GROUPS TAKE THEIR CASE AGAINST ENVIRONMENTAL RACISM TO THE UNITED NATIONS COMMISSION ON HUMAN RIGHTS ATLANTA, GA, May 24, 1999- An eight-member delegation of African American environmental justice organizers, activists, lawyers, and educators traveled to Geneva, Switzerland and appeared before the United Nations Commission on Human Rights. The environmental justice leaders presented findings that highlight environmental racism in Louisiana's petrochemical corridor, an area that is commonly referred to as " Cancer Alley." In their view , environmental racism is a human rights violation and illegally deprives U.S. citizens of color and indigenous people their economic, social, and cultural rights. The groups sought support from the international community to combat the evils of environmental racism in the United States. The delegation included the following members: Elodia M. blanco, Concerned Citizens of Agricultural Street Landfill (New Orleans, LA), Monique Harden, Earthjustice Legal Defense Fund (New Orleans, LA), Margie Richard, Concerned Citizens of Norco (Norco, LA), Deborah Robinson, International Possibilities Unlimited (Washington, DC), Douglas Scott, International human Rights Law Group (Washington, DC), Haki M.D. Vincent, concerned Citizens of Mossville (Lake Charles, LA), and Beverly Wright, Deep South Center for Environmental Justice, Xavier University of Louisiana (New Orleans, LA).
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United Nations Commission on Human Rights
Fifty-Fifth SessionAgenda Item No. 10
ORAL INTERVENTION by the International Human Rights Law Group: a non-governmental organization in special consultative status with the ECOSOC with statements from:
Monique Harden, Dr. Beverly Wright, Monique Harden,
Margie Richard, Elodia M. Blanco, and Haki M.D. Vincent
Statement By
Monique Harden
at the
United Nations Commission on Human Rights
55th Session April 1999ORAL INTERVENTION by the International Human Rights Law Group: a non-governmental organization in special consultative status with the ECOSOC
Thank you, Madame Chair:
I am speaking on behalf of the International Human Rights Law Group and other U.S. non-governmental organizations that have come to this Commission to seek support from the international community. We seek to highlight environmental racism in the United States of America as a human rights violation that deprives U.S. citizens of color and indigenous people of their economic, social and cultural rights.The Law Group welcomes the Commission's and other existing United Nations' mechanisms designed to address racism and toxic polluting around the world: the Special Rapporteur on Contemporary Forms of Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance; his annual reports and country missions; the Commission's annual resolutions on Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and related Intolerance; the Special Rapporteur on the Adverse Effects of the Illicit Movement and Dumping of Toxic and Dangerous Products and Wastes; her annual reports and country missions; the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination; and the Commission's decision to convene a World Conference Against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance no later than 2001.
Environmental racism refers to any government action or failure to act that has a negative environmental impact which disproportionately disadvantages -- whether intentionally or unintentionally -- individuals, groups, or communities based on race or color. For a disproportionate percentage of racial minorities in the United States, environmental racism imposes severe deprivations, such as shorter life spans, higher infant mortality rates, higher health care expenses, poverty, poor housing, and an overall degraded quality of life -- and many of the most severe deprivations are found through examining the lives of women of color.
This afternoon, one of our USA government representatives made a statement on agenda item no. 10, in which he said, and I quote, "No society can be economically, socially and culturally healthy which does not promote equality, does not ensure the rule of law for everyone, does not protect children, does not provide access to education and medical care, does not respect the environment, and does not offer a safety net and a path to advancement for the poorest segments of the population."
Although our government purports to have achieved these noble goals, the reality is that U.S. government policies and practices fail to promote economically, socially, and culturally healthy communities for people of color and poor people. In the United States, polluting industries, toxic waste sites, incinerators, oil exploration, and mining operations are concentrated in communities that are predominantly African American, indigenous, Latino, and Asian American.The U.S. government routinely approves the growth and expansion of these industries without regard for their proximity to or impact on residential areas that are majority people of color. The U.S. government has proven to be resistant to enforcing laws and unwilling to protect communities of color from industrial pollution.
