E veryone’s Backyard - Home - Center for Health ...chej.org/wp-content/uploads/summer2001.pdfE veryone’s B ackyard The Journal of the Grassroots Movement for Environmental Justice

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The Journal of the Grassroots Movement for Environmental JusticeCenter for Health, Environment and Justice

Vol. 19, No. 2 ◆ Summer 2001

YOU CAN BEAT CITY HALL–JUST ASK THE FAMILIES FROM SOUTH BUFFALO

RESISTING POWER: SAYING “NO” TO POWER PLANT EXPANSION IN ARIZONA

Center for Health, Environment and Justice

2 Everyone's Backyard

TABOUT CHEJCHEJ STAFF

EXECUTIVE DIRECTORLois Marie Gibbs

DIRECTOR OF SPECIAL PROJECTSCharlotte Brody

SCIENCE DIRECTORStephen Lester

FINANCE/ADMINISTRATIVE DIRECTORBarbara Sullivan

ORGANIZER/TRAINERLarry Yates

Adrián Boutureira

DIOXIN CAMPAIGN COORDINATORMonica Rohde

HEALTH CARE WITHOUT HARM D.C.CAMPAIGN COORDINATOR

Cecilia Deloach

HCWH MEMBERSHIP SERVICES

COORDINATORJolie Patterson

CHILD PROOFING OUR COMMUNITIES

CAMPAIGN COORDINATORMarlan Maralit

EDITOR/RESEARCH ASSOCIATERon Nicosia

GRANTS MANAGERMaryll Kleibrink

BOOKKEEPERHae-Young Kang

MAJOR GIFTS MANAGERAnita Uyehara-McCartin

MEMBERSHIP MANAGEMENT ASSISTANTDorothea Gross

◆

CHEJ BOARD MEMBERS

MURRAY LEVINE, NYChairman

CLYDE FOSTER, ALConcerned Citizens of Triana

VILMA HUNT, MA

LUELLA KENNY, NYLove Canal Medical Fund

PAME KINGFISHER, NMShining Waters

ESPERANZA MAYA, CAPeople for Clean Air and Water

SUZI RUHL, FLLegal Environmental Assistance Fund

ALONZO SPENCER, OHSave Our County

he Center for Health, Environment, and Justice is a nonprofit, tax-exempt organization that provides organizing and technical assis-tance to grassroots community organizations nationwide. The cen-ter was founded in 1981 by Lois Gibbs, who together with herneighbors won the relocation of more than 900 families from their

neighborhood after it was contaminated by chemicals leaking from the LoveCanal landfill in Niagara Falls, NY. Hundreds of people living near contami-nated sites around the country contacted Lois as her efforts and those of herneighbors captured national attention and proved, for the first time, that toxicwaste is not an abstract issue but one that’s in everyone’s backyard.

The center’s mission is to help people build democratic, community-basedorganizations to address public health and environmental threats. We believestrongly that the best way to solve local problems is from the bottom up, whenthe people directly affected speak for themselves and have a meaningful role, asequals, in any and all decisions that affect their lives, homes and family. Ourfocus and resources are devoted to helping local community based organiza-tions form, grow, and become effective in achieving their goals. We do this byproviding information, advice, training, and support. We also refer callers toother grassroots groups who are working on the same issues or fighting thesame polluter.

CHEJ can help your newly formed group:◆ learn how to conduct successful meetings◆ raise funds◆ define a strategic plan to accomplish goals,◆ network with others◆ hold news briefings and press conferences◆ identify experts to assist with technical or scientific issues and questionsFor more established groups, CHEJ can provide guidance and assistance on

issues such as keeping people involved over the long haul, organizational struc-ture and board development, one- to five-year strategic planning, buildingworking coalitions, developing campaign and issue strategies, media trainingand assistance, and expanding beyond your existing geographical area.

CHEJ has staff scientists who can answer many of your questions and whocan review technical documents and tests results you need help with. The cen-ter also has bilingual staff who can respond to requests for information and or-ganizing assistance in Spanish.

Currently, CHEJ is coordinating three national campaigns:◆ Stop Dioxin Exposure Campaign, which is working to educate the public

about the health threat posed by dioxin and to move all levels of govern-ment to take steps to eliminate the sources of dioxin

◆ Child Proofing Our Communities, devoted to protecting children from pes-ticides and toxic chemicals in schools and day care facilities

◆ Health Care Without Harm, aimed at stopping the incineration of medicalwaste and eliminating the use of medical devices containing toxic mate-rials.

We invite local groups to become part of these campaignsThe center has a unique library of books, reports, government documents,

subject and corporate files, and videos that may have just the information youneed. Don’t hesitate to contact us. ◆


Summer 2001 3

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Center for Health,Environment and Justice, Inc.

150 S. Washington StreetSuite 300

(P.O. Box 6806)Falls Church, VA 22040

(703) [email protected]

Vol. 19, No. 1 ◆ Spring 2001

Everyone’s Backyard is published quarterly by the Center for Health, Environmentand Justice, Inc. The editor is Ron Nicosia. Design and Production is done by PageArtistry, Rochester, NY. Printed by Ecoprint of Silver Spring, Maryland. The coverand text are 100% recycled, 100% post-consumer waste paper, not rebleached withchlorine. Printed using low-VOC soybean inks.

Library of Congress #ISSN 0749-3940. Copyright by CHEJ. Reproduction by per-mission only. Center for Health, Environment and Justice, P.O. Box 6806, FallsChurch, VA 22040, (703)237-2249. Unsolicited manuscripts, news items, artwork,photographs and other submissions are welcome. All submissions become theproperty of CHEJ and will not be returned unless special arrangements are madein advance.

YOU CAN BEAT CITY HALL–JUST ASK THE FAMILIES

FROM SOUTH BUFFALOIn Hickory Woods, families persist and win a commitment from localofficials to evacuate them from homes built on contaminated land. .................. 4

RESISTING POWER: SAYING “NO” TO POWER PLANT

EXPANSION IN ARIZONAGilbert residents are fighting to prevent one of the nation’s largest utilitiesfrom expanding a power plant in the middle of a residential community. ....... 6ACTION LINE ..........................................................................................................9

CAMPAIGNS

HEALTH CARE WITHOUT HARM .............................................................. 18STOP DIOXIN EXPOSURE ............................................................................ 19CHILD PROOFING OUR COMMUNITIES .................................................. 20

RESOURCES .......................................................................................................... 22

◆ The release of Poisoned Schools: In-visible Threats, Visible Actions gener-ated extensive media coverage na-tionwide. Communities have begunusing the report to support their ef-forts to protect children from con-taminated school sites and pesticides.See page 21.

◆ The EPA’s Dioxin Reassessment isfinally on Administrator Whitman’sdesk, despite the efforts of thechemical industry to suppress it.See page 19.

◆ EBY’s report “Understanding‘Low-Level’ Chemical Exposures” inlast summer’s issue (vol. 18, no. 2)was named one of the top 25 cen-sored stories of 2000 by Project Cen-sored. For a review of Censored 2001,see page 22.

Our expandedAction Lineprovides morecoverage of localorganizing. Seepage 9.



YOU CAN BEAT CITY HALL–JUST ASK

THE FAMILIES FROM SOUTH BUFFALO

n February 22, Buffalo’smayor Anthony Masielloannounced that the citywill evacuate familiesliving in the Hickory

OWoods neighborhood. Eighty familiesfought for over two years to getevacuation from this polluted com-munity. This victory is well earnedand desperately needed.

In his announcement, the mayorstated that he was “committed tomaking the families whole.” One resi-dent questioned the ability to some-day becoming “whole” after living ina home contaminated with toxicchemicals. Jennifer Blake, a home-owner, commented, “I’m reallyhappy that the city council has takenthis step. But I’m very angry and hurtthat the city has let things go this far.I’m afraid to have more children.”She continued, “My son Matty hasbeen robbed of ever having a normallife. He is six years old and legallyblind with severe, global develop-mental delays. My husband and I willspend the rest of our lives caring forMatty.”

Homes in Hickory Woods werebuilt by the city of Buffalo and subsi-dized by the state with funds fromthe Affordable Housing and Housingand Urban Development programs.The development was intended toprovide homeownership for low-in-come families who were first-timebuyers. The first homes were con-structed in 1985—five years after the

evacuation of 700 families living nearthe toxic waste site at nearby LoveCanal in Niagara Falls. HickoryWoods is located across the streetfrom the abandoned LTV SteelSuperfund site—which should havebeen enough, given the city’s famil-iarity with Love Canal, to raise redflags and stop the project. But the city,eager for the redevelopment funds,built the homes there anyway.

In 1995, the city of Buffalo con-tracted with developer OmegaHomes to build eleven additionalhomes. Now, ten years after the firsthomes were built, questions wereraised about the safety of the neigh-borhood because of its proximity tothe Superfund site and evidence ofcoke wastes (from the LTV steel pro-duction) in the yard of a local resi-dent. The city asked Omega to sign awaiver of liability for the city of Buf-falo and accept the property “as is.”Concerned about the reports of envi-ronmental problems in the neighbor-hood, Omega walked away from theproject when the city was unwillingto provide proof that the site was en-vironmentally clean. Another devel-oper took the contract to build theremaining homes, but in 1998 con-struction was halted again after con-tamination was found in the soil.

Initial testing found contamina-tion throughout the community inyards and vacant lots. Residents’fears grew as tests results revealedcancer-causing chemicals, lead, and

BY LOIS GIBBS

other wastes. Many of the residentshad watched the Love Canal crisisunfold from 1978 to 1980 and under-stood that it was going to take a col-lective effort to resolve this problem.In the fall of 1999, families that hadbeen concerned individually aboutthe contamination in their yards gottogether and formed the HickoryWoods Concerned Homeowners As-sociation (HWCHA). Two years later,they had won a commitment from thecity to relocate the families.

LESSONS

There are many lessonsother groups working onenvironmental risks to hu-man health can take away

from the Hickory Woods organizingefforts. Here are some of the mostimportant:

In a very short time, the groupfigured out what would meet theneeds of the entire community(goals) and who had the power andability to give it to them (target).They were disciplined and focusedon their target and found creativeways to keep up the pressure andexpand their support.

The group’s primary goals wereto have additional testing done andto secure permanent relocation forthe families at risk. The familiesknew that both the testing and therelocation were going to cost a lot ofmoney and knew, in part from fol-lowing the Love Canal story, that


Summer 2001 5

continued on page 8

H

they needed to be visible and focusedin their efforts.

The group began by exploringwho was responsible for the situationand who had the funds to cover thecosts of testing and relocation—apower analysis. Residents first lookedat the polluter—LTV Steel. They con-cluded that going after LTV didn’tmake sense because LTV had de-clared bankruptcy. LTV was no longeroperating in Buffalo and wasn’t ahousehold name that you could builda campaign against.

