Tough Questions: Poison In Our Parks?

Wendy Saltzman, CBS Atlanta Investigates

ATLANTA -- An exclusive and in-depth CBS Atlanta investigation uncovered metro Atlanta parks contaminated with arsenic.

CBS Atlanta chief investigative reporter Wendy Saltzman asked tough questions about why lumber treated with this dangerous chemical is still being used in the parks where your kids may picnic or play.

Arsenic used to be a common wood preservative used to kill bugs, in a combination with Chromium and Copper, called CCA. CCA-treated wood was banned voluntarily by the lumber industry, and at the recommendation of the EPA in 2003 because of the potential health effects on humans. LINK: EPA Answers Questions About CCA

But as we uncovered, that doesn't mean that arsenic-treated wood has been removed from playground and picnic areas you use. Any wood still on store shelves or already in use was exempt.

"The public needs to know, and we need to stop it," warned Wayne Dawsey. "I mean it could be fatal."

Dawsey provided us with home video he took at the plant where he worked which used CCA to treat wood.

"It will kill you, it will destroy your life. Look at me. Look at me and see what it has done to me," Dawsey said.

Dawsey, once a healthy runner, is now bound to a wheelchair. He said his multiple sclerosis-like symptoms are a direct result of his exposure to arsenic.

"I am a quadriplegic with brain damage," Dawsey told us. "And it is more dangerous for a child. It is just devastating what it could do to a child.”

CBS Atlanta News wanted to see how much danger your kids are in from the arsenic potentially seeping from this CCA treated wood. So we conducted a series of extensive tests checking for arsenic in wood playgrounds and wood parks across metro Atlanta.

Matthew Parker of ATC Associates helped us test for arsenic using both an x-ray gun to detect arsenic inside the wood, and a wipe test. We found arsenic leeching from picnic tables in 8 of the 9 parks we tested.

Piedmont Park, Central Park, Grant Park, Candler Park, Lucky Shoals, Shorty Howell, Wills and Murphy Candler Park all tested positive for arsenic.

"Arsenic in very large doses can interfere with your heart pumping correctly, it can give you sever digestive problems and ultimately bad diarrhea, and ultimately it can kill you," warned Dr. Robert Geller of Emory University and the Georgia Poison Control Center. "In small doses our biggest concern is does it increase the risk of certain kinds of cancer."

Geller said those effects are likely the result of long term exposure, but cautions parents to still take precautions just in case.

"In general, it is an avoidable exposure, and so I think we should take steps to minimize that exposure," Geller said.

And it only takes one look at Wayne Dawsey to see the very real effect the poison can have on a family.

"If you could live a day, or maybe a week in my shoes, you would understand that it is very dangerous," Heath Dawsey, Wayne's son told us.

And the number one place where we found the highest concentration of arsenic is possibly the place kids are most likely to be susceptible to that exposure. At a playground in Alpharetta called "Wacky World."

"It was good you brought this story forward, because quite honestly we didn't know there was a problem," Alpharetta Assistant City Administrator James Drinkard told CBS Atlanta News.

Both the City of Alpharetta and Gwinnett County Parks responded to our investigation immediately.

"We took those tables out and have them out of service," said David Clark, the Deputy Director of Park Operations for Gwinnett County. Within 24 hours both Clark and Drinkard pulled picnic tables that we exposed were seeping arsenic in their areas.

"If we find any that may test positive then we will take those out of service immediately," Clark continued.

Both Gwinnett County and Alpharetta also told us they are going to start testing for arsenic themselves on all wood picnic tables and playgrounds in their areas.

"We weren't following what was apparently the recommended processes, so we will put those in place, and we will go the extra step of doing the annual wipe test," Drinkard said. "So that we have a comfort level that our parks are as safe as we think they need to be."

Alpharetta will also be sealing all of the wood in "Wacky World" and testing it for arsenic on an annual basis.

"If we can't meet that standard, in fact is we can't beat that standard, then we have to look at taking those structures down and replacing them," Drinkard continued.

And while Alpharetta and Gwinnett are taking steps to protect our kids, it seems the City of Atlanta is not.

Remember, 4 of the 8 poisonous parks we tested were in Atlanta. In a written response Atlanta Parks Commissioner Harnell Cohen says the city "Regularly maintains [their] Picnic tables, including using a sealant that is painted over the wood ."

But our tests found that sealant isn't preventing these tables from leaching arsenic. Atlanta's response: Don't place food directly on the tables, and wash your hands. They didn't want to talk about it, and didn't want to answer our Tough Questions.

And DeKalb County, home to Murphy Candler Park, says they'll start replacing the tables, but they are giving themselves 6 months to pull poisonous structures in their parks. They say they'll seal tables annually, but they need funds to repair or replace those tables.

And do you have an old wood play set or deck in your own backyard? You could also have CCA treated wood at your home. There are several wipe-test kits on the market you can use to test wood in your own home. Healthy Building Network sells one, and the testing company we used was EMSL Analytical.

And if there's a wood playground in your area you think needs to be tested, email me at wendy.saltzman@cbsatlanta.com and we'll check it out.