Three out of five African Americans live in communities with uncontrolled toxic waste sites. Three of the five largest commercial hazardous waste landfills are located in predominantly African American or Latino communities. Environmental hazards, such as uranium mining, threaten the very survival and culture of Native Americans, while 270,000 Latino migrant workers are poisoned each year from dangerous pesticides. The pervasive diseases associated with these conditions prevent people of color from full enjoyment of the highest attainable sustainable standard of physical and mental health as recognized by the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, which the U.S. has failed to ratify, and the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, which the U.S. ratified in 1994 but has yet to comply.
African American communities in the southern region of the United States, Latino communities along the U.S.-Mexico border, Native American reservations, and urban ghettos suffer disproportionately. Two examples are Louisiana's petrochemical corridor, a predominantly African American community along the lower Mississippi River appropriately named Cancer Alley, and the mineral extraction region on or near Navajo and Hopi reservations in New Mexico and Arizona.
Communities of color suffer increasing poverty as a result of industrial exploitation of the environment. The wealth of communities of color decline as residents with the financial means move away to escape industrial pollution, and property values plummet. As a consequence, the economic viability of these communities and potential for growth are grossly diminished, while polluting industries expand and continue to maintain these racist practices domestically and globally.
And, finally, environmental racism is also destroying the culture and society of communities of color. In rural communities, people of color have lost the ability to sustain their families in the cultural traditions, such as hunting, fishing, and farming. Polluting industries have even uprooted communities of color. For example, in the State of Louisiana, several African American communities, each established more than 100 years ago, were forced to move because of toxic industrial facilities.
Madame Chair:
Therefore, we urge the Commission on Human Rights to examine human rights violations in the United States that constitute environmental racism by expanding the mandate of the Special Rapporteur on Toxic Waste and Dumping to include industrial nations. We urge the Commission on Human Rights to consider a mission to the U.S. by the Special Rapporteur on Toxic Waste and Dumping to examine the economic, political and social hardships for people of color.Further, we urge the Commission on Human Rights with regard to the World Conference Against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance to authorize a global study on environmental racism for the World Conference and to expressly include environmental racism as an agenda item for the World Conference.
Statement By
Dr. Beverly Wright
at the
United Nations Commission on Human Rights
55th Session April 1999My name is Dr. Beverly Wright and I am a Professor of Sociology and Director of the Deep South Center for Environmental Justice at Xavier University, in New Orleans, Louisiana.
Environmental racism in the United States is a byproduct of racial segregation and discrimination legitimated through the enactment of Jim Crow laws in the South that made all forms of segregation and discrimination legal in the southern United States. The disenfranchisement of a whole race of people was the law of the land and included discrimination in housing, education, public transportation, recreational facilities and restaurants, to name a few.
Environmental racism is part and parcel to the overall pattern and practices of racism and discrimination in the United States. As defined, environmental racism is discrimination in policy and enforcement of environmental laws and regulations that result in the disproportionate exposure to environmental pollutants by people of color. One effect of these policies has been the disproportionate citing of hazardous facilities in people of color communities. Hazardous waste dumps, incinerators and solid waste landfills are a common landscape. The air, water, and soil of these communities have been poisoned by a number of environmental pollutants related to industrialization. These communities are daily spewed with lead from smelters, dust from grain elevators, choked by fumes and kept awake at night by plumes generated from petrochemical plants.
Numerous studies, dating back to the seventies, reveal that low-income persons and people of color have borne greater health and environmental risk burdens than the society at large. Elevated public health risks are found in some populations even when social class is held constant. For example, race has been found to be independent of class in the distribution of air pollution, contaminated fish consumption, location of municipal landfills and incinerators, abandoned toxic waste dumps, cleanup of superfund sites, and lead poisoning in children.
The Mississippi River Chemical corridor in Louisiana, better known as Cancer Alley, challenges every environmental policy and regulation in the United States. For this reason, a closer examination of communities and their struggles in the corridor exemplifies most of the environmental struggles facing U.S. communities today. Indeed, the environmental problems in the Louisiana chemical corridor represent environmental struggles against multinational corporations that operate globally.