The group next considered goingafter the federal Environmental Pro-tection Agency (EPA). The EPA hadbeen helpful in collecting and analyz-ing 600 plus samples that cast doubton the city’s original analysis, whichhad showed no problem. However,the EPA seemed an appropriate targetbecause it had the funds and the au-thority to act. The downside was thatHWCHA didn’t want Hickory Woodson the National Priority List(Superfund) because of the high crite-ria to qualify for relocation and thelong-waiting list for cleanup. Thefamilies needed relocation immedi-ately.

Finally, the group explored goingafter the City of Buffalo. The city hadbuilt on the property, ignored the“red flags” during development ofthe property,and continuedto ignore seriouscontaminationfound later inyards of resi-dents who, atone time, wereforced to evacu-ate temporarilywhile a limitedcleanup tookplace. The city isalso local, whereofficials are ac-cessible, makingit easier forHWCHA to ex-ert pressure andinfluence them.HWCHA, then,decided to tar-

get the city and let the city figure outwhere it would get the funds.

CREATIVE, STRATEGIC ANDPERSISTENT

ickory Woods familieswere incredibly creative intheir efforts. First, theyprofiled the council mem-

bers to figure out who was likely tobe supportive and who would be re-sistant. They already knew that themayor was unsupportive, refusingeven to discuss the situation with theneighborhood.

They looked at each of the coun-cil members, found allies there, andused these council members to pres-sure other members to support thecity taking action. In a very shorttime, they received full council sup-port for two powerful resolutionssupporting relocation.

Hickory Woods families cel-ebrated their victory but continuedtheir efforts. Since they needed themayor to agree to relocation beforeanything could be done, HWCHAbegan to target him in street demon-strations. Each member of the group,children included, wore a small, redflag with a stick on it. These flagsstood for the “red flags” the city hadencountered but wouldn’t address in

developing the property. The flagpins not only demonstrated solidarityamong residents but proved an effec-tive image for getting their messageout. Each time the media covered thestory they described the pins as sym-bolizing the “red flags” the city ig-nored. As a result, pressure remainedfocused on the city and the mayor.

HWCHA built support for theirgroup in several ways. They went toother city government agencies suchas the Environmental ManagementCouncil and asked for letters support-ing them to be sent to the mayor. Thegroup held a “Bipartisan Bash” inMarch of 2000 where they leafletedpeople outside of a city/ county/state-level meeting that was discuss-ing the Hickory Woods situation.Families testified at many meetings,moving their audiences with storiesof human suffering and convincingthem of the need for relocation withsolid scientific information. When, atone informational meeting, themayor’s representative made a re-mark about the red flags to the group,an outraged young mother of an in-fant stood up and yelled: “I don’tneed a red flag…My 6 month oldson’s diaper is my red flag becausewhen I change his diaper it’s full ofblood…That’s the red flag that I livewith every day.”

HickoryWoods folks con-ducted on-goingletter writingcampaigns withtheir local, state,and national leg-islative officials.These letters pro-vided updatesand asked forsupport whenHWCHA neededoutside pressureon a specific is-sue. The groupwas focused—always asking forspecific actionsthey knew theofficial had the

Lois Gibbs joins residents on a toxic tour of Hickery Woods. Courtesy of Judy Robinson.



ith nineteen new powerplants either approved orplanned, Arizona will beable within a few yearsto generate enough elec-

RESISTING POWER: SAYING “NO” TO

POWER PLANT EXPANSION IN ARIZONA

BY RON NICOSIA

wtricity power to serve twenty millionpeople—more than three times thepopulation of the entire state. Behindthis rush to build is the prospect ofimmense profits to be made sellingpower to California.

In Gilbert, a Phoenix suburb, resi-dents have served notice that thisprofiteering has a human cost that nocommunity should have to pay. Resi-dents are fighting to prevent one ofthe nation’s largest utilities from ex-panding a power plant located in themiddle of a residential community.Opponents of the expansion orga-nized early, educated themselves andthe community on the dangers of liv-ing next to a power plant, and haveraised obstacles to the licensing of thenew plant at every step of the way.

A DONE DEAL?

No buffer zone stands be-tween Salt River Project’s300-megawatt San Tanplant and the communi-

ties that surround it. The closesthomes are a mere 250 feet from theplant, and within a two-mile radiusthere are 40,000 residents and 21schools. Emissions from the anti-

quated plant—built twenty-five yearsago and never updated—are a majorcontributor to the poor air quality inGilbert, which has one of the highestrates of asthma in the state.

Press reports last spring that thetown council had signed an “inter-governmental agreement” with SaltRiver Project (SRP) allowing the util-ity to build a second plant on the sitestunned the community. In return forlandscaping and road improvements,Gilbert’s compliant town council hadgiven its official approval to the con-struction of a new 825-megawattnatural gas plant—making the facilityamong the largest ever planned soclose to a residential community.

The Arizona Republic and localmedia quickly endorsed the plan.SRP itself launched a massive publicrelations campaign—holding openhouses in the public schools, sendingflyers out to all households in Gilbert,taking out full-page newspaper ads,and increasing its sponsorship ofevents in the town—to promote itselfas a good neighbor, acting responsi-bly to meet the growing energy de-mands of the area.

The small group of neighbors andfriends that started Citizens Opposedto San Tan (COST) tapped into feel-ings of deep distrust of both the localgovernment and the utility. COSTdistributed flyers outside of SRP

open-houses questioning the need forthe plant. COST expanded quickly. Itsfirst meeting at the public library inlate spring last year drew over 300people. By June, COST had its ownweb site and through phone andemail outreach had developed a net-work of supporters in the community.By the summer, COST was ready forits first demonstrations, attracting 150people to a protest outside of theplant. At the city’s fourth of July cel-ebration, COST set up a booth andcollected 500 signatures. By August,more than 2,500 people had signedCOST’s petitions.

CHALLENGING A GIANT

Opponents of the expansionface a corporate giantwith deep pockets. Aquasi-governmental en-

tity, Salt River Project is subdivisionof the state with the legal status of amunicipality. SRP is the second larg-est power utility in the nation andhas a reputation as the most powerfulorganization in Arizona. One memberof Gilbert’s town council is an SRPemployee, and the mayor, also amember of the council, has publiclyacknowledged that SRP helped payoff her campaign debts. While seek-ing the council’s support, SRP main-tains that Gilbert has no legal author-ity over the utility.


Summer 2001 7

I

How could SRP be stopped? Op-ponents of the plant researched thestatutes governing utilities and de-cided to contest the certificate of envi-ronmental compatibility that SRPwould need from the Arizona Corpo-ration Commission (ACC). Fourteenpeople stepped forward and filedwith the ACC to serve as “interve-nors,” entitling them to documentsfiled with the ACC and giving themthe right to cross-examine witnessesat public hearings. Each intervenorresearched a specific issue—e.g., airpollution, water usage, electromag-netic fields, property values. Oppo-nents of the expansion throughoutthe community worked with the in-tervenors, mostly through email, con-tributing information and sugges-tions.

Hearings before the ArizonaPower Plant and Transmission LineSiting Committee started in Septem-ber and continued through twentypublic sessions to the middle of Feb-ruary. The unprecedented length ofthe hearings reflected the extraordi-nary preparation of the intervenors—and kept the issue before the publiceye. Through its website, email lists,and monthly meetings at the publiclibrary, the in-tervenors keptopponents ofthe expansionupdated andmobilizedthem for dem-onstrations atkey hearings.

COST andthe interve-nors mounteda powerfulchallenge toSRP’s propa-ganda cam-paign. SRP’smessage wasthat the alter-native to thenew plant wasa “California-style energycrisis” withrolling black-

outs and higher costs. Opponents ofthe plant made the case that Arizonawas becoming a fuel farm for Califor-nia. SRP has in fact already set up apower merchant—New West En-ergy—that is a major supplier of elec-tricity to California. But, above all,opponents of the plant focused onhealth and safety issues that con-cerned the whole community.◆ SRP claimed that because it wasinstalling state of the art technologyand strict emission controls, the ex-pansion would reduce pollution fromthe plant. But opponents of the plantshowed that SRP was manipulatingthe figures—overstating how muchthe existing plant was running andunderestimating how much the newplant would be running. The newplant would emit hundreds of addi-tional tons of nitrogen oxides, carbonmonoxide, and particulate matter,worsening the already severe asthmaproblem in the area.◆ Opponents focused considerableattention on SRP’s use of high-pollut-ing diesel fuel at the old plant, whichhas increased dramatically the lastcouple of years. In the first threemonths of 2001, San Tan had alreadyburned eight times what it had burned

in all of 1999. Complaints of respira-tory problems in Gilbert rise dramati-cally during periods when the plantburns diesel fuel.◆ Opponents also brought to thecommunity’s attention the safetyrisks involved in the use of hugeamounts of ammonia—Gilbert’s re-sources are completely inadequate todeal with a large spill—and in the tri-pling of the electromagnetic fieldsaround the plant.

SAN TAN’S OPPONENTSHAVE IMPACT

n February, the ArizonaLine Siting Committee an-nounced that it would rec-ommend SRP be granted a

certificate of environmental compat-ibility (CEC). However, the commit-tee added thirty-four conditions in-tended to ensure that SRP complieswith federal and state standards—asign that the critics had made them-selves heard. Two hundred oppo-nents of the expansion turned out tohear the committee’s decision.

During February and March,COST campaigned hard to elect a vo-cal opponent of the power plant as

mayor, distrib-uting flyersand makingphone calls upto the lastminute on elec-tion day. Thewinner gainedfifty-eight per-cent of thevote, winningin eighteen outof twenty dis-tricts—a majorvictory for op-ponents of theexpansion.

At twotown councilmeetings inearly March,COST mem-bers intro-duced the ideaof a resolution

Opponents of the plant at final hearing of the Arizona Power Plant and Transmission LineSiting Committee. Photo by Jim Parrault.



SOUTH BUFFALOcontinued from page 5

lthough the city of Buf-falo has promised toevacuate them, HickoryWoods residents are

VICTORY IN NEWENGLAND!

Amaking sure the verbal commit-ment stays in place. At the end ofMay, HWCHA held a spiriteddemonstration outside of afundraising event for the mayor.The mayor came out in front of thelocal TV cameras and stated thathe would relocate families withinsix months. Keep up the goodwork Hickory Woods families!

