Brewer Pushes Investigation into Secret City Hall Documents About September 11
City Council member (and former Manhattan Borough President) Gale Brewer (left) is pushing legislation that, if enacted, will compel the City’s Department of Investigation (DOI) to open a probe into a stash of never-disclosed City Hall documents that may shed light on what Rudolph Giuliani, who was Mayor in 2001, knew about environmental health risks in weeks and months following the destruction of the World Trade Center. She will host a public hearing on this proposed measure on Wednesday, January 29.
In the decades since September 2001, the administrations of four mayors (those of Mr. Giuliani, Michael Bloomberg, Bill de Blasio, and Eric Adams) have refused to reveal what those records contain. In July 2022, Mr. Adams took a tentative step that had been blocked by his three predecessors, and announced that he was willing to consider releasing documents concealed by previous administrations about the information City Hall had on environmental toxins released by the collapse of the World Trade Center. Two months later, Mr. Adams reversed this stance and refused to make public the documents in question, unless City government was first granted immunity against any lawsuits that might arise from them.
“The remaining residents and survivors of the attacks are deeply interested in what the City knew about the hazards of that period, and when, exactly, they knew it,” said Ms. Brewer, who chairs the Council’s Committee on Oversight and Investigations. “The Adams administration has refused to release the documents, stating that potential liability prevents them from doing so. That’s not a legitimate reason to keep the files locked away.”
Although Mr. Giuliani said little in public about the dangers posed by environmental toxins at Ground Zero during the three months that remained in his tenure after September 11, 2001, one indication of his frame of mind might be gleaned from an action he took in November 2001 when he urged members of New York’s Congressional delegation to help pass the Aviation and Transportation Security Act, which specifically capped “the liability for all claims against the City of New York as a result of such attacks to no more than the City’s insurance coverage or $350 million.” A February 16, 2023 letter from Congressman Dan Goldman to Mayor Adams refers to an internal discussion within the Giuliani administration, and cites a confidential memo circulated in October 2001 among City Hall staff warning of “toxic tort cases that might arise in the next few decades.”
If enacted, Ms. Brewer’s proposed “binding resolution” would mark the first time the City Council has invoked the authority granted by section 803 of the City Charter to direct DOI to conduct an investigation.
“This legislation is a direct response to the Adams administration’s refusal to release the documents despite requests from members of Congress, advocates, and the media,” Ms. Brewer explained. “DOI would be required to complete a comprehensive public report on the findings no later than two years after the adoption of the resolution.”
“In the wake of the worst terrorist attack in American history, survivors and first responders were promised that the air was safe to breathe, and that Lower Manhattan was free from toxins,” Mr. Goldman said, in support of Ms. Brewer’s proposal. “Now, more than 20 years later, we know those promises were false. The City owes survivors, first responders and everyone in Lower Manhattan full disclosure of the harmful toxins in the area following the September 11 attack. It is critical for families and survivors, especially those who were children at the time of the attacks. The City must do the right thing, regardless of any financial consequences.”
Benjamin Chevat, executive director of 911 Health Watch, a nonprofit that seeks to ensure the Federal government’s continued, long-term commitment to the health and well-being of September 11 responders, survivors and their families, said, “it has been a challenge finding out what Mayor’s office doesn’t appear to want the public to see about what the City of New York knew about the dangers of the toxins from September 11 in the aftermath of the attack. Fighting City Hall to get the City to even admit that records exist has been a struggle.”
Kimberly Flynn, the director of 9/11 Environmental Action, a non-profit advocacy group whose mission is to ensure that those who were affected physically or emotionally by the attacks receive appropriate care, said, “New Yorkers need to know what exactly the city knew after the Towers’ collapse and how the City, in lockstep with the [federal] Environmental Protection Agency, failed to protect the health of its people and the responders who came from everywhere to the rescue. After September 11, having the truth would have made an enormous difference. Today, the truth can still accomplish so much, from strengthening support for the care provided by the World Trade Center Health Program to developing lessons learned that would better protect New Yorkers in the wake of future disasters.”
Seven days after the attacks, then-Environmental Protection Agency administrator Christine Todd Whitman said, “we are very encouraged that the results from our monitoring of air-quality and drinking-water conditions… show that the public is not being exposed to excessive levels of asbestos or other harmful substances.” She added, “given the scope of the tragedy from last week, I am glad to reassure the people of New York… that their air is safe to breathe and the water is safe to drink.” Ms. Whitman has since disavowed and apologized for this remark.
Without adequate warning of the dangers posed by more than 2,500 contaminants (including asbestos, lead, mercury, dioxins, crystalline silica, cadmium, and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, along with pulverized concrete and glass) now known to have filled the air and coated every surface for hundreds of yards in all directions, thousands of first responders and cleanup workers flocked to the site, and tens of thousands of local residents returned to their homes. In the decades since, the death toll among these groups has surpassed the number killed during the actual attacks, while the count of those sickened with the 80-plus conditions subsequently linked to exposure to World Trade Center debris is now many times the tally of the dead.
The Wednesday session, which will be chaired by Ms. Brewer, begins at 10am in the Committee Room at City Hall. Anyone who wishes to participate may testify for up to two minutes in person, via online video, or in writing. If you plan to testify in person, please check in with the City Council Sergeant-at-Arms upon arrival at City Hall. If you are planning on testifying via video conference, please register in advance of the hearing at council.nyc.gov/testify/.
Written testimony may be submitted via email at testimony@council.nyc.gov up to 72 hours after the close of the hearing.