Mayor Acquanetta Warren responded to an outpour of opposition to ongoing warehouse development in a letter to the editor on Nov. 27, 2020.
Unsurprisingly, she failed to meaningfully respond to residents’ growing concerns about building warehouses next to our homes and our children’s schools, as well as the harmful environmental impacts that are exacerbating in the city of Fontana, surrounding communities, and damaging our children’s health.
In her response, Mayor Warren affirmed to the community that she has opted for a “status-quo” approach to economic investment and advancement opportunities, even though residents want and have demanded better.
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Day: December 23, 2020
NORTH HAMPTON – Former state Rep. Mindi Messmer believes residents who live near the Coakley Landfill Superfund site should be concerned by detections of another PFAS contaminant in private wells.
“It is concerning because once again we have people exposed to a chemical that we have no enforceable standards for,” Messmer said after perfluorooctanesulfonamide (PFOSA) was found in private wells near the landfill. “Other states are taking steps to regulate PFOSA and New Hampshire needs to do the same.”
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Photo credit: Ioanna Raptis/Seacoastonline
When it comes to letting Reserve Management Group close its General Iron plant on the North Side and move the metal-shredding operations to the Southeast Side, we understand that Mayor Lori Lightfoot has a problem. She has to worry about keeping businesses in the city. Jobs and tax revenues are at stake.
But because this is Chicago, and because General Iron has shown its operations continue to pollute the city’s air, she also has to take environmental justice into account when considering this move. Though not confined to Chicago, environmental injustice has been endemic here. Systemic racism, in the form of disinvestment in neighborhoods where people of color live, leaves those communities less able to resist when dirty industry decides to move in.
Photo credit: E. Jason Wambsgans / Chicago Tribune
Donald Trump is using the dying embers of his US presidency to hastily push through a procession of environmental protection rollbacks that critics claim will cement his legacy as an unusually destructive force against the natural world.
Trump has yet to acknowledge his election loss to president-elect Joe Biden but his administration has been busily finishing off a cavalcade of regulatory moves to lock in more oil and gas drilling, loosened protections for wildlife and lax air pollution standards before the Democrat enters the White House on 20 January.
Trump has yet to acknowledge his election loss to president-elect Joe Biden but his administration has been busily finishing off a cavalcade of regulatory moves to lock in more oil and gas drilling, loosened protections for wildlife and lax air pollution standards before the Democrat enters the White House on 20 January.
Photo credit: Nicholas Kamm/AFP/Getty Images
By: Ruth Rodriguez, Communications Intern
“I’m hoping this bill can pave the way for a tidal wave of bills like this across the country.”
Maria Lopez-Nuñez, Deputy Director, Organizing and Advocacy of Ironbound Community Corporation (ICC) in Newark, Jersey shared her experience as one of the leaders that helped pass S232, the strongest environmental justice law in the United States. Signed by Governor Murphy in New Jersey, the law protects overburdened communities by requiring the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection to evaluate permits based on cumulative impacts of pollution.
Born in Honduras, Lopez-Nuñez moved to New Jersey when she was 3 years old. She later earned a degree in philosophy. Her entry to environmental justice work was through social justice and began at ICC in 2014.
The Ironbound neighborhood in Newark, the largest city in New Jersey, is situated among the state’s largest incinerator, 2 power plants, a railroad, a port, and a river that is the longest superfund site in the nation. Lopez-Nuñez describes the neighborhood as a “toxic soup.”
Pushed by ICC, New Jersey Environmental Justice Alliance, and Clean Water Action of New Jersey for 12 years, a new and groundbreaking environmental justice bill was signed into law in September. Originally, the state’s Department of Environmental Protection claimed that they did not have the jurisdiction to deny permits based on cumulative impacts. Every factory and industry was viewed as an individual in the permitting process. When each individual goes up to their limit, the combination of their pollution and waste falls upon the community. The Environmental Justice law, also referred to as Cumulative Impacts, protects overburdened communities by mandating that the Department of Environmental Protection “SHALL DENY” a permit to an industry that adds burden to the neighborhood. An impacted community is measured by Census block and defined as 40 percent people of color, OR 40 percent monolingual, non-english speaking, OR 35 percent low income. The definition was designed to be inclusive and protect people of color and low income white communities. If a new facility is planning to settle in an environmental justice/impacted community, a review on cumulative impacts is triggered. Renewals and expansions receive conditions on their permits to lower emissions and pollution. Lopez-Nuñez says, “I’m looking forward to that first denial under the bill, that will be our historic moment come true.”
“I’m hoping that other people can build on this…they always ask you who else has done it…you can go and say that this bill in New Jersey has ‘shall deny’ as the premise.”
