[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 158 (2012), Part 11]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page 15568]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




RECOGNIZING MR. RALPH SPEZIO OF ROCHESTER, NEW YORK, FOR HIS DEDICATION 
                TO ERADICATING CHILDHOOD LEAD POISONING

                                 ______
                                 

                     HON. LOUISE McINTOSH SLAUGHTER

                              of new york

                    in the house of representatives

                       Tuesday, November 27, 2012

  Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, it is my esteemed honor to recognize Mr. 
Ralph Spezio of Rochester, New York for his continuous advocacy and 
leadership to prevent and test for childhood blood lead poisoning. It 
is a pleasure to acknowledge Ralph as an educator, community servant, 
and leader in the fight to protect children's health.
  Ralph Neil Spezio served for 33 years in the Rochester City School 
District as a teacher, curriculum specialist, vice principal and 
principal. As principal of Enrico Fermi School No. 17, he excelled at 
engaging students, faculty, families and the surrounding neighborhood. 
Ralph addressed the needs of the school both inside and outside its 
walls in order to restore School No. 17 back to a safe place for 
learning. He connected with Rochester's leading medical centers to 
build the Community Health and Family Center on school grounds, 
established a music program with help from the renowned Eastman School 
of Music, and promoted an active parent-teacher association.
  Despite these improvements, a large portion of Ralph's students 
continued to struggle with learning and behavioral problems. He felt 
that his school had more than the average number of students who had 
trouble with focus, memory, language, and impulsive behavior. It turned 
out that while Ralph was working to level the playing field for 
students to have a fair chance at success--even in a school plagued 
with a 98% poverty rate and located in Rochester's poverty crescent--an 
unforeseen and silent monster was working against him: lead poisoning.
  Lead is a highly toxic metal. The U.S. Environmental Protection 
Agency (EPA) concludes that in young children, lead poisoning can 
result in lowered intelligence, reading and learning disabilities, 
impaired hearing, reduced attention span, hyperactivity, and antisocial 
behavior. In 1999 Ralph overheard school nurses speaking about students 
who had been poisoned. Eventually it was discovered that school health 
records showed 41 percent of the children at School No. 17 had a 
history of elevated levels of lead in their blood. Worst yet, those 
were only the results of those children who were tested directly for 
lead.
  Through the Community Health and Family Center he had established, 
Ralph began testing preschool students for lead. That first year, 100% 
of the preschoolers tested were positive for lead. Ralph immediately 
initiated a grass-roots effort to educate the community about the 
dangers of lead and to advocate for blood tests and home inspections.
  Mr. Spezio became a founding member of the Coalition to Prevent Lead 
Poisoning, a group of Rochester doctors, nurses, lawyers, educators, 
child advocates, health insurers, property owners and community leaders 
committed to ending childhood lead poisoning. The work of this 
coalition has earned the EPA's Environmental Justice Achievement Award. 
In conjunction with local government and with the support of federal 
resources through the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the 
Coalition reports an 84 percent decline in childhood lead poisoning in 
Monroe County over the past decade. With this success, Rochester has 
become a model for other cities combating lead problems.
  I am so proud of the excellent, life-changing work that Ralph has 
done and his commitment to putting children first in Rochester. Mr. 
Speaker, I ask my colleagues to join me in recognizing and thanking Mr. 
Ralph Spezio for his leadership, compassion and dedication to the 
healthy development of our nation's most precious resources, our 
children.

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