CLPPP Says Obama’s Omnibus Bill Slashes CDC Funding; Puts Children at Risk of Lead Poisoning

One big reality of the current recession is the need for everyone to cut back their budgets.  This holds true for most Americans, businesses and nonprofits.   It has now also started to become a reality for our government.  A recent discussion posted to LinkedIn includes a link to an article that is titled “President Obama: Restore funding to help lead poisoned children!”  The article explains how President Obama’s Omnibus bill slashes CDC funding for its healthy homes and lead poisoning prevention program by 94%, leaving half a million lead poisoned children without the full services they need in the coming year.

The fact is there is less money available and use of the money that is available needs to be prioritized.  It is also important to recognize that as Americans we are all entitled to our opinions, so it is only natural that there are many views for defining that prioritization. 

In this new economy perhaps everyone needs to rethink how we invest.  Organizations like CLPPP do great things for our society. However their ability to do so has been based on being and continuing to be SUBSIDIZED by the government.  Due to economic realities its time such organizations rethink how they use OUR money, because we are running out of it unless we print more.  If they use (or had used) the money they receive to STIMULATE their ability to exist perhaps they would be able to keep accomplishing their purpose without as much money from our government.

Remember the book titled “Who Moved My Cheese”?  With the predictable reality of reduced subsidies becoming the norm due to this economy, organizations like CLPPP could (and should) use the limited funds they will have going forward in a different way. Perhaps knowing funding would likely become tight; they should have already changed their strategies like the smart mouse in the book.   For example:

• Why not use their funds to get the EPA to actually enforce the RRP rule? 

• How about use the money to find and publicly expose the businesses doing RRP work without the required training and firm certification?  

• Why not use the money to check for building permit applications on pre 1978 housing that were approved and granted to businesses that are not EPA certified firms? 

• Why not send CLPPP staff out into the communities they serve on the weekends to find and help DIY parents doing RRP work on their homes without the use or even the knowledge of lead-safe work practices?  

• Why not teach inner city parents how to clean their homes in lead-safe ways that contain and capture lead dust, not put it back into the air and spread it around more?

The fact is that these example tactics could help accomplish the same goal of helping children and all of my examples would be proactive, significantly decreasing the number of children becoming lead poisoned by RRP activities and other sources of lead dust to begin with.

Doesn’t it make sense to concentrate funding on efforts that would prevent lead poisoning to begin with, rather than justify that money from the government is needed to help those already poisoned?  Why is it they are they still getting poisoned?  Plus, it would probably be much less expensive to prevent the problem than it would be to deal with it after it has occurred.

Just like independent small businesses with tight budgets, in a tight economy organizations like CLPPP and others must rethink how they do what they do so they can reduce their costs but at the same time become more effective at what they do.   In this new economy we all must find new ways to do business so we can continue operations and serve our customers the best way possible.