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2005 Social Network and : A Case Study in Perry, Gloria G. Horning

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SOCIAL NETWORK AND ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE,

A CASE STUDY IN PERRY, FLORIDA

By:

GLORIA G. HORNING

A dissertation submitted to the College of Information. In partial fulfillment of the Requirements of the degree of Doctor of Philosophy.

Degree Awarded: Spring Semester, 2005

The members of the Committee approve the Dissertation of Gloria G. Horning defended on December 6, 2004.

______Jane B. Robbins Professor Directing Dissertation

______Donna M. Nudd Outside Committee Member

______Thomas Hart Committee Member

______Ronald D. Blazek Committee Member

Approved:

______Jane B. Robbins, Chair, Director of Doctoral Studies College of Information

______Larry Dennis, Dean, College of Information

The Office of Graduate Studies has verified and approved the above named committee members.

ii TABLE OF CONTENTS

ABSTRACT IV

CHAPTER ONE – 1

GENERAL BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE 1

CHAPTER TWO – 21

HISTORY OVERVIEW 21

CHAPTER THREE – 31

METHODOLOGY 31

CHAPTER FOUR 37

HISTORY OF THE 39

CHAPTER FIVE – 67

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS 67

APPENDICES 68

REFERENCES 155

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH 166

iii ABSTRACT

The Environmental Justice Movement is an aggregate of community- based, grassroots efforts against proposed and existing hazardous waste facilities and the organizations that assist them. The movement has created a context in which low-income communities and people of color are able to act with power. Using interviews, participant observation, and various archival records, a case study of the organization HOPE located in Perry, Florida, was developed. The case compared key factors in community mobilization and campaign endurance. Special attention was paid to the process of issue construction, the formation of collective identity, and the role of framing in mobilizing specific constituencies. In the case of the P&G/Buckeye Pulp Mill where the community face hazardous surroundings. Environmental inequality formation occurs when different stakeholders struggle for scarce resources within the political economy and the benefits and costs of those resources become unevenly distributed. Scarce resources include components of the social and natural environment. Thus the environmental inequality formation model stresses (1) the importance of process and history; (2) the role of information process and the relationship of multiple stakeholders; and (3) the agency of those with the least access to resources. This study explores the information exchange and the movement's identity on both an individual and group level. When people become involved in the movement they experience a shift in personal paradigm that involves a progression from discovery of environmental problems, through disillusionment in previously accepted folk ideas, to personal empowerment.

iv CHAPTER ONE GENERAL BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE OF THE STUDY

“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed people can change the world, it’s the only thing that ever has” (Margaret Mead, 1962).

Lois Gibbs, the founder of Citizens Clearinghouse for Hazardous Waste, stated “The truth won’t stop the poisoning, but organization and information exchange within a community will” (1995). Environmental justice, often used interchangeably with the term environmental equity, refers to the distribution and effects of environmental problems and the policies and processes to reduce differences in those who bear environmental risks. In a general sense, it includes concern for disproportionate risk burden placed upon any population group, as defined by gender, age, income and race. To date, most attention has been directed at environmental justice with respect to income and race. In this context, a definition of environmental justice is the "fair treatment of people of all races, cultures and income with respect to the development, implementation and enforcement of environmental laws, regulations, programs and policies" (Bullard, 1995). There has been increasing concern over disproportionate health impacts on minority and low-income populations with respect to environmental conditions. The debate on this issue, known as environmental justice, is marked by many fault lines in American life. First, there are disputes between various organizations, private and government regarding the relationship between pollution and disease. Second, there are the volatile issues of race, class, and the historic grievances that go along with exposure to pollution and disease.1 Third, there are conflicts over the environment and the tradeoffs necessary in protecting people and preserving nature, along with fostering reasonable economic development. In the mindset of many environmental activists, people of low social and economic value are at risk in a manner disappropriate to their numbers in the population. Opposition to developed with increasing pressure of property rights movements seeking to expand development of natural resources, and an environmental justice movement perceived to be concerned with issues

1 Ever since the federal government began to address environmental hazards in the 1970s, “industries have sought to portray regulators as power-crazed bureaucrats whose senseless edicts are sucking the lifeblood out of the American economy” (Fagin & Lavelle, 1996).

