Douglas County ranks 12th out of the Wisconsin's 77 counties for danger of lead exposure, something Sandy Al-Qudah wants to change. Al-Qudah is the director of Housing Counseling at Catholic Community Services in Superior.
"When you're looking at the fact that such a large percentage of our homes in the Superior, Douglas county area were built before 1978 which was the year that lead paint and lead solder was no longer allowed to be used in homes you have to look at how do you safely live with this because your going to be, at some point in you life, living in a home that either has lead paint or had lead paint."
Terry Hendrick sees the same problems. He's the Director of Catholic Community Services.
"About 40 children a year test positive in Douglas County for lead exposure which is beyond the standard. Wherever you have older homes or older buildings, and of course Superior has quite a number, you will have an increased exposure to lead. 90 percent of the kids testing positive for lead live in the area roughly between 2nd street or Highway 2 on down Belknap and on down Tower to about 40th street, which is the oldest section of town."
Hendrick says Catholic Community Services is working with other organizations to educate the public about the dangers of lead.
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"It's the kind of thing that's so omnipresent that people do not have an awareness of it until it starts making headlines like the latest lead toy issues but frankly there are probably fewer toys with lead now than there were 10 years ago."
The Douglas County Lead Free Task Force is holding a public meeting to discuss ways to curb lead exposure in Douglas County. He says they hope to lower the amount of lead in children in Douglas County by 2010. The Lead Free Task Force meeting will be held 11 a.m. Friday at the Catholic Charities Bureau in Superior.
