State researchers found toxic soil at 38 city community gardens — 70 percent of the total they tested — but refuse to identify them to the veggie-eating public.
Lead levels above federal safety guidelines were found in 24 of the gardens, or 44 percent, in the first-of-its-kind soil contaminant study led by scientists from the state Center for Environmental Health. They referred queries to the state Health Department, which refused to reveal the possibly poisonous gardens.
“By withholding information, they’re responsible for potentially poisoning the children eating from those gardens. Do they want that responsibility?” said Tamara Rubin, founder of Lead Safe America.
The study’s authors would say only that they took samples from nine plots in The Bronx, 31 in Brooklyn, 12 in Manhattan and two in Queens.
The city Parks Department, whose GreenThumb program was also involved with the study, told The Post it did not have a list of specific gardens, and said the study’s authors “reached out to the 54 gardens referenced in the study to discuss steps to mitigate exposure of contaminants.”
And the state has “prioritized clean soil deliveries for specific gardens,” said state Health Department spokeswoman Marci Natale.
Experts said eating mysterious Big Apple-grown vegetables puts the “loco” in locavore.
“I would absolutely not eat vegetables grown there,” warned neuropsychologist Theodore Lidsky, a former state researcher now in private practice.
“Unless you’re absolutely sure there is no lead on their surface or inside them — then you are definitely ingesting lead, which accumulates in the body until it reaches toxic levels,” he added. “Do you even want a little bit of lead?”
Ingestion or inhalation of lead can cause permanent brain damage, seizures, coma and death.
There are approximately 1,500 community gardens citywide, often in areas with limited access to fresh food, notes the study, published in the journal Environmental Pollution.
Leafy vegetables such as spinach and lettuce, and root vegetables such as carrots, are the most susceptible to accumulating lead, experts said. Fruit takes up the least amount of lead, which can wind up in soil from old paint chips, gas emissions or incinerators and smelters.