1 and constituencies not addressed by mainstream environmental organizations (Bryant & Mohai, 1992). As a result of that opposition, the environmental movement in the has strengthened, and broadened through memberships in varied organizations and in the range of issues addressed. The environmental justice movement is relatively young. Its origin is often traced to the protests held in Warren County, North Carolina, in 1982. Yet, many of the elements of the modern movement can be traced much farther back, at least to the Civil Rights Act of 1975 and the first environmental law of 1989. The biographical history of the environmental justice movement is quite different in some ways from that of other major movements, such as the traditional environmental and the civil rights movements. The environmental justice movement is largely decentralized, manifested in the activities of dozens or hundreds of local groups, rather than centralized, operating under the direction of large national organizations. As a result, many of the real heroes and heroines of the environmental justice movement are organizers or chairs of town, county, village, or parish organizations; they are people whose names are probably not well known outside of the environmental justice movement itself.2 While possible adverse distribution of environmental impacts first became a concern in the 1980s, only in the last few years has there been sufficient information to begin to comprehend the extent of the problem. At least two different measures of environmental equity have been proposed. A "proximity-based" measure depends upon people's proximity to facilities that pose environmental hazards. It has been found that minorities and low-income groups are more likely to live close to hazardous waste facilities. The second is a "risk- based" measure that goes beyond measurement of distance to the site and incorporates other factors such as the probability of an accidental release of chemicals, toxicity, level of exposure, the size of the area affected by a release and natural factors, such as wind direction (Bullard, 1995; United Church of Christ Commission for Racial Justice, 1992). Center to the environmental justice issue is citizen involvement for more meaningful public participation in “solution activities” (Bullard, 1993; United Church of Christ Commission for Racial Justice, 1992).3 “Environmental justice demands the rights to participate as equal partners at every level of decision- making including needs assessment, planning, implementation, enforcement and evaluation (Dowie, 1995). As such, environmental justice groups may be the vanguards of democratic revitalization -- demanding the right to information, access to public forums, and a voice in the decision-making process. The most “significant feature of the grassroots movement—and what distinguishes it from other movements—is it strong belief in the right of citizens to participate in

2 For a detailed dateline of the environmental movement see Appendix III. 3 National Institute of Medicine, National Report, 1999.

2 environmental decision-making” (Dowie, 1995). For 35 years, small environmental grassroots organizations have sprung up across the United States. Studies of utilization of information of these groups fall short in examining the manner in which the decision-making process embraces the community and/or neighborhood. Robert Bullard, considered the father of the environmental justice movement, said the movement must “take a multi-media approach and it must involve the public and particularly impacted communities in decision-making” (Bullard, 1998). This is a study of a disenfranchised population’s information behavior regarding environmental issues and environmental factors that affect their health and lifestyle. A central question that guides this dissertation is, how does a small group exchange information to effectively change an environmental inequity?

A Social Network of Citizen Participation

Communities across the United States and the World are becoming more conscious of environmental justice. At the heart of environmental activism is the strong belief in the right of citizens to participate in environmental justice movement and a strong belief in the right of citizens to participate in the environmental decision-making. Community right-to-know laws, citizen enforcement provisions in federal and state legislation, and local input in waste clean-up as well as the location and placement of toxic releasing corporations are key issues to the environmental justice movement. Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring (1962) was the first publication to document the deadly carnage of the pesticide dichloro-diphenyl-trichloriethane (DDT) on the environment and on human life. She wrote, “The victims of DDT are every human being from the moment of conception until death” (Carson, 1962). This was becoming abundantly clear to her in the alarming increase in the use of pesticides following the end of World War II. There were reports of livestock found dead in their fields. There was well-documented and wide-spread damage to wildlife; poisoned birds were literally falling from the skies (Carson, 1962). Carson in Silent Spring challenged the practices and views of the agricultural industry and government. She asserted that the indiscriminate use of DDT was poisoning not just “target” species but the environment itself, and called for an end to the misuse of this and other powerful toxins. Carson succeeded in building a strong scientific case for her thesis. She wrote “we are engaged in a war against nature that will inevitably destroy us as well as our supposed enemies” (Carson, 1962). Rachel Carson was discounted as a “hysterical woman,” and there were various attempts to discredit both her and her findings. Carson’s meticulous research, however, left her detractors little room to maneuver (Dowie, 1996). Agricultural and trade journals attacked Silent Spring before it hit the shelves. Chemical companies attempted to discredit Carson and her findings, and

