VACUUM CLEANERS, CHEAP.(Clean Air Program offered by New York, New York after World Trade Center collapse)

New York City may be facing steep tax increases and a generally diminished quality of life, but at least the federal government wants to buy everyone in town a new vacuum cleaner. Shortly after the attacks on the World Trade Center, the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the New York State Department of Labor launched a joint disaster-relief initiative, providing millions of dollars in emergency aid to help New Yorkers repair damaged property, ride to work, and send their clothes to the dry cleaner. They have also been subsidizing the purchase of vacuum cleaners, air purifiers, air-conditioners, and replacement filters, to the tune of sixteen hundred dollars per household. The deadline to apply for reimbursement is November 30th; so far, few of the city's eligible residents have bothered.

Among those who find this shocking is Dr. Alan Pressman, a chiropractor, nutritionist, and radio personality. "They haven't done much to publicize this, but there is a complete program to clean up the air, paid for by FEMA," Pressman announced during a recent broadcast of "Healthline," his morning talk show on WWRL-AM. "Let me give you the number to call for the Clean Air Program. Just give them your name and address, they'll get you on their list, and they'll send you whatever you need."

As it turns out, the Clean Air Program is not connected with FEMA, or with any other government agency. It's not really a program, either. It's a company that sells vacuum cleaners and air purifiers. Like Dr. Pressman's endorsement, the company's flyers and handbills, which started to appear around town late last year, are deliberately oblique; they direct consumers to contact a Clean Air Info Line. One woman who responded said that she received a brochure in the mail about how to apply for the federal money; then she got a series of increasingly hard-sell follow-up calls.

A spokesman for FEMA says that the agency has kept a watchful eye on a number of companies that have been using the FEMA program to sell vacuum cleaners. Some time ago, it made the Clean Air Program, among others, remove from its Web site any references to sponsorship by FEMA. The spokesman said that these companies operate in a murky territory that is "unethical but not necessarily illegal." (The recent scheme of another entrepreneur to sell vacuum-cleaner receipts for twenty-five cents each, however, was both.) Meanwhile, the city's more established vacuum-cleaner salesmen find the whole thing a little unseemly. Paul McCormack, the senior marketing manager of the Miele appliance company, said, "It's not the Miele way, to look like we're taking advantage." Miele also does not like unauthorized dealers sellings its ...