National EJ Tour Brings
Message of Pollution Solutions to Alabama
for more information:
Elizabeth Crowe 859-200-8207
Rufus Kinney 256-435-4743
Rev. Henry Sterling 256-239-0103
for
immediate release, Wednesday, September 27, 2006
NATIONAL ENVIRONMENTAL
JUSTICE TOUR BRINGS MESSAGE OF POLLUTION SOLUTIONS TO ALABAMA
Environmental
organizers, attorneys and biologists from the Southeast U.S. gathered
in Anniston, Alabama today to meet with area residents as part of the
national Environmental Justice for
All Tour. The purpose of the tour is to lift up the voices of
communities suffering from disproportionate environmental health
impacts and discuss the solutions for protecting public health over
corporate profit.
Rev. Henry Sterling, with the Alabama Chapter of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, welcomed the tour group and presented a brief summary of Anniston's legacy of industrial and military pollution, including that of PCBs and toxics from the Anniston Army Depot. The stories sounded familiar to Christine Bennett, resident of Mossville, Louisiana, who joined the tour to meet others working for environmental justice. Mossville residents have blood levels of dioxin--the sources of which are polyvinyl chloride facilities--that are 60 times the national average. "Our communities are sick and dying but we are not silent and when we stand together we can bring change," Bennett said.
Hilton Kelley, tour participant from Port Arthur, Texas, said that one way communities can hold industry and military polluters accountable is through advanced air monitoring systems. Kelley, a certified operator of Cerex infrared air monitors, shared his experience using the Cerex UV Hound monitor to prove the existence of toxic pollutants from oil refineries, power plants and chemical plants when industry environmental regulators claimed there was none. "If chemical companies and military installations are so convinced that they are not polluting the air," Kelley asked, "then why are they so afraid of using better air monitors?"
Elizabeth Crowe, tour participant with the Chemical Weapons Working Group, noted that such monitors could be used at the Anniston Army Depot to add a layer of protection between incinerator smoke stacks and storage igloos and the community. "In order to provide maximum protection as dictated by law, the Army owes it to the community to install the most advanced air monitors available," Crowe said.
After leaving Alabama, the tour will proceed to communities in Tennessee, Kentucky and West Virginia before ending in Washington DC on October 1. The tour consists of two other simultaneous routes in the Northeast and on the West Coast. Monique Harden, New Orleans, attorney with the group Advocates for Environmental Human Rights, explained that although communities all over the country are experiencing health problems from a wide range of pollution sources, there is unity in the need to find solutions and address the root causes of on-going contamination, "These communities prove that environmental protection is a myth in the United States. The system is broken and must be fixed and Congress is responsible for doing it," Harden said.
Rev. Henry Sterling, with the Alabama Chapter of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, welcomed the tour group and presented a brief summary of Anniston's legacy of industrial and military pollution, including that of PCBs and toxics from the Anniston Army Depot. The stories sounded familiar to Christine Bennett, resident of Mossville, Louisiana, who joined the tour to meet others working for environmental justice. Mossville residents have blood levels of dioxin--the sources of which are polyvinyl chloride facilities--that are 60 times the national average. "Our communities are sick and dying but we are not silent and when we stand together we can bring change," Bennett said.
Hilton Kelley, tour participant from Port Arthur, Texas, said that one way communities can hold industry and military polluters accountable is through advanced air monitoring systems. Kelley, a certified operator of Cerex infrared air monitors, shared his experience using the Cerex UV Hound monitor to prove the existence of toxic pollutants from oil refineries, power plants and chemical plants when industry environmental regulators claimed there was none. "If chemical companies and military installations are so convinced that they are not polluting the air," Kelley asked, "then why are they so afraid of using better air monitors?"
Elizabeth Crowe, tour participant with the Chemical Weapons Working Group, noted that such monitors could be used at the Anniston Army Depot to add a layer of protection between incinerator smoke stacks and storage igloos and the community. "In order to provide maximum protection as dictated by law, the Army owes it to the community to install the most advanced air monitors available," Crowe said.
After leaving Alabama, the tour will proceed to communities in Tennessee, Kentucky and West Virginia before ending in Washington DC on October 1. The tour consists of two other simultaneous routes in the Northeast and on the West Coast. Monique Harden, New Orleans, attorney with the group Advocates for Environmental Human Rights, explained that although communities all over the country are experiencing health problems from a wide range of pollution sources, there is unity in the need to find solutions and address the root causes of on-going contamination, "These communities prove that environmental protection is a myth in the United States. The system is broken and must be fixed and Congress is responsible for doing it," Harden said.
--30--
For
more information on the tour go to www.EJ4all.org.
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