3 threatened to pull ads from magazines and newspapers that gave Silent Spring favorable reviews (Byrnes, 1998). The assault on Silent Spring and her work, ironically, had the opposite effect. The biased, distorted attacks helped bring more attention to Carson’s book, and attracted a large global audience. Soon after publication she formed the first grassroots environmental group--Town Natural Resources Coalition (TNRC) and she is often hailed as the mother of modern environmentalism (Dowie, 1996). President John F. Kennedy discussed the book at a press conference and appointed a special panel to examine its conclusions (Byrnes, 1998). Starting in the late 1960s, the modern "environmental movement" began to take shape as activist lawyers and scientists came to the aid of citizens who were trying to ban the pesticide DDT. In response to the influence of Silent Spring, state legislatures introduced 40 bills regulating pesticides nationwide by the end of 1962. During the 1970s, Congress passed a dozen major environmental laws. In 1972, after much study and debate,4 the Agency (EPA) banned the use of DDT. Four years later, Congress passed the Toxic Substance Control Act, banning or strictly controlling the use of many other pesticides and toxic chemicals (Byrnes, 1998). Forty-two years have now passed since Carson’s Silent Spring exposed the “onslaught of toxic chemicals that threaten the health and well-being of the American people” (Carson, 1962). But many have followed in her footsteps. Lois Gibbs learned in 1978 that 20,000 tons of toxic chemicals were buried under her Niagara Falls, New York neighborhood, she tried to make sense of all the information and scientific names suddenly thrown at her. She began her work by drawing the nation’s attention to Love Canal in western New York. There, Gibbs’s children and other people living in houses or attending a school built over a toxic dump were stricken with liver damage, asthma, urinary tract disorders, immune system dysfunctions and rare blood diseases, such as the one that mimicked hemophilia and leukemia in Gibbs’s daughter, Melissa. Between 1978 and 1980 Gibbs led the Love Canal Homeowners Association of Niagara Falls in a victory that consisted of obtaining $120 million in government assistance plus damages from Occidental Petroleum to test, clean up and relocate them from their neighborhood that had been poisoned with over 200 chemicals. These included as yet unnamed chemicals and known toxins like chloroform, dioxin, trichlorethane, tetrachlorethane, the banned pesticide Lindane and solvents like benzene. On October 1, 1980 in a speech in New York State, former President Jimmy Carter acknowledged Gibbs as the "most important grassroots leader of the Love Canal residents." He said, "Without her impassioned advocacy and dedication there might never have been a Love Canal emergency declaration and the

4 National Institute of Medicine, 1999.

4 agreement between the United States government and the government of the State of New York that permitted the state to purchase the homes of residents of the Love Canal area might never have come to pass." He went on to say, "The whole question of the disposal of hazardous waste, especially toxic chemicals, is going to be one of the great environmental challenges of the [future.] As a nation we must look ahead [and] … must make this resolution for our own sake and more importantly for the entire nation. There must never be in our country another Love Canal." Lois Gibbs went on to become the founder of Citizens Clearinghouse for Hazardous Waste (CCHW), and stated, “The truth won’t stop the poisoning, but organization and information exchange within a community will” (1995). Gibbs sees the poison dioxin as a failure of self-government and a failure of people to control corporations: "We can't shut down the sources of dioxin without finding the courage to change the way government works," she says. "We have to explore how people became powerless as the corporations became powerful. We have to figure out how to speak honestly and act collectively to rebuild our democracy”. After her ordeal at Love Canal, Gibbs received thousands of calls from people around the nation also facing environmental hazards. In order to help other people, she established CCHW. “I can provide something to people in a way that comes from personal experience I walked the walk and did it”, she said. Her organization teaches community groups and individuals the basics of advocacy such as writing letters, meeting with public officials and talking to corporations. She also helps people understand technical information in environmental studies. “People get inspired by their own actions and all we really do is give them the path and frame it in a way that they see each step as a major victory”, said Gibbs. (Gibbs,1999). The dioxin campaign puts the grassroots environmental community squarely "in the face" of the biggest polluters in the nation, and it creates a "line in the sand"--a challenge to the government and to citizens facing life threatening issues in their backyards.” We know that we are up against huge corporate power, but tackling the misuse of corporate power is what the 21st century is going to be about," says Ellen Connett, one of the leaders of the new grassroots campaign, and editor of the weekly, WASTE NOT.

