The City Council could be taking what some officials say is an unprecedented step to understand and investigate the city's response to the toxins released in Lower Manhattan in the wake of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, NY1 has learned.

Manhattan Councilmember Gale Brewer is filing a resolution this week calling for the city's Department of Investigation to open a probe focused on what knowledge city leaders possessed about the dust, which has caused tens of thousands of people to get sick in the decades after 9/11.

The push comes as NY1 has reported on the ongoing resistance by New York City to release any documents it has, and the questions that resistance has raised since.

In an interview with NY1, Brewer said she's hopeful this step can lead to answers some have been seeking for more than 20 years.

"I think that any information that they have should be released. Obviously it's not happening - not under FOIL, not under letters of members of Congress, not under requests from the press, so now we have to try to do what has never been done before, which is demand that the Department of Investigations do their homework," Brewer said.

If the City Council approves the resolution, the Department of Investigation would have two years to finish the report.

NY1 has reached out to the mayor's office for comment.