After three years of citi-zen-led campaigns toclean up old, dirtypower plants in New

England, both Connecticut andMassachusetts have what is beingcalled the strongest clean airregulations in the country. Bat-tling industry scare-tactics that aCalifornia crisis was headingNew England’s way if thesegrandfathered coal and oil-burn-ing plants were required to meetthe same air pollution standardsas newly built power plants, citi-zen activists living closest to thesmokestacks succeeded in pres-suring state decision-makers toprotect public health over theprofit of some of the countrieslargest power companies, NRGand PG&E. Going beyond mostclean air campaign victories, citi-zens of Connecticut are poised torid the state of environmentallyunjust pollution credit trading—an industry-backed scheme thatallows dirty plants to avoid meet-ing new standards by purchasingcredits from a polluting facilityelsewhere in the country. The billwas passed by large margins inthe state legislature, and the Con-necticut governor has announcedhe will sign it.

of opposition. Subsequently, oppo-nents of the plant worked with asympathetic council member to de-velop and pass the resolution. Thepowerful resolution detailed the pol-lution and health risks posed by ex-pansion. It cited “unquestionable,widespread resident opposition” tothe new plant and it committed thetown to officially oppose the expan-sion until the issues raised in theresolution were properly resolved.The 3-2 vote in favor of the resolutionon April 3—to the cheers of hundredsof opponents of the expansion at thecouncil meeting—was another majorvictory.

These successes increased thepressure on the Arizona CorporationCommission and raised expectationsamong the opponents of the plant.But in the last quarter century, theACC has never denied approval tothe construction of any plant, and onApril 26, it granted SRP the necessarycertificate of environmental compat-ibility. At the same time, the ACC im-posed further conditions—some ofthe most stringent anywhere in thenation—on the operation of the ex-panded facility. These conditions di-rectly addressed concerns that oppo-nents of the expansion hadrepeatedly and so effectively raised atthe public hearings. SRP must◆ stop burning diesel fuel at the

plant;◆ install the most effective emission

control equipment available, re-gardless of cost;

◆ report to the ACC every fiveyears on possible improvementsto further reduce air emissions.The ACC will determine whatimprovements SRP must make;

◆ reduce carbon monoxide emis-sions at the plant site, notthrough offsets elsewhere.The ACC defended its decision to

approve the expansion as a way offorcing SRP to clean up the existingplant—an acknowledgment that op-ponents of the plant had made theircase that SRP was a major polluter.

The opponents of the San Tan ex-pansion continue to meet and

strategize for the long haul. The inter-venors have just filed a motion withthe ACC requesting that it reconsiderits decision to grant the CEC basedon its failure to fully address the is-sues in the town council’s resolutionof opposition. They are pressing thetown council to formally rescind theintergovernmental agreement be-tween Gilbert and SRP. And they areworking on plans to monitor theplant’s emissions in preparation for anuisance lawsuit against SRP. This isa struggle that is far from finished. ◆

A

power to do. They always followedup on the letters to ensure that theactions they had requested had beendone. Residents also engaged ingrassroots solidarity, reaching out tonational, state, regional, and localgroups to co-sign letters calling forrelocation.

BUILDING FOR THE FUTUREn exciting outcome of theHickory Woods effort isthat HWCHA membersare thinking beyond their

own struggle and trying to organize acoalition of impacted groups whowould have a visible presence andinfluence on all toxic issues in westernNew York. During their struggle,HWCHA reached out to existinggroups, such as the Citizens Environ-mental Coalition and CHEJ, for helpwith media and government tacticalissues. Now, leaders from HWCHAare attending other groups’ meetingsand providing support for their issueswhile building the basis for a coali-tion.

Families at Hickory Woods will bemoved and a new exciting grassrootscoalition in western New York hasbeen born. It wasn’t an easy fight.This grassroots effort has changed thelives of Hickory Woods families for-ever. Let’s hope it has also opened theeyes of Buffalo’s city hall so the nexttime there is a toxic waste problem itcan recognize the red flags. ◆


Summer 2001 9

as Action Line includedyour group recently?Please let us knowabout yourself—what

ALASKA◆ Concerned Parents of GridwoodSchool continue to press for a thoroughstudy of the Gridwood Elementary andJunior High School properties. Theschools, part of the Anchorage SchoolDistrict, were built 1980-81 on top of anold landfill that contains fuels, paints, andpossibly herbicides, solvents, and othertoxic substances. The schools’ drinkingwater well is about 165 feet deep and isdown-gradient from the landfill; the AlaskaDepartment of Environmental Conserva-tion has recently rated the well’s vulner-ability to contamination as “high to veryhigh.” Parts of the playground have beenclosed due to a brown, foul-smelling sub-stance oozing up. The group has used thePoisoned Schools report to bolster thecredibility of their fight. In the nearbyEagle River area, parents have just begunto organize against a proposal to build anew high school next to an old dumpsitewhere no one knows exactly what is bur-ied. Parents in the area are determined tofind out what their children are being ex-posed to at the Gridwood schools andwant to ensure that the school districtdoesn’t repeat the same mistake by build-ing the new Eagle River high school nearanother dump.

◆ Alaska Community Action onToxics, Alaska Center for the Environ-ment, and Cook Inlet Keeper have fileda notice of intent to sue Entech Incinera-tion, which burns medical, municipal, andindustrial waste in South Anchorage. TheAlaska Department of EnvironmentalConservation estimates that Entech dis-charges almost forty tons a year of hydro-gen chloride and notified the company in1997 that under the Clean Air Act it wasrequired to get a permit. Entech has con-tinued to operate without one and has notbeen reporting its hazardous discharges.The three groups are seeking an injunc-tion to shut down the incinerator untilEntech complies with federal standards.

ALABAMA◆ Anniston residents won a belated vic-tory against Monsanto spin-off Solutia Inc.

this April when the company agreed topay $40 million to settle a lawsuit charg-ing it with contaminating the communitywith toxic chemicals and covering it up.Plaintiffs claimed that company docu-ments showed that Monsanto, whichmanufactured PCBs in Anniston from1935 to 1971, continued to dump PCBwaste into local landfills and discharge itunfiltered into local streams even afterMonsanto’s own research in the 1960srevealed the material to be hazardous.For more than two decades afterMonsanto stopped production of PCBs, itwithheld information about PCB pollutionthat would have helped protect the localcommunity. Solutia will pay an average of$12,000 to 1,600 plaintiffs, $2.5 million torelocate plaintiffs who live near the plant,and $3.5 million to establish a foundationfor victims of PCB contamination. Solutiahad previously agreed to pay $43.7 millionto property owners living along waterspolluted with PCB waste and is currentlyinvolved in at least twenty other lawsuits.

◆ Years of painstaking local and nationalorganizing, research, and relationship-building with elected officials paid off in abig way for the Chemical WeaponsWorking Group (CWWG) on April 25 at ahearing of the Senate Defense Appropria-tions Subcommittee in Washington. Localactivists from Families ConcernedAbout Nerve Gas Incineration inAnniston, joined Craig Williams, a long-time CWWG leader from Kentucky, to tes-tify to the subcommittee about the Army’sflawed plans for destroying chemicalweapons in the midst of civilian communi-ties. Their testimony showed that a majorrationale for using incineration—that it isnecessary to meet U.S. treaty obliga-tions—is contradicted by information inthe Army’s own confidential documents,which CWWG had obtained. The activistsgave details from their communities of theArmy’s willingness to accept civilian expo-sure to lethal chemicals from chemicalweapons incineration rather than usesafer non-incineration methods. One ofthe activists demonstrated how to use thekit issued to residents by the federal gov-ernment to protect families from the incin-

erator. The kit consists of duct tape, plas-tic sheeting, and a pair of scissors.Anniston residents have been told theywill have an eight-minute warning of anydangerous releases from the incinerator.The three U.S. senators present for theactivists’ testimony—Stevens of Alaska,Shelby of Alabama and McConnell ofKentucky, all conservative Republicanswith pro-military voting records—stronglycondemned the Army’s approach. SenatorMcConnell once again expressed hislongtime support for nonincineration tech-nologies, while Senator Stevens said thethought of a chemical agent release hadhim “scared as hell.” Senator Shelbyscolded a federal official with the reminderthat the only issue at stake was the“safety, safety, safety” of the peoplearound chemical weapons sites.

◆ Community members of the state-rec-ognized Mowa band of the Choctaw Tribeare organizing against the siting of amedical waste microwave treatment facil-ity on their reservation. In February, resi-dents of Mobile County, bordering thereservation, rejected the facility, which isto serve as a regional incinerator formedical waste from counties statewide.Concerned about the facility’s health im-pact, Mowa community members haveorganized Mowa Against EnvironmentalHazards and are challenging the tribalcouncil’s decision allowing the facility tobe placed within the reservation. Thegroup is demanding more information onEnvironmental Medical Systems, an un-

HWE NEED YOU!

you are organizing for or against,how you are organizing, and whatactions or campaigns you wouldlike to tell others about. We wantto hear from you! Contact EBY’seditor Ron Nicosia at 703-237-2249or [email protected].



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known company, and full public disclo-sure of the contract negotiated by thetribal council. An important concern isthat no health assessment of the po-tential impact of the facility on nearbypublic housing has been done. Thegroup is demanding that the commu-nity be part of the decision-making pro-cess and is calling for a new vote bythe tribal council that addresses thecommunity’s health and environmentalconcerns.

CALIFORNIA◆ Members of the former McClellanAir Force Base Restoration AdvisoryBoard (RAB) are suing the base com-mand for illegally dissolving the com-mittee last May. The former RABcontends that the Air Force violatedthe RAB charter and federal Superfundregulations. According to the group, theAir Force acted to suppress complaintsabout the cleanup of the base, one ofthe most contaminated installations

approved for closure by the Base Re-alignment and Closures Commission.Del Callaway, the former communityco-chair of the McClellan RAB and afifteen-year civilian employee of the AirForce, stated that “the Air Force

wanted to shut us up, because they wantto downplay the serious threat to publichealth and the environment posed by theradioactive waste and other toxins con-taminating the base. But we’re not goingaway!” The Air Force has spent thirteenyears and nearly $300 million trying toclean contaminated groundwater. Thecleanup of toxic landfills and topsoil andthe remaining fourteen billion gallons ofcontaminated groundwater will take atleast another thirty-five years. The AirForce is closing the base in July and turn-ing over parts of it to McClellan County.

◆ Literacy for Environmental Justiceand Linking San Francisco sponsored aYouth on Fire! rally for environmental jus-tice at the PG&E power plant in HuntersPoint, San Francisco this May. At the rally,public school students and activists calledfor an immediate and total cleanup of theHunters Point area and closure of the out-dated PG&E plant, which threatens thehealth of the more than 10,000 children inthe Bayview area. Hunters Point residents

suffer extremely high rates of such ill-nesses as asthma and breast cancer. TheYouth on Fire! rally, which was organizedby teachers and students at four publicschools, included a march around the en-tire power plant, as well as such festivitiesas mural painting and theater.