5 Environmental Justice

It is well documented that health differs by race and class. According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control (1998), poor people and people of color get sick more often than people from middle and upper social classes, and pollution plays a complex role in these disparities. The combination of poverty and pollution amounts to “double jeopardy” according to the National Institute of Medicine, National Report (1999).5 The affected communities experience higher levels of exposure to environmental stresses in terms of both frequency and magnitude. They are less able to deal with these hazards as a result of limited knowledge of exposures and because of a disenfranchisement from information concerning their health.6 Of course their financial situation serves as a barrier in acquiring necessary knowledge and mustering adequate support. In July, 1990 an Environmental Equity Workgroup was established within EPA to assess the evidence that environmental risks are not shared equally across populations. On February 11, 1994 President Bill Clinton signed Executive Order 12898, giving national priority to what previously had been a community-rooted movement, and creating an interagency Federal Working Group on Environmental Justice. In addition, state and federal agencies have developed strategies to identify adverse health and environmental effects upon minority and low income populations. The order directs each federal agency to make… …achieving environmental justice part of its mission by identifying and addressing, as appropriate, disproportionately high and adverse human health or environmental effects of its programs, policies, and activities on minority populations and low-income population” (Executive Order 12898). Environmental justice ensures that all communities, including minority and low-income communities, live in a safe and healthful environment. The Environmental Protection Agency Office of Environmental Justice defines environmental justice as: “The fair treatment and meaningful involvement of all people regardless of race, color, national origin, or income with respect to

5 In a face-to-face interview with Erin Brockovich, she said “The media plays a vital part in environmental issues. The media has more power than I ever thought. They have (media) to convey a huge message and they have always been there to support my cause. I can honestly say I have had a great experience with the media and that is not easy for most to say” (18 April, 2001).

6 Locally unwanted land uses (LULUs) generate a sense of unfairness because LULUs “gravitate to disadvantaged areas: poor, minority, sparsely populated, or politically underrepresented communities that cannot fight them off and become worse places to live after they arrive,” Frank J. Popper, “The and the LULU,” Environment, 27, March 1985.

6 the development, implementation and enforcement of environmental laws, regulation and policies. Fair treatment means that no group of people, including racial, ethnic, or socioeconomic groups, should bear a disproportionate share of the negative environmental consequences resulting from industrial, municipal, and commercial operation or the execution of federal, state, local, and tribal programs and policies” (National Environment Policy Act, Section 309.1.3, 1998). The heart of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) is quality of life. Quality of life includes considering such issues as what kind of communities and what kind of jobs people want? Certain questions are posed regarding the kind of natural and man-made surroundings in which they live, shaping communities, creating jobs and enhancing this notion of quality of life. The National Environmental Policy Act describes the effect of a potential hazardous site upon a city, community, group of property owners, or individuals in terms of compatibility of use, zoning, community growth, and other factors associated with the public interest (Bullard, 1993). Various solutions to the environmental justice problem have been proposed. These include: (1) toxics use reduction (pollution prevention), (2) improved stakeholder participation in the public environmental decision-making process, (3) improved access to environmental data and information, (4) increased research on health risks from exposure to toxics, and (5) improved enforcement and compliance assurance through increased sensitivity to potential environmental justice problems in rule-making (Bullard, 1993; United Church of Christ Commission for Racial Justice, 1992). The third solution is of course integral to the nature of this study, and is a strong rationale for its conduct. The National Environmental Justice Advisory Council (NEJAC), and advisory council to the EPA, recently spoke of systemic reform of the norms for democratic involvement decision-making. The new grassroots movement for “environmental justice,” the report noted, “represents a new vision borne out of community-driven process whose essential core is a transformative public communication and exchange of information that are vital to communities ” (Waste and Facility Subcommittee, 1996). At the core of this vision is an elaboration of the terms for an “informed and empowered community involvement” in the decisions affecting a community’s overall well being (Waste and Facility Subcommittee, 1996). Generally, advocates for public participation identify at least four conditions that make possible a more substantive model of citizen involvement in environmental issues. The conditions include the right to know, the right to participation, the right for independent expertise, and the right to act.

