attack on children.

“Public education is being attacked, funding to end childhood hunger was cut, and there is no money in the budget for lead hazard programs.” she stated in an email. “Most people understand that lead exposure is dangerous and how this intensifies when there is early exposure as a child.”

McNally noted that Youngstown is ranked 25th nationally for the most lead pipes and Ohio is ranked third among the states.

“It is an actual problem. It is a problem that local, state, and federal agencies need to work together to help combat. In order to replace all the lead pipes in Youngstown, and guarantee lead free water would take around $36 million,” she said. “This does not include other sources of lead exposure, like lead paint and window glazing.”