◆ A Bay Area coalition of community,labor, and environmental groups, in-cluding Greenaction, continues topressure Integrated EnvironmentalSystems (IES) to adopt safernonincineration technologies at itsOakland plant. On a rainy March 1,150 people held a protest in front ofthe facility, placing a padlock on thegate. The next day coalition membersconducted a sit-in at the Bay AreaQuality Management District office toprotest IES’s announcement that it hadreached an agreement with state regu-lators that would keep the plant operat-ing. Air regulators then denied that adecision on the permit had been made.The Oakland facility is located in a low-income and minority neighborhoodnear a glass plant and asphalt facility,less than a mile from seven elemen-tary schools, a middle school, and ahigh school. The only commercialmedical waste incinerator in the state,the plant has a long history of air qual-ity violations and plant breakdowns.

◆ At the end of April, the OceanBeach Grassroots Organization(OBGO) led a protest march atAnheuser-Busch owned SeaWorld inSan Diego to call attention to the factthat the world’s largest aquatic parkhas been built next to an old landfillpolluted with hazardous waste. Duringthe 1950s, the local aerospace indus-try dumped millions of gallons of wastecontaminated with heavy metals andother toxic substances into the MissionBay landfill. OBGO opposes the pro-posed expansion of the park due to therisk of disturbing the old toxic landfill,as well as the likely impact on air andwater quality and wildlife.

◆ The Silicon Valley Toxics Coali-tion (SVTC), working with Grass-Roots Recycling, Mercury PolicyProject, Clean Water Action and U.S.PIRG have launched the ElectronicsTake It Back! campaign. The Take ItBack! platform endorses the principleof Extended Producer Responsibility,which requires that manufacturers anddistributors of electronic equipmenttake financial and physical responsibil-ity for their products throughout aproduct’s entire lifecycle. The platformcalls on the electronics industry to endthe use of hazardous materials in theproduction of electronic products and


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to adopt health and safety measures toprotect workers.

GEORGIA◆ On April 3, U.S. PIRG, joined bymore than eighty national, state, andlocal health and environmental organi-zations based in Alabama, Georgia,Florida, Mississippi, and Tennesseelaunched the Clean Up Southern Com-pany campaign to pressure the electricutility to commit itself to cleaner powergeneration. At press conferences ineight southern cities and Washington,D.C., the groups released the report“Southern Company, a Giant AmongPolluters” documenting that the levelsof pollution emitted from SouthernCompany’s antiquated plants are thehighest in the nation and pose a majorhealth threat throughout the southeast.On May 22, U.S. PIRG followed up witha second report—“Abuse of Power:Southern Company’s Campaign toUndo, Weaken, Delay and CircumventLife-Saving Pollution Rules.” The reportdocuments that Southern Companyspent more than $48 million in 1999 onpublic relations efforts and buying po-litical influence in order to avoid havingto modernize its old, dirty power plants.In April, 14,000 campaign supporterssent postcards or faxes to SouthernCompany asking it to clean up thecompany’s plants and support strongerfederal clean air regulations for powerplants.

KENTUCKY◆ The Coalition for Health Concern(CHC) recently completed an intensivecommunity heath screening projectfunded by a mini-grant on environmen-tal justice by the U.S. EPA. This studygathered information on health symp-toms from communities living near twocontaminated sites in western Ken-tucky—the Paducah DOE nuclear en-richment site and the Calvert Citypetrochemical complex. Both commu-nities are described by CHC as “na-tional sacrifice areas” that areimpacted by hundreds of toxic chemi-cals, toxic metals, and gases. Thehealth screening results provided resi-dents with a “snap shot” of the variedhealth problems in the community, in-cluding cancer and reproductive, neu-rological, and respiratory problems. At

community meetings, CHC distributedinformation on the toxicity of the chemi-cals released from the petrochemicalplants and the DOE facility and realizedthat this was the first time that manypeople had ever received information on

what was making them sick. While thehealth screening studies did not providedefinitive answers, CHC is using the re-sults to push the DOE to set up a clinic inthe community to provide medical testingand treatment.

MAINE◆ The Penobscot Alliance for MercuryElimination (PAME) applauded the deci-sion of the Bethlehem Apparatus Com-pany in Pennsylvania not to accept usedmercury from a now-closed HoltraChemfacility in Maine. Mercury from BethlehemApparatus, the largest mercury recyclingcompany in North America, has beenfound in two illegal mercury dumps in In-dia. In announcing its decision, the com-pany acknowledged that it was concernedabout negative publicity. Earlier this year,D.F. Goldsmith Chemical and Metal Com-pany, which had purchased the mercuryfrom HoltraChem, was forced to recall atwenty-ton shipment of the mercury toIndia because of protests in India by envi-ronmentalists and workers. D.F. Goldsmithhas wanted Maine’s Department of Envi-ronmental Protection to classify the used

mercury as a commodity rather than ahazardous waste to make it easier tosell and ship, but the DEP has refused.State and federal officials are currentlynegotiating with Mallinckrodt Inc., apast owner of the plant, to get it to pay

for cleaning up the mercury-contami-nated site, one of the worst in theworld.

◆ Natural Resources Council ofMaine and a member of Physiciansfor Social Responsibility, along withmothers and children, held a pressconference on May 10 to urge theMaine legislature to pass three billsthat would reduce toxic pollution. Twobills focus on mercury; these would setstandards for mercury in water andban the sale of mercury thermometers.The third bill aims at reducing dioxinemissions by banning backyard trashburning and the burning of plastic, rub-ber, styrofoam and metals in construc-tion debris; it also establishes a stategoal of eliminating dioxin and requiresthe state to undertake a one-time out-reach effort to educate the public abouttrash burning, the largest source ofdioxin emissions in Maine.

MARYLAND◆ More than nine months of organiz-ing and agitating by office workers in a



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building where 1,000 employees ofboth the State of Maryland and Balti-more County work finally got results. InDecember, the state and the countyagreed to relocate the employees fromthe Towson building after worker actionled to substantial publicity about prob-lems with asbestos, fungi, and mold,as well as what workers called “slip-shod” management and maintenance.

◆ Parents for Safe Schools (PFSS)in Ellicott City is planning on meetingwith the Howard County Department ofPublic Works to discuss issues raisedby the New Cut Landfill. After readingthe technical reports prepared for thegroup by CHEJ and a local consultant,the county agency prepared a 100-page response. The landfill is adjacentto the Worthington Elementary School.

MASSACHUSETTS◆ Officials in Quincy don’t seem tohave learned their lessons very well.Last year, Quincy Citizens for SafeSchools helped defeat a plan to builda new school on an old shipyard site

contaminated with asbestos, PCBs,and other chemicals (our cover story inthe last EBY). Now the city is propos-ing a Department of Public Works sitecontaminated with benzene, petroleum

hydrocarbons, and other chemicals. Manyresidents oppose this site as well and arefrustrated by the city’s slow learningcurve.

MICHIGAN◆ A community fight in a primarily Latinosection of south Detroit over the construc-tion of a public school on a contaminatedsite continues to build momentum. DetroitPublic Schools (DPS) and Michigan De-partment of Environmental Quality offi-cials are attempting to move forward witha grossly mismanaged soil remediationplan for the newly built Beard school de-spite strong objections from two neighbor-ing communities. DPS has miscalculatedcontamination levels and has failed to dosufficient testing of the site and DPS con-tractors have illegally dumped contami-nated materials and hidden contaminatedmaterials —undermining the community’strust in DPS. Parents of students at theold Beard school agree on the need for anew building but have organized Parentsfor Healthy Schools (PHS) to demandgreater participation and transparency inthe project. DPS has responded by offer-

ing to create a community oversight com-mittee lacking decision-making author-ity—which the community, until now, hasrejected while continuing to press for anindependent committee with real clout.

While maintaining a dialog with DPS,PHS has intensified community out-reach efforts. It recently joined forceswith parents from the neighboringMcMillan public school, which will alsobe closed when the new Beard schoolopens, to work on education and orga-nizing of the community.

◆ On March 10, activists from acrossMichigan, including EnvironmentalHealth Watch and the Ecology Cen-ter staged a demonstration at Dow’sshareholder meeting in Midland. Sinceits merger with Union Carbide, Dow isthe second largest chemical companyin the world. Outside the meeting, pro-testers wore papier-mache pregnantbellies to drive home the point that de-veloping babies are most at risk fordioxin contamination. Inside, activiststestified about the need for Dow tostop its dioxin-polluting practices andclean up its contaminated sites, suchas the one in Midland. Activists alsodelivered a message from survivors ofthe 1984 Bhopal chemical disaster de-manding redress for the thousandswho are still suffering health effectsfrom the massive gas release fromUnion Carbide’s pesticide plant.

MONTANA◆ Will the Agency for Toxic Sub-stances and Disease Registry(ATSDR) ever stop amazing us? Mem-bers of the Lockwood CommunityCoalition for Environmental Health(LCCEH) outside of Billings recentlyreceived a letter from ATSDR, which isconducting a health assessment in thecommunity to evaluate the impact ofcontaminated groundwater from theLockwood Solvents Superfund site.Earlier, EPA connected the communityto a public water system and had tovent the crawl space areas undersome homes because of the off-gas-sing of high levels of chemicals out ofthe groundwater. In a “comfort letter”written by the EPA, the community hasbeen told that their homes are nowsafe, but LCCEH isn’t buying it. Furtherfrustrating the community, the letterfrom ATSDR asks people to describetheir “quality of life,” a new addition tohealth assessment. One communityleader responded, “What quality of life?We have no quality of life thanks to theSuperfind site.” What kind of life can

Parents for Healthy Schools in south Detroit getting their message out. Photo byPaul Engstrom.


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anyone have living next to one of theworst contaminated sites in the coun-try? Community leaders are now wor-ried that the agency might use theirresponses to minimize their concernsand to explain away illnesses in thecommunity as due to stress and notchemical exposure.

NEW JERSEY◆ South Camden Citizens in Actionwon an unprecedented legal victory onApril 20 when a federal judge haltedthe opening of a St. Lawrence Cementplant for violating the civil rights of Afri-can-Americans and Hispanics in theSouth Waterfront neighborhood ofCamden. The suit had been filed byCamden Legal Services with assis-tance from the Public Interest LawCenter of Philadelphia and the Centeron Race, Poverty and the Environ-ment in San Francisco. Judge Orlofskyruled that in issuing a permit to theplant the New Jersey Department ofEnvironmental Protection had failed toconsider the cumulative impact of pol-luting facilities, the health of residentsin the community, and the community’sracial and ethnic makeup. The judgeconcluded that the plaintiffs had “es-tablished a prima facie case of dispar-ate impact discrimination based onrace and national origin in violation ofthe EPA’s regulations,” which arebased on Title VI of the federal CivilRights Act. The South Waterfrontneighborhood is ninety percent blackand Hispanic and has a medianhousehold income of $15,000, com-pared to the statewide median of$67,000. The neighborhood alreadycontains the region’s largest trash in-cinerator, a power plant, a sewagetreatment plant, a scrap metal yard,and two Superfund sites. The judgenoted the “disproportionately high inci-dence of asthma and other respiratoryailments” among residents of theneighborhood.