7 Role of the Mass Media

In modern America, the role of mass media, in addition to providing entertainment, is to inform citizens to enable them to make intelligent decisions. The information provided by the mass media uses various outlets including film, broadcasting, and newspapers. The information provided by the mass media is then used by individuals and by groups or large organizations to understand the patterns of health levels within populations and then the linking of illness to major local environmental factors or events. The information exchange results in challenges to hazardous sites and unwanted land-use and location conflicts involving unwanted land uses.7 Environmental justice activities enable small grassroots organizations to bring national attention to environmental disasters that are intentionally located in areas populated by people of color and people with low social and economic status. Activists generally are average people driven by necessity to resist and change a system they believe is betraying them. They watch as the fabric of their lives is frayed by the danger of pollution and the effects chemical industries have on their children and grandchildren. They write letters, attend meetings, organize protests, interact with politicians and bureaucrats, and devote most of their personal time to the movement (Bullard, 1993). The subject of environmental justice has become a concern with a growing audience, most notably in the mass media market. Two docudramas, “A Civil Action” (1999) and “Erin Brockovich” (2000) focused on real-life individuals fighting for information concerning the health of their communities. “A Civil Action” traces the formulation and outcome of the legal complaints filed by eight families in East Woburn, Massachusetts, against three local industries for the improper handling and disposal of toxic chemicals (Harr, 1996). The docudrama “Erin Brockovich”8 centers on a struggling single mother who helps California plaintiffs win a $333 million settlement of water-contamination claims against Pacific Gas & Electric Company (Grant, 1992). Cover stories in U.S. News and World Report (June 19, 2000) and Time (Special Edition, Spring, 2000) profiled individuals and organizations and their efforts to pin-point the sources of deadly environmental wastelands. The cover stories focused on two of the most notable environmental disasters in the United States – dioxin and polycholorinated biphenyls (PCB)

7 Procter & Gamble Cellulose plant is now known as The Buckeye Cellulose Plant. However, the board of the Buckeye Plant consists of retired P&G board directors, and P&G still controls half of the shares in the plant.

8 The professional organization involved in the study is LEAF (Legal Environmental Assistance Foundation). LEAF exists to help people protect their water, land and air from pollution and achieve vibrate discourse within the community and outside of the community to achieve environmental healthy communities (LEAF Mission Statement, 2000).

8 poisoning of the community of Love Canal, New York, and the PCB contamination of Anniston, Alabama. Love Canal was one of the first suburban neighborhoods in the U.S. The housing was designed for predominately white, low to lower-middle income citizens. The Citizens’ Clearinghouse on Hazardous Waste (CCHW), founded by Love Canal homemaker Lois Gibbs in 1983, single-handedly fought for the closure of her American dream home neighborhood because she discovered through state and federal documentation that the community was built on a dioxin landfill. The soil, contaminated with dioxin, caused severe health threats and diseases in children and adults residents (Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, 1988). The other cover story focused on Anniston, Alabama, a small, rural, poor and predominately black area. The community’s neighbor since the 1930s was a Monsanto chemical plant that makes industrial and pharmaceutical chemicals. Similar to the Love Canal incident, PCB was released into the soil (The Center for Public Integrity, 1996). The community knew it was up against a giant corporation with annual revenue of $69 billion, but Anniston residents were determined to take a stand based on what was best for the health and welfare of the community. In early 1980, local citizens filed a multimillion dollar class-action lawsuit against Monsanto. Mary McCastle, a 72-year-old grandmother, lead the battle against Monsanto: “We had no warning, no information about Monsanto. We didn’t know what they were dumping. We did know it was making us sick. People used to have nice gardens and fruit trees. When Monsanto came in all our gardens died. Some days the odors from the plant would be nearly unbearable” (1988).9 The suit was settled out of court in 1987 and the plant stopped producing in 1988 when the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) banned any production of PCB or any by-product of PCB (Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, 1988). The soil and water of the community remain contaminated with the chemical that continues to poison the environment, resulting in the deterioration of health levels in the community. PCB has long been linked to life-threatening diseases including various forms of cancer, diminishing IQ levels, poor memory, and lack of coordination in Anniston residents (Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, 1988). Opponents accuse these activists of exaggerating health threats from pollution and standing in the way of progress. By 1988, after 18 years, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) had managed to set limits on only 25 of the thousands of chemicals in the American work force, and only after lengthy, stop-and-go lawsuits on each. In 1989, when OSHA tried to

9 David Maraniss and Michael Weisskopf, “Jobs and Illness in the Petrochemical Corridor,” Post, December 22, 1987, p. 1; Brown, The Toxic Cloud, pp 152-161.

9 set standards for an additional 200 chemicals identified as harmful through well- established research, the courts struck down the agency’s directive (Fagin & Lavelle, 1996). America witnessed the unfolding of two interpretations of Environmentalism: a media-framed, technically oriented, behavior-defined set of national issues and individual activities; and a less visible more contentious grouping of rooted movements, networks and actions (LeMay, 1991). Media portrayal of environmental issues were limited to recycling, conserving water or energy, and making more “environmentally sensitive purchasing decisions” (Gottlieb,1991). Environmental activity, including pollution prevention, industrial restructuring, community right-to-know and environmental equity, became additional forms of consumption (Gottleib, 1991). Although environmental justice is a term with which Americans are only now becoming familiar, we can see its development over the years beginning with the writings of Rachel Carson in the 1960s, then progressing into main stream media. Now environmental justice is, albeit small and controversial, a part of the environmental standards in the United States.