The law is not currently in effect, but is in its rulemaking process. During this period, industry begins lobbying to create loopholes in the legislation. Lopez-Nuñez says that the hardest part of the journey now is to influence the bureaucrats. She found that using tangible things like the way the air smells was effective in community organizing, and stresses that the community needs to lead and negotiate for themselves. Community members are trained to participate in stakeholder meetings. She said that, “It’s not about intelligence, it’s just about a little determination.”
“At the heart it’s about community organizing and making sure we’re all connected…fight together against the forces that would really just bury us.”
By: Kayleigh Coughlin, Communications Intern
In an interview on Wednesday, July 15, 2020 for CHEJ’s Living Room Leadership Series, Linda Robles, founder of the Tucson Environmental Justice Task Force, shared her experience battling TCE contamination in her neighborhood.
Since the 1940s, military installations in Tucson, AZ have been using and improperly disposing of TCE and other toxic chemicals. These chemicals leaked into the soil and groundwater of surrounding communities, poisoning residents who drank the tap water in their homes. In the 1980s, the EPA asked the city of Tucson to close all TCE-tainted wells in the area, but the city did not fully comply. As a result, a predominantly Mexican-American community, low-income on the Southside of Tucson has been severely affected.
The EPA declared Robles’ community and the surrounding area, including the Tucson International Airport, a Superfund site in 1994 due to its contaminated groundwater and soil. Despite declaring this Superfund site, the government failed to acknowledge the adverse health effects residents in the area were experiencing, such as high rates of cancer, birth defects, lupus and other diseases. Robles said, “We knew the TCE-tainted water was to blame”. Robles stated The Environmental Justice Task Force was created to organize around these health issues and prevent further pollution. In 2014, the group began a series of health assessments among its members through door-knocking, and the data on cancer clusters collected through these assessments increased awareness of the problem among Tucson’s elected officials.
CHEJ helped the Environmental Justice Task Force focus their organizing efforts. In 2018, Lois Gibbs came to town and provided the group with organizing training and strategies that helped Robles’ group grow. With CHEJ’s help, the group convinced the EPA and local officials to conduct a vapor intrusion investigation at six different schools between two districts in the area. While the community has this win to celebrate, Robles admits that organizing is still a challenge for her group due to the large undocumented population in the area. Many undocumented immigrants in the community care about the issue, but are nervous to get involved because they fear deportation, Robles stated. “Their silenced voices lead us all – local officials and the EPA, especially – to underestimate the threat we are facing”.
To learn more about the Tucson Environmental Justice Task Force and how you can help, visit https://www.facebook.com/ejtaskforce.
To listen to Linda Robles’ full interview with CHEJ, click here.
There are many ways in which Americans are united.
Across party lines Americans reject the so-called revolving door. People in government and industry move back and forth working for companies when they are out of government and supposedly overseeing them when they are in government. Since the industry employers invariably pay more, which master do they serve while they are in government?
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Photo credit: Carolyn Kaster, STF / Associated Press
By: Shaina Smith, Community Organizing Intern
Massive wildfires fuelled by climate change have damaged millions of acres across California, Oregon, and Washington over the past few weeks. Some parts of California have an AQI of over 700. Air Quality Index (AQI) measures air pollution on a scale of 0-500. Any level above 200 is “unhealthy” to “hazardous”.
As residents evacuate areas threatened by the fires, let’s consider those who stayed behind. You might be surprised to learn that California uses prison labor, disproportionately people of color, to battle their wildfires. In fact, incarcerated workers make up to 80% of California fire personnel, including juveniles. The state pays incarcerated workers only 1 dollar an hour (or less if they owe restitution) to fight wildfires.
With this perspective, prison doesn’t appear to be about justice or rehabilitation, instead about exploiting labor for profit. As exemplified by a question asked by a former corrections officer at one California inmate fire camp: “How do you justify releasing all these inmates in prime fire season?”
Historically, once released from prison, California abandons their former inmate firefighters, preventing them from being hired as professionals. However, now that covid shutdowns have left no other option, California has passed a bill making it easier for formerly incarcerated people to become firefighters.
Inmate firefighters work up to 48 hour shifts with 50 pound backpacks. The state does not provide goggles or respirators. It’s no wonder then that incarcerated workers are more than 4 times as likely to sustain an injury than a professional firefighter working on the same fire.
The smoke from these wildfires contains air pollution particles called PM 2.5. PM 2.5 exposure leads to worse coronavirus outcomes. These particles are so small that they enter the bloodstream through the lungs, and cannot be broken down by the immune system.
People residing in low income and minority communities are already disproportionately exposed to PM 2.5 from industry polluters, and are therefore more likely to have an underlying health condition. Underlying conditions exacerbate the dangerous health risks of smoke, specifically heart attacks.
