HUD Requests Input for Updated Strategy to Reduce Childhood Lead Exposure

HUD, which co-chairs the Lead Subcommittee of the President’s Task Force on Environmental Health Risks and Safety Risks to Children (Task Force), is requesting public input regarding an update to a federal lead strategy. The previous strategy is from 2000. Comments are due November 24, 2017.

HUD is particularly interested in receiving comments regarding:

1. What priority risks (for example, exposures from housing, air, water, soil, food, etc.) and issues should be addressed in a new federal lead strategy?
2. What actions should be taken to address these priority risks and issues?
3. What obstacles should be considered in determining which actions to include?
4. How can the obstacles be overcome?
5. What federal agency messaging regarding lead exposure in children, including information on where lead is found and how to avoid exposure, have been useful in the past and for which audiences? How could such messaging be improved?
6. Which non-federal partners should the Task Force consult to address the environmental health risks and safety risks of lead exposure to children, and why?

On April 21, 1997, the president issued Executive Order 13045, establishing the President’s Task Force on Environmental Health Risks and Safety Risks to Children. The Task Force works to identify children’s environmental health and safety issues, develops federal interagency strategies to protect children, and communicates information to federal, state, and local decision makers. Among other things, the Task Force is developing a comprehensive strategy to further reduce lead exposure in children’s environments.

The Task Force published “Eliminating Childhood Lead Poisoning: A Federal Strategy Targeting Lead Paint Hazards” in February 2000. The strategy included recommendations for eliminating childhood lead poisoning as a major public health problem by the year 2010. The strategy focused primarily on expanding efforts to correct lead paint hazards. Addressing lead exposures, however, requires consideration of additional sources of lead exposure, such as soil, food, drinking water, and consumer products.