Cancer Alley
The Mississippi Chemical Corridor, an 85 mile stretch of land along the Mississippi River located between New Orleans and Baton Rouge, Louisiana is home to 136 petrochemical plants and six refineries. This industrial corridor produces 1/5 of the United States' petrochemicals. The air, ground and water along the corridor were so full of carcinogens that it was once described as a massive human experiment. This 85 mile stretch of plants and refineries transformed one of the poorest, slowest-growing sections of Louisiana into communities of brick houses and shopping centers, but not for the African Americans who had been there long before the chemical plants came. The narrow corridor absorbs more toxic substances than do most entire states. Poor African Americans living in small communities along the river bear the greatest burden of this pollution. Yet, they have benefited the least from its existence.In 1980, the Corridor was emitting as much as 700 million pounds of toxic chemicals into the air, water, and soil. Today, 12 parishes produce 82% of the 186,000,000 million pounds of chemicals released in the state. Eight of these parishes are in the corridor and are responsible for 79% of all chemicals released in the state.
The Mississippi River itself has been a major attractor for industry, but state industrial inducements that save companies millions of dollars in taxes have been the greatest attraction. A pattern of discrimination in the siting of polluting facilities has been noted in a report released by the Deep South Center for Environmental Justice at Xavier University in New Orleans, LA. A geographical information systems analysis (GIS) showing the spatial distribution of toxic release inventory (TRI reporting facilities), indicated that African Americans live closer to these more dangerously polluting facilities than do whites in seven out of nine of the river parishes, with 80% living within three miles of TRI facilities.
For example, the spatial distribution map for Ascension Parish shows high percentages of minority population concentrations on the west and southwest ends of the parish. There are two air pollution clusters in the parish. Each cluster has at least one site with very high emissions of over one million pounds of air releases. There are high percentages of minority populations in the neighborhood of the two clusters.
A linear regression model was built to demonstrate the relationship between the percentage of minority population and the distance to air pollution sites. An almost perfect linear relationship between percent minority and distance to air pollution sources. This means that as distance away from polluting industries increase, minority percentages decrease.
A review of cancer mortality data for all nine parishes shows excess cancer mortality for all but a very small number of cases. These statistics suggest a disturbing, but consistent pattern of negative health impacts for parishes along the Mississippi River Chemical Corridor where air pollution sources are most prevalent and toxic emissions are the highest in the state. These areas are also those where African Americans are over represented and thereby disproportionately impacted by air pollution sources.
Conclusion:
Just how bad is it living in the corridor?
In the words of Amos Favorite:
People in the community began to notice a few years after the plants came, that the metal screens on their windows that kept the mosquitoes and bugs out when the windows were open, were beginning to rust and fall from the windows every six months. They also observed spots on their cars where the paint was fading, but only on the side of the car nearest the chemical plant.And lastly, persons living in close proximity to toxic facilities have been trained to "shelter in place" as an emergency response to an accidental releases. Shelter in place is the government's response to the recurrent and unpredictable occurrences of environmental exposure due to chemical accidents. At its essence, "shelter in place" requires that in the wake of a chemical accident, a resident dash to their homes or the nearest shelter and tape shut all windows and doors to avoid exposure.
This approach is unacceptable and completely inadequate. That is, even if all windows and doors were sealed, the lack of adequate insulation and the existence of other pathways for air, renders this approach useless.In sum, where African Americans live in the Mississippi Chemical Corridor, is inundated with large expansive toxic facilities with huge TRI emissions. These neighborhoods are mostly fence line to toxic facilities. The housing is substandard and dilapidated. All of this on a backdrop of huge conveyor belts crossing River Road, connecting these facilities to the river.
In contrast, most white communities, even when they are not affluent, are farther away from toxic facilities than African Americans. However, when they are near a facility, they are buffered by a small fence line community that is mostly poor and African American. Most importantly, the facility that is in close proximity to the white community has very low TRI emissions. The trend seems to be that more affluent whites live in the cleanest areas possible even when an areas is inundated with toxic facilities.
Statement By
Monique Harden, Esq.
at the
United Nations Commission on Human Rights
55th Session AprilInternational Human Rights Law Group Briefing on Human Rights Violations in the United States
I am an attorney with the Earthjustice Legal Defense Fund in New Orleans, Louisiana, USA, which is a non-governmental organization and environmental law firm. I assist communities of color in their efforts to stop environmental racism. I have been personally involved in two legal cases that have extended the reach of U.S. domestic remedies for protecting communities of color. However, I am deeply troubled by a pattern of governmental actions that continue to foster environmental racism and limit the rights and freedoms of people of color.