The ruling was thrown into doubtless than a week later when the U.S.Supreme Court, in a different case,limited the ability of private citizens tofile lawsuits under Title VI of the CivilRights Act to cases of intentional dis-crimination. On May 10, however,Judge Orlofsky ruled that the Camdensuit to prevent the cement plant from

opening could proceed under U.S. Code,Section 1983, a nineteenth century civilrights statute that permits suits for state

actions that violate rights guaranteed bythe Constitution or by law.

NEW YORK◆ These are rough days for St. LawrenceCement, a Canadian subsidiary of Zurich-based Holderbank. Columbia ActionNow! and Friends of Hudson sponsoreda demonstration in front of the Swiss em-bassy in Manhattan on April 25 to protestthe company’s plans to build a coal-burn-ing cement plant in Greenport, New York.The plant would generate an estimated17.5 million pounds of pollution annually.“Holderbank and its subsidiaries have anirresponsible track record of air and waterpollution all over North America,” said

Sam Pratt, director of Friends ofHudson, a 1,800-member communityinterest group. “The health effects of

this coal-burning facility,” he added,“would be felt far beyond the borders ofColumbia County.” In Switzerland, coalcan no longer be used as fuel becauseof the pollution it causes.

◆ After the Southside Elmira Envi-ronmental Action League (SEEAL)released the Poisoned Schools report,former one-time Centers for DiseaseControl (CDC) Director Clark Heathtold a community gathering that there’sno reason to continue to study thecluster of twenty-two cases of testicu-lar cancer among the students at theSouthside High School. Heath said hedidn’t believe the students had any sig-nificant exposures to the low levels of

Health Care Without Harm’s Anti-Incinerator/Alternative Technology Workgroupheld a skill share in April at Kernersville, North Carolina. Thirty activists camefrom as far away as South Africa to share strategies and celebrate the numer-ous successes HCWH has had in shutting down incinerators. Participants arestanding in front of the Stericycle medical waste incinerator in Haw River. BlueRidge Environmental Defense League, CACTUS and others have been orga-nizing locally to try and shut down this facility for the past year. Photo courtesyof Monica Rohde.



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contaminants found on the schoolgrounds. An investigation by CHEJ,however, found that the state’s healthstudy failed to do any sort of risk as-sessment. So how can the state judgewhat risks exist for the students, teach-ers, and workers at the school?SEEAL and other area residents arecontinuing to press for further study ofthe cancers.

NORTH CAROLINA◆ When Concerned Citizens ofNorthampton County learned inJanuary that International Paper (IP)intended to expand its industrial land-fill, twenty members of the group metwith the Northampton County Commis-sioners, demanding to know why nopublic notice had been given of theproposal. Angry that city officials hadrubber-stamped IP’s permit to open anew cell, Concerned Citizens voicedtheir concerns to the Roanoke RapidsDaily Herald—prompting IP officials toarrange a quick meeting. After review-ing the permit with Clean Water Fund,Concerned Citizens presented senior

IP officials with pages of questions onthe landfill’s design and on protectionof ground and surface water. While thepermit does provide more protection

for groundwater than older permits, Con-cerned Citizens has served notice to IPthat it will be carefully monitoring the land-fill—as well as requests for any future per-mits.

◆ At a press conference on April 3 inMathews to announce the release of Be-hind Closed Doors, the Blue Ridge Envi-ronmental Defense League (BREDL)urged the Mecklenburg County Depart-ment of Environmental Protection to testthe BMWNC incinerator for levels of dioxinand furan emissions, conduct a healthsurvey of the community, and shut-downthe facility until health issues can be re-solved. BMWNC is the state’s secondlargest commercial medical waste incin-erator. BREDL has information on el-evated levels of cancer and respiratorydisease in the vicinity of the plant.

OHIO◆ Valleycrest Neighbors and Con-cerned Citizens in North Dayton helpedchange the U.S. EPA’s decision to stopthe cleanup of the Valleycrest toxic wastedump. The dump was established back in

the 60s despite protests from neighboringresidents and contains thousands ofdrums of toxic substances, as well aswastes from pollution control processes.

In 1994, the EPA declared the dump aSuperfund site, and in 1998, some ofthe companies, including Waste Man-agement and General Motors, agreedto begin cleaning it up. Last fall, how-ever, the EPA granted the companies’request to halt removal of the drums.Valleycrest Neighbors and ConcernedCitizens organized to put pressure onthe EPA and the companies to finishthe cleanup. The groups collected peti-tions, held regular protests outside theoffices of Waste Management andGeneral Motors, and lobbied their rep-resentatives. After the EPA’s an-nouncement on April 25,Congressman Tony Hall, who had metwith Administrator Whitman on the is-sue, said, “It was a grassroots, biparti-san effort. The people spoke and EPAlistened. The health and safety ofValleycrest neighbors and all Daytonarea residents will benefit by this deci-sion.”

◆ Committee Opposed to Ruiningthe Environment (CORE) inCuyahoga Falls is opposing a new Cityof Akron landfill to be located next toboth a national park and an old landfillthat is already contaminating the area.After the Ohio EPA agreed to an infor-mational meeting in the community,CORE mobilized 800 local residents,got their message across to the com-munity and to the Ohio EPA, andsigned up 500 members at the meet-ing.

◆ Members of The AwarenessGroup (TAG) in Middlefield have beenpressing local, state, and federal au-thorities for several years concerningindustrial contamination of localgroundwater. They’ve gotten a lot ofresistance; one local company evenwrote to a regulator naming one TAGleader as having singled them out forno good reason. Recently, TAG metone more time with officials, using amap with pins to indicate residentswith health problems in the area. Thistime the group is getting support in-stead of a runaround. A local healthofficial spoke out supporting TAG’sclaims and sharply criticizing the OhioEPA. Other officials, including a con-gressional staffer, offered cooperation.The Buckeye Environmental Net-work has been working closely withTAG, providing technical assistance

Concerned Citizens of Northampton County in North Carolina. Photo courtesyof Clean Water Fund.


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and support for the group’s develop-ment.

OREGON◆ When four mothers in Dallas be-came concerned about Boise Cascade(BC) pesticides that were killing plantsand wildlife around their homes andthreatening their children’s health, theyhad an uphill battle. After all, BC had$7.6 billion in corporate revenues lastyear. Nevertheless, the women went tothe local newspaper, the state legisla-ture, and every audience they could,demanding advance notification andprecise application methods. BC,which has been under some pressurealready for its anti-environmental andanti-environmentalist actions, didn’tneed one more problem. So this year,BC took extra care when it sprayedherbicides near those homes in Dallas.Some plants and animals have comeback, and neighbors have even seenearthworms for the first time in years.The kids can play outside more safely,and the pets can go out too. But the“four housewives” of Dallas plan tokeep the pressure on the state govern-ment until laws are changed to betterprotect the citizens.

PENNSYLVANIA◆ On April 17, Group Against Gas(GAG) in Hazelton held its own meet-ing at the same time as an EPA publicrelations event, drawing 200 residentsto EPA’s audience of 20. Local doctorsjoined the community in denouncing arecent EPA report that concluded thatthe Tranguch Gasoline Spill posed nohealth risk to the community. Petitionscirculated calling for federal and statebuyouts of residents’ homes—andcame back with signatures from nearlyeveryone in the room. Three days later,Governor Ridge announced that thePennsylvania Emergency ManagementAgency’s (PEMA) would not apply forfederal disaster assistance for theirneighborhood. GAG quickly charteredbuses and took 100 people to picket aRepublican Party event featuringRidge. They were greeted by a helicop-ter and eleven state police cars.

On May 11, residents of Hazeltonfiled an eight-count class-action lawsuitin Luzerne County Court on behalf of

those affected by the gasoline spill. De-fendants include BP Amoco, Exxon-Mobil,and Shell Oil. The suit also alleges thatthe Pennsylvania Department of Environ-mental Protection has repeatedly con-cealed information on the effects of thespill that could help protect residents.

◆ Alliance for a Clean Environment(ACE) in Stowe received a Technical As-sistance Grant (TAG) from the U.S. EPA tohelp them evaluate the impact of the Oc-cidental Chemical Superfund site in theircommunity. The company operates a PVCmanufacturing plant that releases vinylchloride, benzene, and other chemicalsinto the air and has contaminated ground-

water with TCE, xylene, styrene and othervolatile organic chemicals. ACE has beenfighting for years to prevent Occidentalfrom building a pipeline through the townto transport gas from a nearby landfill asfuel for the plant.

PUERTO RICO◆ Days before the U.S. Navy was to re-sume bombing exercises on Vieques,Puerto Rico’s new governor Sila Calderonsigned into law a bill regulating noise lev-els at sea—in effect outlawing Navybombing. Her decision was based in parton a study by the Ponce School of Medi-cine, which found heart problems amongVieques’ residents that could be attributedto noise from the Navy bombing and artil-lery. The Navy criticized the science be-hind the study, and a judge backed theNavy and overruled the law. The Navy has

also attacked a study of the coral reefaround the island, which foundunexploded ordnance leaking toxicTNT and more than 1,000 deterioratingbarrels and cylinders of unknownchemicals. There have also been re-ports of higher rates of cancer, lupus,thyroid deficiencies, and asthma onVieques.

When the Navy—undeterred by thelaw or the scientific studies—resumedbombing, the residents of Vieques andtheir supporters, led on the island bythe Committee for the Rescue andDevelopment of Vieques, turned tocivil disobedience. Protesters arrested

for entering the prohibited area in-cluded Vieques’ mayor and many otherresidents, as well as representatives ofCalderon’s Popular Democratic Party,the pro-statehood New ProgressiveParty and the Puerto Rican Indepen-dence Party, parties which disagree onmany issues, and also supporters fromthe mainland, including Reverend AlSharpton, Mexican-American actorEdward James Olmos, DemocraticU.S. Representative Luis Gutiérrezfrom Illinois, Robert F. Kennedy Jr.,and New York labor leader DennisRivera. The protests on the island werebacked up by rallies in San Juan and infront of the White House, as well as bya full-page ad in major newspapersfeaturing supporters from the enter-tainment and sports worlds.

Valleycrest Neighbors and Concerned Citizens picket in front of General Motorsin Dayton, Ohio. Photo courtesy of Jeannie Manning.



