Nearly a year after Milwaukee Public Schools began the work to clean lead out of its school buildings, the district says its classrooms are now lead-free.
MPS said crews finished the last of the lead remediation in the 99th and final school that had lead-based paint.
“This is an important milestone for the MPS community,” MPS Superintendent Brenda Cassellius said. “We have asked so much of our students, families, and staff over the past 10 months as we addressed this issue with the urgency it required…because of the hard work of so many dedicated teams in our district – we can move forward with the peace of mind that our schools are safe.”
MPS had to move students or close parts of six entire school buildings because the lead contamination in those buildings was so bad. The other 90-plus schools had some lead paint, but students were allowed to continue with classes while the work unfolded.
In all, MPS says it cleaned 2,700 classrooms or common areas in those school buildings.