In the United States, communities that are predominantly African American, Indigenous, Latino, and Asian American have become the literal dumping ground for deadly industrial toxic chemicals and the location of hazardous waste sites, incinerators, oil exploration, and mining operations. At great personal expense and on behalf of our families and communities of color throughout the U.S., we have traveled to the 55th Session of the United Nations Commission on Human Rights to bring international attention to the fact that the U.S. government has failed to enforce laws that would eliminate environmental racism and, in fact, has worked against the efforts of U.S. citizens of color that combat environmental racism. We seek international support in urging our U.S. government to broadly participate in the global effort to end environmental racism.
Sociology studies demonstrate that race, not educational background or wealth, is the single most determinative factor of where polluting industries locate. Three out of five African Americans live in communities with uncontrolled toxic waste sites. Three of the five largest commercial hazardous waste landfills are located in predominantly African American or Latino communities, together these landfills account for 40% of the total estimated landfill capacity in the U.S. Environmental hazards, such as uranium mining, threaten the very survival and culture of Indigenous People, while 270,000 Latino migrant farm workers are poisoned each year with dangerous pesticides.
These hazardous industrial operations have the approval of the U.S. government, which has proven to be resistant to enforcing the domestic law against permit violators and unwilling to protect people of color from recurring facility accidents that endanger their health and lives. In communities of color, the U.S. government typically does not solve the problems of contaminated water and soil, huge fires from facility smokestacks, and excessive toxic chemicals that make life unbearable. However, for predominantly Caucasian communities the government is more responsive in taking care of environmental problems.I NO GOVERNMENTAL PROTECTION FOR HEALTH & QUALITY OF LIFE
In the U.S., no remedy is provided for the pervasive health problems that exist in communities of color due to successful lobbying by industrial associations that weaken environmental protection. In many homes, you will find expensive prescription medicines and respiratory devices that help residents to breathe and cope with the daily poisoning from surrounding industries and waste sites. This is particularly alarming in the case of children living in industrialized communities, who are more vulnerable than adults to the toxic pollution that can impair their behavioral and physical development. In some communities, children are frequently rushed to hospitals because of chronic asthma attacks. These children also suffer from the side effects of steroids and other medication used to keep their lung passages open.There is no domestic remedy available in the U.S. that ensures a safe distance between residential areas and toxic facilities. In the communities of Mossville and Norco, Louisiana, for example, the government allows chemical facilities to spew millions of pounds of cancer-causing chemicals on an annual basis directly across the street from the homes of African Americans.
There is an overall degradation in quality of life in communities of color. People live in fear of recurring industrial facility explosions and accidental toxic spills and leaks. Communities that depend on seafood often witness fish kills caused by pollution in lakes and streams. Many residents become prisoners in their homes in order to escape the toxic fumes and loud facility operations that go on 24 hours a day.
In rural communities, the ability of people to sustain themselves in the tradition of their parents by hunting, fishing, and farming is eliminated by pollution. People of color have been physically displaced by polluting industries and, as a result, have forever lost the cultural and ancestral ties to their homelands. For example, in the State of Louisiana, African American residents in the communities of Reveilletown, Morrisonville, and Sunrise, were forced to move because of toxic industrial facilities. Industrial companies tore down every house, school and church in these communities. The communal bonds and heritage of these communities, which were established by former slaves more than a century ago, no longer exist.
Environmental racism also creates pervasive poverty in communities of color. In rural communities, people of color can no longer depend on the environment for sustenance. Families become more wage dependent, but are unable to find employment in their communities because their work experiences are not compatible with the technical jobs offered by the industrial companies. The wealth of communities of color declines as residents with the financial means move away to escape industrial pollution, and property values plummet.
It is clear that for communities of color human health and quality of life are subordinate to the industrial exploitation of the environment. Our government continues to deny that the concentration of toxic pollution in communities of color causes declining health. Our U.S. government has a pattern of reviewing health concerns raised by communities with callous skepticism, conducting health studies with poor research and data gathering, and in the end produce inconclusive health reports. In addition, our government also applies biased standards that places the burden on U.S. citizens of color to prove with absolute scientific certainty that excessive pollution in their community has caused a specific cancer, respiratory ailment, reproductive disorder, or other health problem. In this regard, the health problems suffered in communities of color are allowed to continue and worsen because the standard for government action is impossible to achieve.