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SOUTH CAROLINA◆ Two-thirds of the way through a$150 million project to deepenCharleston’s harbor, local activistsfrom South Carolina—More Than aPort found something that had es-caped the notice of the EPA, ArmyCorps of Engineers, and the SouthCarolina State Ports Authority: tons ofdredging materials intended for onespot in the ocean were being dumpedsomewhere else. The agencies arenow dumping in the “right” place andinvestigating whether any harm wasdone to aquatic life. A similar mistakeearlier in the project was only identifiedwhen a shrimper’s nets were fouled.Looking at the bright side of things, anArmy Corps spokesperson said, “Weshould finish ahead of time and wellwithin the budget.”

TEXAS◆ After helping force Envirocare todrop its plans to dump nuclear waste inWest Texas, Friends of Ward Countyjoined with the Lone Star Sierra Cluband other communities and environ-mentalists around the state in a biggervictory against an even bigger nucleardumper. Waste Control Specialists

spent lavishly lobbying for a west Texasnuclear waste dump proposal that wouldhave favored thatcorporation. Thebill, however, wasblocked by a com-mittee of the Texaslegislature. Envi-ronmentalist oppo-nents of thelongstanding planto bring Maine andVermont’s nuclearwaste to Texas hadargued that anydump for thatwaste would alsoend up taking fed-eral nuclear waste.When the proposalwas amended toallow U.S. Depart-ment of Energywaste in the dump,it became clearthat the environ-mentalists wereright, and opposi-tion to the dumpsolidified in the me-dia and in the leg-islature.

VIRGINIA◆ The Coalition for the Safe Rede-velopment of Avtex marked EarthDay with a rally and a ceremony for thehealing of the earth, gathering at theAvtex Superfund site in Front Royal.The group included high school andcollege students, pagan activists, aformer Avtex employee who livesnearby, and a lot of kids, and featureddrumming, dancing, and healthysnacks. Speakers and a skit protestedthe rush to “clean up” the site by cap-ping toxic waste with sludge and flyash and leaving it in the ShenandoahRiver flood plain. In addition, neighborsof the site questioned an EPA repre-sentative about the continuing odorsand emissions. EPA continues to moveforward with a rush-job cleanup that isbeing touted as a national model.

◆ Montvale residents won their fightto keep out an industrial park beforethey had even named their group. Thesmall rural community of Montvale isalready dominated by several largegasoline storage tanks. Last year,county officials decided to put in an

View from classroom window at Cesar Chavez High School in Houston, Texas.School is within quarter mile of industries that release nearly 5 million pounds oftoxics annually into the air. Photo by Juan Parras of Unidos Contra EnvironmentalRacism. For more info, please contact Mr. Parras at 713-313-4270.

Earth Day dance in front of former Avtex building, now aSuperfund site, in Front Royal, Virginia. Photo by LarryYates.


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ane Akre and Steve Wilson, who put their careers on theline to expose the health risk to humans posed byMonsanto’s bovine growth hormone (BGH), are amongthis year’s winners of the prestigious Goldman Environ-

continued on page 21

JREPORTERS WIN GOLDMAN AWARD

mental Prize. Working for a Fox network station in Florida in 1997,Akre and Wilson prepared a report on the health problems of cows in-jected with BGH and on scientific evidence linking BGH to human can-cers. Bowing to pressure from Monsanto, Fox postponed the broadcast.Fox forced Akre and Wilson to do eighty-three rewrites—none accept-able to the network—then fired the two reporters. In August 1998, aFlorida jury awarded Akre $425,000 for lost wages and damages, vindi-cating her claim that Fox had fired her for threatening to make publicthe network’s pressure on her to falsify the report. (The script of thesuppressed report and the full story behind the lawsuit are available atwww.foxBGHsuit.com).

This year’s other winners are labor activist Oscar Olivera, who leda coalition of organizations in protests and strikes against theprivatization of Bolivia’s public water system, forcing the governmentto cancel its contract with multinational corporations; YosephaAlomang, an indigenous woman who has led the fight in West Papua,Indonesia against Freeport Inc.’s gold and copper mine, the largest inthe world; conservationist Eugene Rutagarama, who risked his life dur-ing the 1990s to save Rwanda’s last few hundred mountain gorillas;Myrsini Malakou and Giorgos Catsadorakis, biologists who haveworked for a quarter-century to preserve the wetlands of Préspa innorthwestern Greece; and Bruno Van Peteghem, who has led a cam-paign to protect the coral reef of New Caledonia from mining interests.

The Goldman Environmental Prize is given annually to environ-mental activists from six geographic regions: North America, South/Central America, Asia, Africa, Europe, and Island Nations. Lois Gibbswas awarded the first Goldman Prize for North America in 1990. (De-tails are available at www.goldmanprize.org)

industrial park and to make it acces-sible from the highway via the samesmall road that leads to Montvale’shomes and elementary school. Offi-cials moved quickly with the plan butresidents organized themselves andreached out to neighbors, finding notonly large numbers of supporters butsupporters who had specific expertisethey needed—including a firefighterwith hazmat experience and a busi-nessman knowledgeable about eco-nomic development. Their researchfound that the county had not updatedits comprehensive plan as required bystate law. When 200 supportersshowed up at a county meeting, with60 of them signed up to speak, theofficials decided to hear from theneighborhood’s selected speakers,who covered the group’s key points.The media were also there and muchof the press attention focused on asign held by two Montvale children—“Keep our children safe.” The countyPlanning Commission voted down theindustrial park plan, and the countysupervisors supported their recom-mendation. The Montvale group hascontinued to be a force in local landuse, contacting and giving advice toother resident groups facing spot zon-ing efforts by the county. They havebeen assured by county staff that, forthe foreseeable future, the countyplans to “leave Montvale alone.”

WASHINGTON◆ At the end of April, the Washingtonstate legislature passed the Children’sPesticide Right-to-Know Act – a majorvictory for children’s health. The actrequires that school districts post in-door and outdoor notices warning stu-dents and staff when pesticides areused and provide advance notificationto interested parents, and schools willbe required to publish an annual reporton their pesticide use. The Washing-ton Toxics Coalition had been push-ing for a parents right-to-know act forseveral years. Other groups thatworked hard to get this bill passed in-clude WashPIRG, the Lutheran PublicPolicy Office, Washington Conserva-tion Voters, League of Women Voters,and Washington State PTA. After thevote, Democratic representative MikeCooper, a cosponsor of the bill, said

that “Pesticides can cause cancer andother serious health problems. This is areally important step that will let parentsknow what their children are being ex-posed to at school.”

◆ People for Environmental Actionand Children’s Health (PEACH) held apress conference on April 3 in front of theSpokane Municipal Waste to Energy In-cinerator to announce the release of Be-hind Closed Doors. Next to arepresentation of a closed boardroomdoor, PEACH members spoke to a crowdof women and children about the need forthe EPA to release the Dioxin Reassess-ment. Standing in a gentle snowfall,Brightspirit, the president of PEACH, said,“If you could see dioxin, this is what itwould be like everyday.”

◆ Over 500 Thurston County resi-dents came to a school auditorium inlate March to oppose a proposedsludge facility in the community. Thesite of the proposed facility was previ-ously the site of an illegal sludge op-eration, which was shut down in theearly 1990s. Opponents of the sludgefacility continue to meet, to pressurethe county government for answers,and to research the backers of thesludge plan.

WISCONSIN◆ Stop Unnecessary Road Expan-sion (SURE), the Sierra Club of Wis-consin, and Citizens for a Better



MORE ON THE DANGERS OFMERCURY

AO

H

recent study by the Centers for Disease Con-trol Blood and Hair Mercury Levels in YoungChildren and Women of Childbearing Age—United States, 1999 tested the blood, urine, and

hair of women and children for mercury. The studyshowed that one in ten women in this country have levelsof mercury in their bodies high enough to cause neuro-logical effects in their offspring. That puts the number ofbabies at risk in the U.S. at about 395,000 per year. (Reportavailable at www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm5008a2.htm)

The Environmental Working Group (EWG) has re-leased Brain Food: What Women Should Know About Mer-cury Contamination of Fish. Brain Food warns that govern-ment recommendations are completely inadequate toprevent pregnant women from exposing their fetuses todangerous amounts of mercury. EWG recommends thatpregnant women not eat any quantity of thirteen types offish and strictly limit consumption of ten others, includingcanned tuna. EWG points out that the government’s rec-ommendations for pregnant women are based on calcula-tions appropriate for a 150-pound man and fail to takeinto account the amount of mercury already in our bodies.(Summary of the report available at www.ewg.org/pub/home/reports/brainfood/execsumm.html.)

RESOURCES FROM HCWHCWH and the American College of Nurse-Midwives have just published Green Birthdays.Green Birthdays developed out of concern thatinfants, the most vulnerable population, were

being exposed to chemicals and products that could besafely and cost-effectively replaced. We examine productsand practices, suggest more environmentally sound alter-natives, and address other areas in which health care pro-viders can improve their environmental performance. Weexplain how new parents can put together a green nurs-ery in their home and offer suggestions on non-toxic fur-nishings and carpets. Copies of Green Birthdays are avail-able through Health Care Without Harm’s websitewww.noharm.org or by calling Jolie Patterson at 703-237-2249, ext. 26.

HCWH’s Anti-Incinerator/Alternative TechnologyWorkgroup has produced the Toolkit for Community Activ-ists: How to Shut Down a Medical Waste Incinerator. If you

would like a free copy of the Toolkit, contact CherylHolzmeyer at the Washington Toxics Coalition [email protected] or 216-632-1545, ext. 11.

POLLUTION PREVENTIONne of the key ways that HCWH works on alocal level is through its Pollution Prevention(P2) workgroup. The P2 workgroup is a col-laboration of organizers who work in cities

throughout the country. These organizers targethealthcare insiders and work with hospital systems toimplement waste volume and toxicity reduction pro-grams, mercury elimination programs, and environmen-tally preferable purchasing programs. They also organizeconferences and trainings with the goal of educatinghealthcare providers and frontline healthcare workersabout ways in which they can help their hospitals savemoney and become more environmentally responsible.The target locales for 2001 include Maine, Boston, NewYork, Philadelphia, Washington, DC, Chicago, Minneapo-lis/Duluth, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Portland, OR.Target cities are chosen by two criteria: they must have aflame to fan (i.e., a dedicated organizer or a hospital sys-tem that has made overtures about pursuing HCWH’sagenda) and have potential to ‘move the market.’ Wechose Philadelphia, for example, for the prestige of itsmedical institutions; if those institutions could make sig-nificant progress, they could serve as role models forother medical facilities across the country and around theworld.