Significance of the Study

This study strives to provide understanding of information needs and information dissemination practices of a single community in its encounter with a corporate employer over environmental and economic development issues. The community of Perry, Florida thus serves as a model of a small town struggling for environmental fairness and equity. Its local environmental advocacy group, Help Our Polluted Environment (HOPE) is much like others in this country who have waged similar battles, and represents the American grassroots organizations that have become increasingly vocal and active. HOPE’s effort to combat environmental inequity is representative of a significant element in America public policy. Studies of utilization of information of these groups fall short in examining the manner in which information-based decision-making embraces the community and/or neighborhood. One of the shortcomings in the available literature is that most of the reported studies of environmental justice have characterized disparities only in terms of proximity to potential sources of exposure or, in a few cases, to measured exposures and have not taken the next step of trying to characterize or compare either the incidence of exposure or differences in health status between these populations and the general population (Bullard, 1987; Glickman et al., 1995; Greenburg, 1993, United Church of Christ Commission for Racial Justice, 1987; U.S. General Accounting Office, 1983, Zimmerman, 1993). Few studies have looked directly at whether local, residential exposure to environmental agents is associated with an increased incidence of disease (Sexton, et al., 1995; Wagner et al., 1993).

10 This study is written from the perspective of environmentalist orientation and therefore utilizes the theory and philosophy of those seeking environmental justice. While environmental justice advocates attempt to open doors of discourse they face significant obstacles.10 Environmental activists confront a policy regime that is more than simply stacked against them. Katz and Miller (1996) argue that public policy making employs a “closed communication of authority, control, precision associated with the power of science and technology and the cultural belief that these are the only valid ways of knowing and doing,” leaving few assurances that the public will ever become informed or empowered to participate in meaningful dialogue with decision-makers (Katz & Miller, 1996). The Model Plan for Public Participation reported at a minimum, the public participation process must provide stakeholders with the information that they need to participate in meaningful ways. This requires news information and education strategies that are sensitive to a community’s needs and which are geared toward community capacity building (MPPP, 1996). As Shannon (1991) explained, decision-building “involves both stakeholders and agency staff in creating knowledge and developing shared commitment toward a mutually defined course of action.” On one side, officials and consultants speak in scientific terms of chemical substances; on the other side, community groups and leaders feel their concerns matter little and there efforts to gain understandable information fail. In this day of global information including, but not limited to, the Internet, information exchange has not really changed much from the days of Socrates (470-399 B.C.). Information was documented and transcribed by philosophers and others of the ruling class. Working people were generally illiterate, creating an information gap between, what is known as today, the haves and have-nots. The information gap, in the context of environmental justice, is linked directly to the information “haves” and “have-nots.” In recent years researchers have pointed out that there are huge differences in people’s ability to obtain and act on information. This is causing concern, with experts arguing that a fundamental split is developing between the information haves and have-nots throughout the world. The information rich have good access to information—especially online, but also through more traditional media such as newspapers, radio, television, and books—and can plan their lives and react to changes in circumstances on the basis of what they know or can find out. The information poor don’t have such access and are vulnerable to all kinds of pressures. Though the information rich are mainly in the industrialized countries and the information poor are mostly in the developing world, similar

10 Very troubling is the fact that traditional assumptions and practices of public participation still not only undermine, but work directly against, meaningful citizen participation. See R.J. Cox (1999, July).“Indecorous structures of public participation by low-income communities in environmental decision-making. Earthtalk: Communication empowerment for environmental action. Westport, CT: Praeger.

11 splits are obvious between prosperous and disadvantaged groups inside industrialized countries.11 The subject of environmental justice elicits strong emotion from many parties. Neither the serious health concerns nor the charges of biased on unfair policies that are implicit in the subject can be taken lightly. An extensive body of literature documents the fact that not all segments of the U.S. population have experienced the same advances in health status and gains in life expectancy (National Research Council, 1998).