U.S. government policies and practices fail to protect the health and safety in communities of color and, therefore, fail to meet international human rights laws and standards. Principles of the 1992 Rio Declaration, which was unanimously adopted, states that "Human beings are at the center of concerns for sustainable development. They are entitled to a healthy and productive life in harmony with nature." In addition, the Rio Declaration calls for the precautionary approach in order to protect the environment -- "where there are threats of serious or irreversible damage, lack of full scientific certainty shall not be used as a reason for postponing cost-effective measures to prevent environmental degradation."
The United States and over 150 other countries have ratified the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, which requires our U.S. government to implement at every level concrete legal protections that eliminate environmental racism suffered in our communities of color.
II. U.S. GOVERNMENT RESTRICTS POLITICAL FREEDOM
Nationwide, industrial pollution, race, and democratic freedom have a disturbing relationship. Government officials routinely subordinate citizens' human rights to industrial exploitation. For example, Governor Murphy "Mike" Foster, the highest official in Louisiana, approved his administration's threats to take away the nonprofit tax status from a non- governmental organization, the Louisiana Coalition for Tax Justice. Why? Because the organization wrote a letter in a newspaper that supported the predominantly African American community of Convent, Louisiana who opposed the siting of a petrochemical complex in their community. Governor Foster approved his administration's undercover investigations and compiling lists of non-governmental organizations that supported the African American community. He advocated that private contributions to a local university should stop because the university's law clinic was providing legal services to the Convent citizens' group. Foster was also instrumental in shaping new, oppressive rules promulgated by the Louisiana Supreme Court that deny community groups and many Louisiana citizens the legal assistance of all university law clinics in the state. A university law clinic provides free legal services, and is one of the few resources available to communities of color for judicial access and legal protection. The rules have been publicly criticized by civil rights, women's advocacy, environmental, religious, and other social justice organizations because they prohibit law clinics from helping all working class people in Louisiana.
Throughout the nation, people of color report intimidation tactics used by the government to keep them silent and limit their participation in deciding issues that impact their communities. But even more troubling is the hostile political backlash against establishing U.S. domestic remedies for environmental racism. In the past year and a half, the U.S. Congress, the national lawmaking body, has blocked people of color from raising complaints of environmental racism to governmental agencies. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency set a negative precedent that substantially weakens civil rights protections against environmental racism. Currently, the Environmental Protection Agency is developing rules that compromise the very civil rights laws against racism that have cost many U.S. citizens of color their lives.
The U.S. Constitution prohibits the government from undermining and restricting the freedom of speech and freedom of association. However, for communities of color, these constitutional mandates are routinely defied by the U.S. government. Moreover, the U.S. government's defiance is a violation of the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. These international laws impose an affirmative duty on our government to guarantee the indivisibility of all rights for people of color. There are numerous examples of our government defying these important laws in order to protect and facilitate the growth of polluting industries and waste sites.
We, therefore, urge the Commission on Human Rights with regard to the U.N. Third World Conference Against Racism to authorize a global study on environmental racism for the World Conference; explicitly include environmental racism as an agenda item for the World Conference; and urge the United States to submit its report to the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination that is now four years overdue. On behalf of people of color throughout the United States, who are suffering from environmental racism, we also request that the United Nations Commission on Human Rights to urge the United States to comply with all human rights laws and standards to which it is obligated.
Statement By
Margie Richard of the Concerned Citizens of Norco
at the
United Nations Commission on Human Rights
55th Session April 1999My name is Margie Eugene Richard, I am president of Concerned Citizens of Norco. My home town is located in the southeastern section of Louisiana along the Mississippi River. In 1926 the Royal Dutch Shell Company purchased 460 acres of the town called Sellers and began building its oil refinery. When Shell purchased the town of Sellers, which is now Norco, they displaced African American families from one section to another.
We are now surrounded by 27 petrochemical and oil refineries (and counting), refineries for which Norco received its name: Norco is an acronym for New Orleans Refinery Company. Our town is approximately one mile in radius and home to 5,000 residents. There are four streets near the plants occupied by African Americans, Washington, Cathy, Diamond, and East. My house is located on Washington Street and is only 3 meters away from the 15 acre Shell chemical plant expanded in 1955. Norco is situated between Shell Oil Refinery on the east and Shell Chemical plant on the west. The entire town of Norco is only half the size of the oil refineries.Nearly everyone in the community suffers from health problems caused by industry pollution. The air is contaminated with bad odors from carcinogens, and benzene, toluene, sulfuric acid, ammonia, xylene and propylene- run-off and dumping of toxic-substance also pollute land and water.