This winter the P2 workgroup celebrated one of itsmost significant accomplishments. In March, the MaineHospital Association, the Maine Department of Environ-mental Protection and Health Care Without Harm signedan agreement modeled on the 1998 national Memoran-dum of Understanding (MOU) between the U.S. EPA andthe American Hospital Association (AHA). The MOUcommitted AHA’s member hospitals to a voluntary pro-gram to reduce infectious waste by 33 percent by 2005 and50 percent by 2010 and to eliminate mercury within theirmember institutions by the year 2005. The Maine agree-ment expanded on this commitment by delineating morespecific mercury reduction goals and including languageabout phasing out the use of polyvinyl chloride (PVC)medical products. The agreement sets a precedent forother state hospital associations—and opens the door tomoving similar agreements through a number of ‘target’cities and states. ◆

HEALTH CARE WITHOUT HARM

C A M P A I G N P A G E


Summer 2001 19

DIOXIN REASSESSMENT ON ITSWAY!

OOn April 3, the Stop Dioxin Exposure Campaign re-leased Behind Closed Doors, which details the chemi-cal industry’s attempts to prevent the release of theDioxin Reassessment and weaken the POPs treaty.The report is available online at http://www.chej.org/BehindClosedDoors.html.For a print copy, call CHEJ at 703-237-2249.

O

n June 1, the fate of the EPA’s Dioxin Reassess-ment landed in the hands of AdministratorChristie Whitman. This is a huge victory! Thisends seven years of scientific peer review, a

process that was held up largely due to industry pressure.The EPA is now poised to put the finishing touches on theReassessment and release this important public healthdocument to the American people before the end of thesummer. In the letter sent to Administrator Whitman, theScience Advisory Board (SAB) recommends that theagency “proceed expeditiously” to complete and releasethe Dioxin Reassessment. The SAB also encourages theEPA to “limit emissions and human exposure…in view ofthe very long biological and environmental persistence ofthese chemicals.”

The SAB Executive Committee also announced that itwill launch an investigation into the Dioxin ReassessmentReview Subcommittee and their review process. The pro-cess has come under scrutiny from congressional repre-sentatives, who sent a letter to SAB Executive CommitteeChair Dr. William Glaze asking that the EPA be allowed tomove forward and release the Dioxin Reassessment by theend of the summer. The subcommittee’s report was filledwith bias and inconsistencies. Research by the Stop Di-oxin Exposure Campaign revealed that one-third of thepanel members had taken funds from ninety-one compa-nies that would be adversely affected by strong regula-tions to reduce dioxin emissions.

BUSH SIGNS GLOBAL TREATY TOELIMINATE DIOXIN

n May 23 in Stockholm, the U.S. joined 120other nations in signing the Convention onPersistent Organic Pollutants (known as thePOPs Treaty). The treaty bans or places tough

restrictions on twelve of the most highly toxic and persis-tent chemicals known and calls for the reduction andeventual elimination of dioxin. The Bush administrationhad announced a month earlier that it intended to signthe treaty—a move intended to placate critics of its envi-ronmental record. To show its commitment to the treaty,the administration will need to 1) send it to the Senatepromptly for ratification; 2) cooperate with EuropeanUnion and Canada in providing financial and technical

assistance for developing countries to implement thetreaty; and 3) support efforts to screen additional chemi-cals for inclusion in the treaty.

The signing of the treaty is a victory for communitygroups across the country who are fighting to end dioxinexposure. Thanks to all of you who have lobbied withyour feet, your voice, and your computer to make this astrong treaty.

DIOXIN STILL IN OUR FOOD ATLEVELS THAT CAUSE HARM

According to a new study published in the Jour-nal of Toxicology and Environmental Health, theamount of dioxin in U.S. food has remained atthe same dangerous level it was more than a

decade ago. The study, led by Dr. Arnold Schecter at theUniversity of Texas, Houston School of Public Health,found that nursing infants are getting thirty-five to sixty-five times the level recommended by the World HealthOrganization. The study—“Intake of Dioxins and RelatedCompounds from Food in the US Population”—is the firstnationwide study of dioxin in U.S. foods.

JOHN GRAHAM—A CRUMBYCHOICE FOR TOP REGULATOR

Dcontinued on page 21

BEHIND CLOSED DOORS!

uring the week of April 23, the Stop DioxinExposure Campaign called on the Senate Gov-ernment Affairs Committee to oppose the con-firmation of John Graham to head the Office

of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) within theOffice of Management and Budget (OMB). To call atten-tion to Graham’s pro-industry record, community groupsfrom across the country flooded the members of the Sen-

STOP DIOXIN EXPOSUREC A M P A I G N P A G E



NEXT STEPS IN CAMPAIGN WORK“Parents in Leominster, Massachusetts (“ThePlastics City”) won a major victory recently when

the School Board voted 7-2 in opposition of re-opening a middle school in a converted office

building just 300 feet from a closed municipallandfill, formerly a Superfund site. The school was

shut down a year ago when methane levels werefound in the surrounding soil above safe standards.The town mayor and building owner were pushingto re-open the school and an intense overcrowdingproblem within the city’s schools made the parent’schoices and challenges very difficult. Nevertheless,

precaution won.

“I was able to attend the final School Board voteand presented all 9 School Board members with the

Poisoned Schools report. The legitimacy of ournational and the fledgling statewide campaign to

prevent schools from being sited within 1000 feet ofa landfill gave the ‘fence-sitters’ on the Board

something to hold onto. It was perfect timing. Therelease of the report and the article in the Boston

Globe were what initially caused the parents to giveus a call and ask for help. Cheers to all involved.”

—Bernadette Del Chiaro,Toxics Action Center, Boston, MA

C

T

POISONED SCHOOLS REPORT RECEIVES MASSIVE MEDIA ATTENTIONongratulations and a big Thank You! to every-one who assisted in the release of the PoisonedSchools: Invisible Threats, Visible Actions report.

The stories about the need to protect children at schoolfrom environmental chemicals spread like wildfire acrossthe country.◆ There were sixty-seven organizations in thirty-onestates that released the report. Some groups did a pressbriefing or release while others held protest actions intheir communities or at the state capital.◆ The news coverage was spectacular with coverage na-tionwide. There were over 100 interviews from large andsmall media outlets—too many to list here. But to giveyou a sense of the reach, here are some highlights:

he campaign consists of four committees, eachwith its own work plan. The Poisoned Schoolsreport, for example, was the work of the Con-taminated Schools and Pesticides Committee.

The committees are open to others in the network thatwould like to participate.

◆ Air Committee—Addresses indoor and outdoorair contamination issues, including mold, carpets,ventilation, products such as cleaning agents, air qual-ity in portable classrooms, and chemicals from othersources. Diesel-fueled buses parked near areas wherechildren stand or near air intake vents are also of con-cern.◆ Pesticides Committee—Addresses pesticide useand notification in school buildings and on grounds.Campaign members have adopted model policies,which groups are introducing at the local and statelevels. The committee is working at the federal levelto pass the School Environmental Protection Act.◆ Contaminated Schools Committee—Addressesthe location of new and existing schools near knowncontaminated sites, such as landfills, and sources ofcontamination from local industrial complexes.◆ Healthy Building Materials—Addresses the pur-chasing of environmentally safe school materials forrenovation/expansion, new buildings, and products.

National television—Good Morning America, Today,World News Tonight, NBC Nightly News and Court TV.National Newspapers—New York Times, USA Today, Wash-ington Post, Boston Globe, Newsday, Seattle Times, San Fran-cisco Chronicle, New York Daily News and Education Week.Regional and local media outlets covering the stories in-cluded the Providence Journal, RI.; Peoria Times, AZ.; Herald,WA.; Los Angeles Daily News, CA; Capital Weekly, ME;Elmira Star Gazette, NY; WB39, Houston, TX.

The campaign worked to connect journalists with lo-cal struggles to give groups a tool to put pressure on deci-sion-makers. For that reason, the news reports focusednot on comments by “experts” but on the local groupsthemselves.

CHILD PROOFING OUR COMMUNITIES

C A M P A I G N P A G E


Summer 2001 21

STOP DIOXIN EXPOSUREcontinued from page 19

Each committee holds one or two conference calls amonth to move the committee work forward. Each lastsno more than one hour and does not cost participantsanything. However, you must share in the work thatneeds to be done.

WHAT DO COMMITTEE MEMBERS DO?◆ Comment, write, review, or brainstorm ideas for re-

sources, activities, publications, and how to networkwith others to move the committee’s goals forward.

◆ Help with school-based surveys on pesticide usage,the location of new schools in your area or state, andplaces where renovations or expansions will be takingplace.

◆ Write letters to legislators to support policy initiativesand other campaign actions

Get involved in this important campaign and work withus to protect our children from chemicals in their schoolenvironments! ◆

ACTION LINEcontinued from page 17

ate Government Affairs Committee with boxes of GrahamCrackers that contained the message “John GRAHAM is aCRUMBY choice for OIRA.”

Research by the Stop Dioxin Exposure Campaignfound that during his tenure on the EPA’s Science Advi-sory Board (SAB) Dioxin Review Committee, Graham re-ceived funding from sixty dioxin-polluting industries, in-cluding chemical manufacturers, incineration companies,pulp and paper companies, the petroleum industry, andcoal- and oil-based utilities. As a member of that commit-tee, Graham constantly argued that dioxin is not a knownhuman carcinogen. This effort to keep from the public thelink between dioxin and cancer has been at the forefrontof the chemical industry’s agenda for a number of years,even though numerous independent and internationalagencies have concluded that dioxin is a human carcino-gen.

The Office of Information and Regulatory Affairsplays a critical role in shaping environmental policies. Ifconfirmed, Graham would have the discretion to blocknew standards or rules on industrial chemicals, fueleconomy, and air and water pollution.

Unfortunately, in mid-May, the Senate GovernmentAffairs Committee voted 9-3 in favor of Graham for thepost. However, Senator Durban (D—Ill.) is calling for avote in front of the full Senate, and with the shift in powerin the Senate to the Democrats, there is still a chance thathis nomination will not go through. ◆

Environment were joined by two TV stations and six newspa-pers in the May 7 Tour de Sprawl. The tour, attacking pro-sprawlpolicies in Wisconsin, focused on the area where SURE hasbeen fighting Wisconsin Department of Transportation (WDOT)plans to make Highway 164 a divided, four-lane superhighway.The tour gave the press a look at the massive development informerly rural and small town areas spurred by the four-lanehighway and included a stop at a fifth-generation family farm,which would be demolished if WDOT’s plans move forward. Thefinal stop of the tour was Ralph Williams’ home in the historiccommunity of Ackerville, where two nearby leaking landfills havecontaminated the WDOT’s proposed site for a bridge—and Mr.Williams’ well. Analysis done for SURE by Dr. John Thresher,Ph.D., a professional soil and water scientist, has shown that thewater contains arsenic, lead, trichlorethylene (TCE) and othertoxic chemicals. Mr. Williams’ wife died of cancer, and Mr. Will-iams no longer drinks from the well.

