Document b5DEqGaEOngr9kOdg7j6wp3Y3

4A R e g io n ST.LOUIS POST-DISPATCH Thurs., Jan. 24, 1985 Group: 2 Firms Here Exposed Workers To Toxic Substances By Jo Mannies POst-Dispatch Washington Bureau ' .'WASHINGTON -- Two work sites iiYthe St. Louis area are among 249 in the nation where federal investigators blieve that more than 200,000 workers have been exposed to dangerous substances, a public rds^arch group says. " The group. Public Citizen, made pliblic a federally compiled list of sites Wednesday as part of a campaign to persuade the federal government to notify the workers of their exposure. ' The area work sites on the list are Monsanto Co.'s Sauget plant and an undisclosed area used by Union Electric. Two outstate Missouri sites also are listed: a Lead Corp. plant in Viburnum and a defunct hexachlorophene plant in Verona, in southwestern Missouri. The list of sites was compiled by the federal National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health and covers the 13 years that it has been studying work places where people might be subject to health risks because of t hei r exposure to dangerous substances. The list was recently obtained by Public Citizen through the Freedom of Information Act. Monsanto says that its employees have been informed of any health risks; Union Electric declined to comment because of a pending court case. In a statement Wednesday, Public 'Citizen noted that the Department of Health and Human Services had turned down a request by the national institutue for $4 million in this year's federal budget to notify the individual workers. The group said such notification could save lives. It cited a pilot project involving a chemical company in Georgia where a notification program found 13 employees with bladder cancer. The Monsanto plant in Sauget, as well as the Verona plant now owned by Syntex Agribusiness Inc., are sites where some workers were exposed to the toxic chemical dioxin. A Monsanto spokesman said Wednesday that all employees exposed to dioxin had been notified by the company. Since 1969, Monsanto has made no chemicals that produce dioxin as a byproduct. The list also cites Monsanto's plant in Nitro, W.Va., where workers were exposed to dioxin. The spokesman contended that Public Citizen was "totally off-base" because- it assumed that employees had not been informed of any health risks suffered by their exposure. * The spokesman, Dan R. Bishop, said the national institute had obt a i ne d its i nf o r ma t i o n on Monsanto's sites with the company's cooperation. In the case of Union Electric, the list says 25 workers have been exposed to polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCBs, which can cause cancer. Union Electric sources indicated that the 25 workers were probably those who had sued some chemical companies because of exposure to a defoliant they used on the job. The Viburnum lead firm is cited for silica dust and diesel exhaust that might cause respiratory disease. Experts Urge Flu Shots For Elderly Laboratory confirmation of a " ,r virulent influenza virus in SL Louis means that the elderly and " C hro n ically 111 should be ''vaccinated Immediately, a panel -'f health expertssays. T hree cases of Type A ''influenza have been confirmed "-by virologists at Cardinal Glennon Memorial Hospital for 'bYn.u^nan a rvan^Cnf doctors at Davis From page one district for work at labor negotiations he had not attended. The sessions were between April and August 1982. From June 1981, when he began working for the Special School District, and the end of 1982, Davis was paid $162,170. George R. "Buzz" Westfall, St. Louis County's prosecuting attorney, spent 22 months investigating attorneys' fees charged to the school district. With Davis' guilty plea, "that's the end of it," Westfall said. Davis was the only attorney for the school district to be indicted. The Police Tow Car; Bosley Denies It's His Police say the car of Alderman Freem an Bosley Sr; was towed Tuesday because he had eight unpaid parking tickets. But Bosley, a mayoral candidate in St. Louis, denies that his car was towed. "My car's a red Ford," Bosley said. "I have never driven a green Ford. "The car that was towed must have been registered to the campaign___It was not my personal car." Apolice officer said he had been on routine patrol Tuesday when he noticed a green Ford with expired license plates parked on a private lot next to Bosley's campaign headquarters, at 4308 North Grand Boulevard. "The car had September plates, so I checked, and it came back issued to" Bosley, the officer said. He agreed to talk only on the condition that his name be withheld; "The computer then showed that there were eight unpaid tags," or parking tickets, the officer added. The policeman said he then had ordered a tow truck for the car; He added that no one had complained about the car -- he stumbled across the violation on his own. Bosley has had problems with cars before. Last November, he said his car had been stolen, but a police check revealed that it had been scheduled for repossession. Bosley later said that his car had not been repossessed. It was missing because his daughter had it, he said. He said the car had been scheduled for repossession because he had canceled his insurance in a dispute with the leasing company. Two years ago, Bosley's wife, Marjorie, had to pay $120 in unpaid parking tickets to keep her car from being towed. Bosley clai med harassment, blaming Mayor Vincent C. Schoemehl Jr. and Joseph Roddy. Roddy was unseated as St. Louis circuit clerk by Bosley's son. The elder Bosley and Schoemehl are opponents in the upcoming Democratic primary.