My sister died at the age of 43 from an allergenic disease called sarcoidosis, a disease which affects 1 in 1,000 people in the United States, yet in Norco there are at least 5 known cases in fewer than 500 people of color. My youngest daughter and her son suffer from severe asthma; my mother has breathing problems and must use a breathing machine daily. Many of the residents suffer from sore muscles, cardiovascular diseases, liver, blood and kidney toxicant. Many die prematurely from poor health caused by pollution from toxic chemicals. Please indulge me while I share with you a few stories that embody some of our fears, because these tragedies can happen at any moment without notice. In the early 70's a pipeline at Shell Chemical Company exploded and killed Mrs. Helen Washington and Joseph Jones. Mrs. Washington was inside her home asleep and her fellow neighbor, Joseph, was cutting grass in his backyard; they both died from burns sustained from the explosion.
In 1988 an explosion at the Shell Oil Refinery plant created a nightmare. Houses collapsed, people suffered from numerous health problems and many lost their lives. The Shell explosion effected people up to 60 kilometers away.
In 1994 an acid spill at Shell Oil Refinery plant caused property and health damage.
May 10, 1998 a lime truck inside Shell Chemical plant exploded and spilled the lime into the community. And, on December 8, 1998 the Shell Chemical plant spilled methyl ethyl ketone and other harmful substance into the community. There have been many other accidents.Daily, we smell foul odors, hear loud noises, and see blazing flares and black smoke which emanates from those foul flares. The ongoing noisy operations the endless traffic of huge trucks contributes to the discomfort of Norco citizens. We know that Shell and the U.S. government are responsible for the environmental racism in our community and other communities in the US and many communities throughout this world. There must be an end to industry pollution and environmental racism.
Even as U.S. citizens, we are not protected from environmental racism in the United States of America by our government. I would like to see justice in action that leads to an end to this struggle. Norco and many other communities of color across our nation suffer the same ills. We are not treated as citizens with equal rights according U.S. law and international human rights law, especially the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, which our government ratified as the law of the land in 1994. I am bringing these issues before you to increase international support to end support of these human rights violations by the United States, and: 1) to propose actions that protect communities of color from being dumping places for industrial waste, because these deadly toxic substances cause poor health and problems which contribute to low-poor social economical conditions; and 2) to change the way human beings are mistreated by multinational corporations worldwide.
Thank you....
Statement By
Elodia M. Blanco of Concerned Citizens for Agriculture Street Landfill
at the
United Nations Commission on Human Rights
55th Session April 1999I and 900 other African Americans live in homes that were built by the United States government (Department of Housing and Urban Development) on top of a toxic landfill. This site is 95 acres and is located only 8 minutes from Downtown New Orleans. The land on which my house is built was the landfill for the city of New Orleans for 50 years. The landfill was closed in 1965, but the Press Park housing development opened in 1971, and the first of 67 homes of Gordon Plaza housing development was completed in 1981. The government convinced mostly young, African Americans, that these housing developments were part of a grand future for New Orleans, but it was a dream unfulfilled.
Health problems began to occur almost immediately. Residents experienced various illnesses as a result of the toxic landfill, including elevated rates of breast cancer, skin problems and other cancers. Children were born with various birth defects. In 1993, after years of community complaints, the Environmental Protection Agency finally agreed to test the soil surrounding Gordon Plaza and Press Park. These tests confirmed what the residents already knew: toxin levels were high enough to qualify for Superfund status and the area was added to the EPA Superfund list in 1994. A Superfund site is a hazardous waste site where funds have been set aside for appropriate cleanup.
The newly built elementary school on Agriculture Street landfill was forced to close and is presently closed because of the toxic dump. Tests of the site surrounding the school revealed the presence of 9 heavy metals and 11 carcinogens including lead and arsenic. Scientists have now identified over 151 toxins and heavy metals in the ground surrounding the homes of Gordon Plaza.
Acids from these toxins have ruptured pipes under the streets and sidewalks, causing three major cave-ins or collapsing of the streets. When this occurs, many families are without water, lights, heat or cool air for weeks.