Immediate symptoms of wildfire smoke exposure include shortness of breath, coughing, sore throat, and eye irritation. Years following wildfire smoke exposure, lung capacity among residents decreased.
Wildfire smoke is linked to an increased rate of emergency doctors visits for respiratory and cardiovascular issues such as heart attack or stroke– specifically for adults over 65. Black people who live in areas where the poverty rate is above 15% were particularly affected.
As this latest challenge demonstrates, climate change imposes the heaviest burdens on people of color. The evil of capitalism and racism in the United States is intrinsically linked even to crises in nature, such as wildfires and coronavirus.
Photo credit: Newsweek
By: Julie Silverman, Communications Intern
Since 2014, the Blue Ridge Environmental Defense League (BREDL) began campaigning to counteract the planning and construction of the Atlantic Coast Pipeline. After six long years of dedicated work, BREDL and its partner organizations succeeded on July 5th, 2020 in cancelling the construction of the Atlantic Coast Pipeline: a major victory that likely would not have been accomplished without the work of Lou Zeller, the executive director of BREDL as well as key BREDL leaders and supporting partners and coalition groups.
The Atlantic Coast Natural Gas Pipeline was a multi-billion project led by Duke and Dominion Energy companies and was planned to go through rural and low-income parts of North Carolina, Virginia, and West Virginia. The construction of the pipeline would have not only damaged local ecosystems but jeopardize the health of many nearby residents through emissions from compressor stations and pollution in both waterways and drinking water systems. The pipeline targeted poor communities and would have had a tremendously detrimental impact on community members’ health and agricultural success. For example, a sweet potato farmer in Johnston County, North Carolina allowed an earlier branch pipeline to come through his farm and said that the land never produced again despite it being 20 years after the pipeline’s construction. Therefore, the opposition to the pipeline was centered around risks of public health and environmental degradation as well as economic and agricultural concerns.
The victory that we saw over the Atlantic Coast Pipeline is “relatively rare. We don’t normally get the satisfaction of knowing that [fusion_builder_container hundred_percent=”yes” overflow=”visible”][fusion_builder_row][fusion_builder_column type=”1_1″ background_position=”left top” background_color=”” border_size=”” border_color=”” border_style=”solid” spacing=”yes” background_image=”” background_repeat=”no-repeat” padding=”” margin_top=”0px” margin_bottom=”0px” class=”” id=”” animation_type=”” animation_speed=”0.3″ animation_direction=”left” hide_on_mobile=”no” center_content=”no” min_height=”none”][the fight] is really over,” said Lou Zeller.
One of the key tactics in leading to BREDL’s massive success was uniting community members against the pipeline from all across the political spectrum. By reaching out to people who are both conservative and liberal and everywhere in between, BREDL was able to create a cohesive and extremely powerful bipartisan movement, one that you don’t see often in today’s political climate. Regardless whether people cared about the environment, public health, or land rights and eminent domain issues, there was a welcoming spot at BREDL for people to get involved and fight against the pipeline. This strong base allowed BREDL to cast out to a larger audience and gain a diverse following that appealed to people who would not have normally joined an environmental organization. By allowing different groups of people to focus on what issues impassion them, BREDL was able to create an extremely strong movement that even the most powerful companies, such as Duke and Dominion Energy corporations could not face.
Another tactic that was used to create a successful movement and opposition to the pipeline was organizing in communities and creating coalitions with organizations that were directly in the path of the pipeline’s planned construction zones in both Virginia and North Carolina. Lou Zeller described this process as stringing beads on a necklace. By engaging those closest to the pipeline, BREDL was able to create opposition along its entire route. This was an extremely tough task since the pipeline’s planned construction spanned across 12,000 acres of land that would have been disturbed from West Virginia all the way down to Southern North Carolina.
The success of BREDL in defeating the Atlantic Coast Pipeline is one that should be greatly celebrated. The idea of never giving up fighting for what you believe in and working together despite differences are important themes that led to BREDL’s victory. In the words of Janet Marsh, BREDL’s founder, “one person speaking alone may not be heard, but many people speaking with one voice cannot be ignored.”
Please visit http://www.bredl.org/index.htm if you are interested in BREDL’s work or would like to learn more or get involved with their campaigns.
If you are interested in hearing more about BREDL’s Atlantic Coast Pipeline, click here to watch a Zoom recording of CHEJ’s Living Room Leadership Event from July 15, 2020: a conversation with Lou Zeller and other key leaders in the organization.[/fusion_builder_column][/fusion_builder_row][/fusion_builder_container]
I look out my window every day and see that plant putting out black smoke, dark clouds of smoke. And now we’ve got this virus going on. I joke we’ve got a double whammy going on, but this is serious. We were in battle over here. We’ve got a war going on. Keisha Bowns interview with Katherine Webb-Hehn a freelance multimedia journalist in the South.