{"id":124529,"date":"2026-02-05T23:50:07","date_gmt":"2026-02-05T23:50:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/124529\/"},"modified":"2026-02-05T23:50:07","modified_gmt":"2026-02-05T23:50:07","slug":"newly-released-9-11-memo-reportedly-shows-nycs-concerns-about-toxic-air-following-attacks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/124529\/","title":{"rendered":"Newly released 9\/11 memo reportedly shows NYC&#8217;s concerns about toxic air following attacks"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A newly released memo reportedly shows that in the month following the 9\/11 attacks, New York City leaders were preparing for possible lawsuits they thought could arise from claims of toxic air.<\/p>\n<p>That would contradict public messaging at the time from officials saying the air was safe, which we now know\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbsnews.com\/newyork\/news\/9-11-toxins-nyc-transparency-bill\/\" target=\"_blank\" data-invalid-url-rewritten-http=\"\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">it was not<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>What&#8217;s in the memo<\/p>\n<p>The nonprofit 9\/11 Health Watch says it recently obtained <a href=\"https:\/\/www.911healthwatch.org\/files\/Court-Submission-20260205.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">the so-called &#8220;Harding Memo&#8221;<\/a> addressed to then-Deputy Mayor Robert Harding, reportedly sent in the month following the 9\/11 terrorist attacks.<\/p>\n<p>The subject line is &#8220;Legislative alternatives to limit the City&#8217;s liability relating to 9\/11\/01.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>It reads that, according to the law department, potential lawsuits could arise from people claiming toxic exposure or that rescue workers were provided with faulty or no equipment.<\/p>\n<p>The document does not give any details about the actual air quality or equipment used.<\/p>\n<p>CBS News New York reached out to Harding and former Mayor Rudy Giuliani but have not heard back. \u00a0<\/p>\n<p>9\/11 Health Watch suing NYC DEP<\/p>\n<p>The group filed the memo as an exhibit in its Freedom of Information lawsuit against the city&#8217;s Department of Environmental Protection, seeking documents related to air quality.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The city tried on three occasions to dismiss our proceedings, claiming it had no documents,&#8221; attorney Andrew Carboy said.<\/p>\n<p>In November, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbsnews.com\/newyork\/news\/911-ground-zero-toxins-documents-uncovered\/\" target=\"_blank\" data-invalid-url-rewritten-http=\"\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">the city said 68 boxes of materials were discovered<\/a>, but 9\/11 Health Watch didn&#8217;t get the memo from the city. They say they finally got it from the personal papers of a late investigative reporter.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We&#8217;re here not to tell people what to think,&#8221; Carboy said. &#8220;We&#8217;re here to show people what the city has fought us for 25 years to produce.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Calls for release of more records<\/p>\n<p>The group is calling on Mayor Zohran Mamdani to release all records. They said it&#8217;s not about suing and they just want the truth.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;There&#8217;s so much more work to do that we can do with these records to show what was out there,&#8221; attorney Matthew McCauley said.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We need to know who knew that the air was contaminated, who knew that they were aware there was going to be a problem, and who kept their mouths shut for 25 years while people got sick,&#8221; said Andrew Ansbro, president of the Uniformed Firefighters Association.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Hearing after hearing after hearing, and we were told, yes, the air was safe to breathe,&#8221; City Council Speaker Julie Menin said.<\/p>\n<p>The City Council passed legislation in July 2025 ordering a two-year 9\/11 documents investigation.<\/p>\n<p>A city law department spokesman said at his City Council confirmation hearing Wednesday, &#8220;Corporation Counsel nominee Steve Banks testified that he will be conducting a full review of the issue if he is confirmed. Part of that review will be to see what records exist and what records can be released.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>\n          More from CBS News\n        <\/p>\n<p class=\"content__tags__label\">In:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A newly released memo reportedly shows that in the month following the 9\/11 attacks, New York City leaders&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":124530,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[5301,9,56,63,65,64],"class_list":{"0":"post-124529","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york-city","8":"tag-9-11","9":"tag-new-york","10":"tag-ny","11":"tag-nyc","12":"tag-nyc-headlines","13":"tag-nyc-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/124529","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=124529"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/124529\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/124530"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=124529"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=124529"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=124529"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}