As a solution to this environmental nightmare, the US Environmental Protection Agency recommended the removal of only the top two feet of soil from the land surrounding the residents= homes. With this plan, only 10% of the community will have this partial remedy. It is a partial remedy because they are only removing the top two feet of soil when the toxic soil is actually 17 feet deep. Another problem is that this toxic soil removal will take place while residents remain on site, further exposing residents to the underground toxins.
The EPA has already begun to dig up toxic dirt in the Press Park homes for the elderly and the undeveloped area surrounding Gordon Plaza in the summer of 1998. April 1, 1999 the Federal Court gave EPA permission to began the so-called cleanup of the 160 Press Park homes against the wishes of the community residents. Residents of Gordon Plaza have refused to allow the EPA access to their properties. We are DEMANDING relocation.
The involved agencies, Housing and Urban Development, Desire Community Housing, The Environmental Protection Agency and the City of New Orleans, are all responsible for building housing on a toxic landfill and therefore, should bear the cost of relocation. In fact, the so-called cleanup plan proposed by EPA will cost of $20 million, while relocation of the entire community will only cost $12 million.
A non-African American, high level official of the Environmental Protection Agency Superfund Division, acknowledged that he would not want to live in our community while the EPA digs up toxic dirt because his grandchildren would be exposed to lead and other toxins. But what about our children?
The United States has failed to fulfill its obligation under the Convention for the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination by refusing to relocate our community, even though it has relocated non-African American communities away from toxic sites because of health and environmental concerns. Seventeen communities in America located on, or near, toxic areas have been relocated. None were African American communities. It should be remembered that only African Americans were targeted to become residents of the Agriculture Street landfill development.
The EPA's handling of this Superfund site is a clear example of environmental racism. In our case, the EPA has decided to overlook the human health risks and its obligations under the President=s Executive Order on Environmental Justice. We believe this is a toxic experiment on our lives that will be repeated in other African American communities that have also been developed by the government on or next to toxic sites.
I would like to make the following recommendation:
I urge the United Nations Commission on Human Rights to expand the mandate of the Special Rapporteur on the Dumping of Toxic Waste and to authorize the Special Rapporteur to conduct an investigative mission to the Agriculture Street Landfill in New Orleans and other communities of color that have been built on toxic waste sites, and to report her findings to the 56th session of the UN Commission on Human Rights.
Thank you very much for giving me this opportunity to share what's happening in my community.
Statement By
Haki M.D. Vincent of the Mossville Environmental Action Now (MEAN)
at the
United Nations Commission on Human Rights
55th Session April 1999Contact address: 3442 East Burton Street, Sulphur Louisiana,
USA Phone number: (318) 882-7856 or Pager (318) 626-5631I have been a member of the Mossville community in Louisiana state of USA, since 1977. The total population of our town of Mossville is 593 African American citizens. My town is surrounded by the polyvinyl chloride ("PVC") production facilities of PPG, Condea-Vista, and Conoco and has been contaminated by those facilities since 1969. I am here to share with you the plight and struggle of Louisiana communities to stop PVC production by U.S. and multinational chemical industry such as Shell oil, PPG, USA and Conoco, USA. Our past present and future are marked with the environmental degradation caused by PVC manufacturers. A decade ago, Louisiana lost the two communities of Reveilletown and Morrisonville when Georgia Gulf and Dow, two PVC manufacturers, located next to them. These companies moved residents away from their homes and then tore down every building in these communities. Presently, my community of Mossville suffers because of toxic PVC chemical contamination in lakes and underground water. The future of PVC expansion has now brought plans to Westlake Petrochemical to build expansive PVC complexes near Mossville. But it is for the future of our children and our communities that we have fought to block these plans. I am proud of the fact that Louisiana citizens are working together to stop PVC expansion. Our bodies, rivers, air and land have been contaminated with chemicals used in PVC production, many of these chemical cause cancer and threaten our future with reproductive damage. We, in Mossville join with other communities in Louisiana such as the Concerned Citizens of the Agricultural Street Landfill Community and Concerned Citizens of Norco in saying, Enough is Enough!