Social Network Theory

The essential component of social network theory is the success of the network in fulfilling the needs of its members (Chatman, 1992). A social network is a set of actors and the relations that hold them together. Actors can be individual people, or they can be aggregate units, such as departments, organizations, or families. The key is that the actors exchange resources which then connect them in a social network. Resources may include data, information, goods and services, social support, or financial support. Each kind of resource exchange is considered a social network relation, and individuals who maintain the relation are said to maintain a tie. The strength of their tie may range from weak to strong depending on the number and types of resources they exchange, the frequency of exchanges, and the intimacy of the exchanges between them (Marsden & Campbell, 1984). Social network theorists hold that individual, group and organizational behavior is affected by the kinds of ties and networks in which the members are involved, not by the traits and attributes the individuals possess (Bates & Peacock, 1989; Monge, 1987). This description is critical to this study because the center of investigation is the small, southern, rural, low-income community of Perry, Florida. This study describes how a small environmental grassroots

11 Several years ago, the World Bank identified poverty reduction as its central mission. World Development Report 2000/0111 set the stage for a new poverty reduction strategy for the coming decade. In the report, “poverty” is defined not only as a lack of income, but, more importantly, as a multi-dimensional phenomenon that includes: powerlessness, lack of opportunity, lack of security, lack of freedom to select their way of life. This change in the definition was based on an extensive participatory poverty assessment conducted by the Bank during 1990’s in more than 60 countries, for which more than 60,000 people were interviewed to determine how they define poverty. The results of the studies were compiled into the report known as “Voices of the Poor”11. The study brought the concept of “empowerment” to the forefront as one of the central pillars needed in poverty-focused development. However, the question of how to operationalize empowerment remains an important issue for us to solve. World Bank. 2000. World Development Report 2000/2001: Attacking Poverty, Oxford University Press , World Bank.

12 organization utilized information to bring attention to an environmental crisis in a rural and poor community. Social norms are expected and represent social traditions, especially in a small-town community like Perry, Florida; for an individual or individuals to depart from that role means they become labeled as troublemakers or radicals with anti- American agendas (Hadden, 1989). Many environmental activists have been personally attacked for their differing perspectives. This is clearly demonstrated in this case study of Perry, Florida where individuals stepped forward and departed from the normal communication patterns and were labeled as “trouble makers.” The founder of HOPE, Joy Towles, claims this to be true in her case and describes the ordeal as being “equal to The Scarlet Letter” (Towles, 1999). Mainstream leaders in the community blacklisted her, claiming she was an outsider with no real community ties. In reality, her family had farmed in Taylor County for more than four generations (Towles, 1999). I came to know Joy Towles during research on a documentary that focused on environmental issues in the South. My travels began on the Mississippi River in , the so-called “Cancer Alley” of chemical plants in the southern part of the state, and ended at American Beach in Florida – the last standing African-American Beach12 in the United States. Along the way I met two environmental activists, both women and both fighting for the same principle: to rid their neighborhoods of the chemical dioxin. The publicity given to the issue of the deadly chemical, its impact on communities though out the world and subsequently, the community opposition to corporate polluters who release the chemical into the ground water, served as a stimulus for the beginning of this research. The organization, HOPE, chose to wage a fight with Procter & Gamble,13 a major corporation with immense economic power, both locally and nationally, for its pollution of the community’s drinking water and its refusal to clean up a 50- year-old environmental disaster. In this study, the social network is represented as the organization, HOPE; and the focus is on the network’s information base that allowed a rural community to conduct a struggle with a national corporation that was poisoning its residents. In order to change behavior, one must begin with the beliefs or the social norm expected of the individual. We know through years of social scientific research, the access to information alone will not cause a shift in public attitudes

12 American Beach was developed as an ocean front resort for on the south end of Amelia Island, Florida, in 1935. The Pension Bureau of the Afro-American Life Insurance Company bought three parcels of land just north of Franklintown, a black township, to create a beach and resort for African Americans in response to segregation laws in Florida (Park Net National Services (1999). 13 Procter & Gamble Cellulose plant is now known as The Buckeye Cellulose Plant. However, the board of the Buckeye Plant consists of retired P&G board directors, and P&G still controls half of the shares in the plant.

13 (Cantrill & Oravec, 1996; Coppola, 1996; O’Keefe, 1990). Within the HOPE network, leaders of the organization stepped outside of their “normal roles in their society” and opened up doors of information utilizing basic information techniques and organizations set well outside their rural community of Perry, Florida and the social base of the community’s tenants. That this type of activity has been conducted many times in American society is undoubtedly true; this is what makes the documentation of this struggle important within societal context. Basic techniques employed by HOPE were the development of phone banks, media outlets, legislative bills, and networking activities with outside organizations including the Legal Environmental Assistance Foundation (LEAF),14 Florida State University Aquatic Department, and various environmental grassroots organizations including Citizens Clearing House of Hazardous Waste based in New York. The basis of the social network theory is described in more detail in chapter three.

