I was thrilled to see my old colleagues on the Daily News editorial board win a Pulitzer for their all-out fight to put the heatlh of Ground Zero workers on the local and national agenda.

One guy who really deserves that award, though, was left off: News columnist Juan Gonzalez. 

Gonzalez was hammering the issue when most of the New York press, myself included, were believing assurances from the local and federal governments that the air was fine, assurances that virtually everyone has since backed off. A few local officials, led by Jerry Nadler, among others, didn't buy it, and neither did Juan.

Way back on September 28, 2001 he wrote the first about 30 columns on the subject,

"Ever since the World Trade Center disaster, federal and city officials have said there is minimal risk from the fetid, dust-filled air and smoke that continue to envelop Ground Zero. But independent tests of dust samples around the site have found dangerous levels of cancer-causing asbestos, fiberglass - and even residues of human bone particles," Gonzalez wrote. "Leaders of the Patrolmen's Benevolent Association retained the New York Environmental Law and Justice Project to conduct independent monitoring after dozens of cops assigned to rescue operations voiced their worries to union leaders about what is in the polluted air they keep breathing."

It's not that Gonzalez hasn't gotten any recognition. He shared an award from the New York Committee on Occupational Safety and Health earlier this year with the editorialists earlier this year, and his 2003(!) book on Ground Zero health was well-received, at least on the left.

And last September, he was able to claim a kind of victory:

"After nearly five years of lies from top city and federal officials about the health dangers from the toxic dust released by the World Trade Center collapse, the truth has finally begun to emerge," he wrote. "Back on Oct. 26, 2001, in a Daily News front-page story headlined 'A Toxic Nightmare at Disaster Site,' I reported that hundreds of tests conducted by the federal Environmental Protection Agency revealed far more elevated levels of toxic pollutants in the air and dust in lower Manhattan than the public had been told.

"That shocking story was immediately attacked by top officials in then-Mayor Rudy Giuliani's administration, by the EPA boss at the time, Christie Whitman, and even by the city's main business group, the Partnership for New York City, whose top official labeled it 'irresponsible journalism.'"