Mossville is mostly African American and poor neighborhood that is near the city of Lake Charles, Louisiana which is in the southwestern part of Louisiana near the Texas border and near the Gulf of Mexico. My community is prime example of the results of environmental injustice. There are several petrochemical facilities surrounding our neighborhood of 593 families who are African American and more than half are children. The average annual household income in Mossville is about $8,000/year compared with an average annual income for Lake Charles of $29,000/year. The U.S. federal government agency, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) recently reported that the three facilities bordering Mossville were the biggest contributors to the toxic damage in our waterways. NOAA is a federal government agency that published a report in 1997 telling us that our fish are contaminated and that every water body in our area is also contaminated.
In Mossville, we live like people did during World War II. When there is a chemical accident by one of the companies in our area, an alarm sounds that warn us to quickly find a building to hide in to escape the airborne contamination. This program that we are subjected to is called "Shelter-In-Place." We hear the alarms every week and must find a house or church to hide in. Because many of our homes are not airtight, we are not completely protected from exposure to toxic chemicals that can enter buildings through cracks and holes. We are further jeopardized with an evacuation route that we are to use to get away from dangerous chemical accident. This evacuation route leads to a gate that is locked and sends us on a narrow and bumpy road that is full of potholes and ends next to rail cars that are used to store and transport chemicals.
There are some serious health problems in our community, which are linked to dioxin exposure. The health problems do not just start with persons living now, they are passed on through the mothers to their children and on and on. The environment problems in Mossville are now spreading to other areas. The nearest city to us is Lake Charles, Which has approximately 76,000 people. In 1996, there were 280+ "accidental" releases in Lake Charles reported to the State Police by parish industries. There were no major fines or penalties assessed against any of the companies responsible for the releases. Another neighboring community of Vincent Settlement is the proposed site for the Westlake vinyl complex. Both Mossville and these neighboring areas are in Calcasieu Parish where there are 53 industries. There are at least 35 within one and one half miles of Mossville. Seven plants almost surround Mossville. We are working together to stop the PVC expansion and hold PVC companies accountable for their contamination.
As citizens of Mossville , we want this U.N. forum to help us expose the truth about life threatening health problems as a way to focus on the dangers of PVC facilities in our area. In 1998, Dr. Marvin Legator, Director of the university of Texas Medical Branch Division of Environmental Toxicology and the Toxics Assistance Program conducted a Symptom Survey in the Mossville community. The survey exposed the actual trends of illness and disease in Mossville and cross-referenced that information with known environmental contaminants.
Also in 1998, Communities for a Better Environment, a California based environmental NGO has also chosen Lake Charles to be one of the pilot communities for their nationwide "Bucket Brigade" project. Bucket Brigades are local volunteers trained to use EPA-approved air monitoring devices to catch air samples in neighboring residential areas following and industrial toxic air release. The air samples are then sent to an accredited laboratory for analysis. Citizens will then have information on the kinds and levels of toxins in the air. The last two samples were taken on February 28th and on March 6th. Copies of those results are available upon request.Communities nearby Mossville are also working to find solutions. Kathy Landry, President of CLEAN (Calcasieu League for Environmental Action Now) has recorded that the lives of children are not acceptable risk for the financial gain of giant vinyl industries. In Kathy's neighborhood the Louisiana state environmental agency, granted air pollution permits to Westlake Vinyl Corporation for both an ethylene dichloride and chlorine manufacturing company that would produce over half a million pounds of toxic air emissions per year, less than half a mile away from an elementary school. These facilities would also endanger the lives of more than 100 people living south side of the site, who would be trapped if a chemical accident occurred at one of these facilities. They have only one way in and one way out as their evacuation route.
Community groups are asking that no new vinyl site be built or permitted in the state of Louisiana. They are also calling for the cleanup of hazardous waste sites and strict enforcement of federal environmental and public health protection laws by the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
Another small community that has been struggling for 30 years is the Willow Spring area, less than 2 miles from Mossville, where hazardous wastes have been dumped by BFI now called BFI/CECO. BFI/CECO is now asking for permit to allow them to allow wastewater (from rainfall) to be released in the neighborhood where there is already land contamination was well as water contamination.
Recommendation:
On behalf of Mossville Environmental Action Now and the 600 African American residents, men women and children of Mossville, we urge the United Nations Commission on Human Rights to authorize the U.N. Special Rapporteur on "Dumping of Toxic Waste" to visit Mossville and investigate the dumping and storage of toxic waste in our community in Mossville and present this report to the 56th session of U.N. commission on Human Rights. Thank you.
