Patricia Loftman repeats last year's call for enforcement over new regulations

Greetings, Chairperson Truman.

Thank you for this opportunity to provide testimony.

My name is Patricia Loftman.

I am a certified nurse midwife.

I speak as the former midwifery service director at Harlem Hospital for 30 years.

I also am a New York City resident who could be impacted by Legionella at any time.

I testified almost one year ago on September 19th before this very committee on this very same topic.

Yet here I am again.

I have attached a copy of my testimony from last year.

Last year, DOHMH proposed regulatory reforms to improve monitoring and accountability with the city law to prevent an outbreak, a legionary recurrence.

Proposed changes included requiring cooling tower testing every 30 days instead of every 30 days.

every 90, increasing fines for noncompliance as the penalty for noncompliance was just $2,000 for the first violation, followed by up to $10,000 for subsequent violations,

hiring more inspectors and engineers, expanding proactive sampling capacity and creating neighborhood health centers to provide information during emergencies.

Cooling tower inspections, according to city experts, are a critical defense against Legionnaire outbreaks.

Among the 10 buildings identified by DOHMH last year, all but one had cooling towers that were either behind on Legionella testing or had not been inspected by the city in the past year.

During my testimony last year, I stated that no new regulations were required.

What was required was monitoring and enforcement of existing laws.

I further stated that it was ludicrous to expect that requiring testing every 30 days instead of every 90 in the absence of inspector staffing numbers

necessary to accomplish inspections and enforcement would achieve a different outcome than what existed.

Fines cannot be imposed in the absence of inspections that are staffing dependent.

Thus, I have no new testimony this year.

I simply repeat and implore that no new unenforceable regulations are required.

Prevention is simply...

dependent on performing inspections, monitoring compliance, and issuance of fines for noncompliance.

It's not my desire to be here again next year.

Understood.

Thank you.

Thank you to this panel.

Appreciate your testimony.

I want to ask our President, President Brian O'Minn-Sigel, you walked in at the right time to give testimony.