NOVA SCOTIA◆ In a dramatic attempt to pressure Canada’s government torelocate residents living near the Sydney Tar Ponds, Canada’sworst toxic waste site, the executive director of the Sierra Clubof Canada Elizabeth May started a hunger strike on May 2. Sheended it seventeen days later when the Canadian health ministerannounced that the government would support testing of thearea and of the population and relocate families at risk. TheSydney Steel Mill and its coal processing plant left over a milliontons of toxic waste in the area, including 40,000 tons of PCBs. Arecently released study undertaken by a consortium of four com-panies found extremely high levels of heavy metals and cancer-causing chemicals. The level of arsenic was seventy times thefederal limit. Twenty thousand people live less than a kilometerfrom the coal site or the tar ponds, an area with one of the high-est rates of cancer in Canada and abnormally high rates of birthdefects and miscarriages.

MEXICO◆ In May, a circuit court judge ruled that evidence that Guerreroactivists Rodolfo Montiel Flores and Teodoro Cabrera Garcíawere tortured by the Mexican army must be considered by theoriginal judge and sent their case back to him. In May 1999, thearmy illegally arrested and detained the men. Based on thestatements they made under prolonged torture, Montiel andCabrera were convicted last year on weapons and drug chargesand received long prison sentences. Montiel was awarded theGoldman Environmental Prize for North America in 2000 for hisrole in organizing campesinos against Boise Cascade’s loggingin the Petatlán area. ◆

CHEJ was very sorry to learn of the death of Floridaactivist Carol Riley. Carol took on incinerator andmining issues and helped us host a leadership devel-opment conference in the 1980s. Carol would neveraccept “No” from her opponents and never say“No” to friends asking for help. We’ll miss her.



RESOURCES◆ Polluting Our Future: Chemical Pollution in theU.S. that Affects Child Development and Learningdocuments the scope, nature, and sources of in-dustrial chemical emissions in the U.S. that po-tentially impact child development. Based onconservative data from the Na-tional Academy of Sciences, theauthors conclude that at least onein every two hundred children cur-rently suffers a developmental or neurological disorderproduced by exposure to toxic chemicals. The authorsanalyze data from the federal Toxics Release Inventory toprovide detailed statistical summaries on the chemicalsthat are being released, including state rankings by airemissions and water discharges, the 100 worst countiesfor toxic emissions, rankings by industry and facilities,and the percentage of African-Americans in the top 25polluting counties. Polluting Our Future provides a thor-ough overview of the threat posed to our children by in-dustrial chemicals. (National Environmental Trust, Physi-cians for Social Responsibility, Learning DisabilitiesAssociation of America, 2000, 31 pp.; tables, notes; avail-able online at www.safekidsinfo.org)

◆ In Why Poison Ourselves? A Precautionary Approach toSynthetic Chemicals, Anne Platt McGinn provides a lucidintroduction to the health and environmental risks posedby persistent organic pollutants (POPs). Arguing thatchemical-by-chemical regulation is inadequate, McGinndraws effectively on recent research to build a strong casefor production processes that are not dependent on syn-thetic chemicals. McGinn looks at the use of chlorine inpaper production, the reliance on pesticides in agricul-ture, and the use of chlorine and phthalates in the produc-tion of PVC and argues that in all three cases alternativepractices and materials are currently available that wouldeliminate or drastically reduce the use of toxic chemicals.(Worldwatch Institute, 2000, 92 pp.; figures, notes; orderby phone at 800-555-2028 or online atwww.worldwatch.org)

◆ Reclaiming the Environmental Debate: The Politics ofHealth in a Toxic Culture is an exceptionally stimulatingcollection of essays on the ideology and practices of con-temporary environmentalism, with contributions fromboth academics and activists. Editor Richard Hofrichterhas arranged the essays into three sections. The first ad-dresses the assumptions and limitations of current publicpolicy approaches to protecting human health and the en-vironment and includes essays on safety regulations inthe workplace, risk assessment, and urban redevelop-ment; the second addresses how corporations use publicrelations campaigns to shape public opinion and domi-nate policy debates; the third presents case studies of

community resistance to toxic pollution.The third section is the shortest sec-

tion of the book and hardly doesjustice to the scope and creativityof current grassroots activism. Theessays are rich in detail—bothabout the problems of toxic pollu-

tion that communities face andabout the communities themselves.

The writing is probing and critical—not only of official ap-proaches but those of environmental activists as well.Taken as a whole, the volume presents a powerful argu-ment for an environmental health movement that moredirectly challenges the corporate system of production andaims at more comprehensive social change. (MIT Press,2000, 356 pp.; notes, bibliography, index)

◆ Project Censored’s annual review of important storiessuppressed by the corporate media makes it possible forthe work of the alternative press to reach a much wideraudience. Among the biggest stories in Censored 2001 areseveral on health and environmental issues—the dangersof genetically altered foods, the passage of extended pro-ducer responsibility laws in Europe, the EPA’s toxic pollu-tion, and the health risks posed by low-level exposures tochemicals (described in an EBY report, Summer 2000). Thistwenty-fifth anniversary edition includes summaries of thetop ten stories featured each year since the publication be-gan in 1976, essays documenting mainstream media biasand tracking media ownership, and a resource guide toalternative publications and media organizations. (SevenStories Press, 2001, 381pp; index)

◆ No one does a better job of exposing corporate propa-ganda than Sheldon Rampton and John Stauber, authors ofToxic Sludge is Good for You! In their new book Trust Us,We’re Experts! they look at how the public relations indus-try uses the “third party technique” to promote corporateproducts and discredit public health and environmentaladvocates. By enlisting scientists and other credentialed“authorities” to produce research tailored to corporateneeds and smear critics’ work as “junk science,” PR firmshave successfully downplayed the hazards of tobacco, car-cinogenic chemicals, even global warming. Rampton andStauber show that through funding of university researchand sponsorship of conferences, corporations have gainedincreasing control over both what scientists do and whatresearch becomes public knowledge. An invaluable guideto the PR firms, corporate front groups, and conservativethink tanks behind the “independent experts,” Trust Us,We’re Experts! raises disturbing questions about the role ofpublic relations in a democracy and the influence of moneyand ideology on the practice of science. (Jeremy P. Tarcher/Putnam, 2001, 360 pp.; notes, index)


Summer 2001 23

WITH SPECIAL THANKS

The Center for Health, Environment and Justice remains an advocate, educator, organizer and leader in themovement for health and environmental justice through the generous support of our members, Partners,Guardians and key foundations and institutions. CHEJ would like to acknowledge the following individualsand institutions who made critically important donations to support our work between March 1, 2001 and

May 31, 2001. Our members number in the hundreds, and are therefore too many to name. However, each gift, no matterwhat the size, is very much appreciated.

INDIVIDUALDONORS

PARTNERS’ CIRCLE

(gifts of $100-999)…partners in a movementof people and communitiescommitted to protectingpublic health and the envi-ronment.

NEIGHBORHOOD ADVOCATES

George & Elizabeth MartinMichael McCally, M.D.

FAMILY PROTECTORS

Mary S. CooperJudi FriedmanSteven HillKenneth & Katherine

Mountcastle

HEALTH DEFENDERS

Anonymous DonorsMeredith BrennanJerry BrownPaul & Michelle CooperLynn CorcoranRobert D. DeboltEllen EdmundsonDana EvansDavid FallowEugene & Jane FosterLeonard FremontGary & Cynthia GillenClifford & Marilyn GraceyArthur & Patricia GreyBarbara HolmanChen Yu HuMarco KaltofenKurt KieblerMarc Lavietes, M.D.

Murray & Addie LevineTim LockhartDan MacDougallBarbara MayKaren MilesDavid MillikenMelinda O’BrienDavid OzonoffZoe RothchildAndris SalterRon Simon & Diane FuchsM. SmithBeatrice SpezialeMark StemenStanley & Susan TomkielMartha Vinick

IN MEMORIUM

Ida Rita Rose Ruf Baum

COMMUNITYGROUP DONORS

Environmental HealthCoalition (CA)

Group Against Gas (PA)Northwest Coalition for

Alternatives to Pesticides(OR)

Ohio Valley EnvironmentalCoalition (WV)

Safe Sites 4 Children (CA)Safer Pest Control Project

(IL)Sustainable Resources (MN)Women’s Community

Cancer Project (MA)

CORPORATEDONORS

Edmonson ProfessionalNursing Services (FL)

◆ While reading Rampton and Stauber, take a look at theIntegrity in Science web site just set up by the Center forScience in the Public Interest. The site contains a search-able database for tracking the corporate funding of scien-tists working in the fields of nutrition, medicine, and theenvironment. The Integrity in Science Project also pro-vides information on the funding of professional andhealth associations. (At www.cspinet.org/integrity/)

◆ The Scorecard web site, a project of Environmental De-fense, makes available to the public a wealth of environ-mental information by location. Users type in their zipcode to get the local facts about air and water quality,superfund sites, toxic releases, and lead hazards. The sitealso provides information on the distribution of environ-mental burdens by race/ethnicity, income, poverty level,

education, home ownership, and occupation—makingthis a crucial resource for environmental justice research.(At www.Scorecard.org)

◆ Greenpeace has issued another important report on thetoxic dangers of PVC. This Vinyl House: Hazardous Addi-tives in Vinyl Consumer Products and Home Furnishings callsattention to the risks posed by the use of phthalates andmetal stabilizers in common vinyl products around thehome, including furniture, wallpaper, floors, andchildcare items—all of which children come into contactwith every day. The report documents the levels of thesetoxic additives in PVC products, the presence of thesechemicals in humans, and potential adverse health effects.(Greenpeace, May 2001, 34 pp; appendixes, bibliography;available at www.greenpeaceusa.org/toxics/vinylhouse.htm) ◆

RESOURCEScontinued from page 22

A note on our mailing labels:Expires: [date]=Date subscription expiresLast or final issue=Time to renew your subscription

CHEJP.O.Box 6806Falls Church, VA 22040(703) 237-2249

Non-Profit Org.U.S.Postage PaidMerrifield, VAPermit No. 6484

Poisoned Schools: Invisible Threats, VisibleActions addresses the risks our childrenface at school from environmental toxins.The report

◆ examines children’s specialvulnerability to chemical exposure

◆ highlights examples of schoolsaround the U.S. built oncontaminated land and providesguidelines for ensuring that newschools are not constructed onabandoned landfills or near heavilypolluting industries

◆ documents the threat posed by theuse of pesticides in our schools andexplains the principles of integratedpest management

79 pages, $10.00A User’s Guide to the report is alsoavailable.To order, call 703-237-2249

E veryone’s Backyard - Home - Center for Health ...chej.org/wp-content/uploads/summer2001.pdfE veryone’s B ackyard The Journal of the Grassroots Movement for Environmental Justice

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