Case Study Method

A case study is but one of several ways of conducting social science research. The research questions, under the heading of case study, generally focus on the “why” and “how,” and most importantly may be utilized to examine controversial events; these events are generally of contemporary nature (Yin, 1984). Case studies rely on many of the same techniques as historical research, including the use of primary and secondary documents and cultural and physical artifacts. An important difference in the study of a contemporary phenomenon is that case study research includes primary source material derived through the techniques of direct observation and systematic interviewing of those who were engaged in the activities under study (Yin, 1984). These two strategies are especially important for this research because direct interviews provide insight into the thoughts and actions of the leaders of the social network. Leedy explains that: “Data gathering in case studies can be in the form of words, images, or physical objects. Fieldwork is typically a part of the data collection efforts because it enables the researcher to engage in informal conversations with participants and to observe and understand the phenomenon as it is experienced by them” (1997). The interviews focus on key issue areas, including information needs, nature of the dispute, networking among members, organizational tactics, and

14 The professional organization involved in the study is LEAF (Legal Environmental Assistance Foundation). LEAF exists to help people protect their water, land and air from pollution and achieve vibrate discourse within the community and outside of the community to achieve environmental healthy communities (LEAF Mission Statement, 2000).

14 leadership elements within government and representatives from the private sector (the polluter) in question. The primary examination focuses on the role of a particular socio-political network (HOPE) and its impact on decision-making policies that directly influence the health and economic status of people in Perry, Florida. HOPE was chosen as the context for this study because in its fight against P&G/Buckeye Cellulose Plant in Perry, the quest for environmental justice appears to clearly reside in information issues. This study is an attempt to determine how the transmission of information within and outside an activist group can effectively change an environmental inequity.

Research Questions Guiding the Study

There are two major questions used to examine information exchange in Perry, Florida. The social norms of the community are addressed within the context of social network theory to understand the social environment under crisis. 1. How did HOPE activists access their information? 2. What method(s) were used by HOPE to transfer their information?

The Network

The following people served as primary sources due to the roles they played in providing information relevant to the disclosure and understanding of of the development of this series of events. Joy Towles, founder and director of Help Our Polluted Environment (HOPE). Perry, Florida. When Towles returned to her home town of Perry, she discovered her family and friends where living in what she described as “an environmental waste land”. She began researching the by-product of the local pulp mill plant and exposed the fact the plant was dumping millions, upon millions of chemical waste (dioxin) into the town’s river. Thus not only polluting the river water, but also the town’s water source that ultimately polluted farm lands where cattle grazed and local fruits and vegetables were harvested. From her kitchen table she organized a community-based organization to stop the pulp mill from polluting their environment and to make Perry, Florida a safe place to live and work. Lois Gibbs, Executive Director for the Citizen’s Cleaning House for Hazardous Waste. Love Canal, New York. Lois Gibbs is a key figure in the environmental justice movement. She brought national attention to her hometown of Love Canal, New York when she started questioning the health issues in her community. Children were getting sick and dying at alarming rates. She found out her low-income community with affordable housing was built on a toxic waste

15 dump consisting of the main chemical waste – dioxin. The chemical was in the dirt the children played in, it was in their drinking water and in the air they breathed. The children were literally living on grand-zero. The children were dying form cancer related diseases directly linked to the dioxin exposure. Gibbs launched one of the first environmental justices movement in the country. It gained national attention and the attention of then President Carter. The Center for Health, Environment and Justice was launched by this single, low-income working-woman with three children. Her work not only closed the neighborhood and re-located all the families to safe neighborhoods, it brought national attention to environmental in-justices the United States was facing. Dan Simmons, Public Relations Director for Procter & Gamble and Buckeye Cellulose Plant, Perry, Florida, served as the spokesperson for P&G/Buckeye. As such, he faced the pitfalls of defending an environmental polluter on a daily basis. On one interview with Simmons at the pulp mill I was asked to sign-in, and at the top of the sign-in sheet it read “Do Not Read This List”. I asked Simmons about this and his reply was it was to protect the privacy of visitors. Simmons was the face and voice for the national corporation that was faced with a community split on health issues and the economical welfare of the community. Upon leaving Perry, Florida, Simmons became a lobbyist in the state of Florida for P&G. Julie Hauserman, Environmental Reporter, St. Petersburg Times. St. Petersburg, Florida. Hauserman worked side-by-side with Towles to expose the chemical waste being dumped into the Fenholloway River. She helped her learn research techniques, directed her to information outlets and wrote a series of articles on what the community of Perry, Florida was faced with. Dr. Robert “Skip” Livingston, Florida State University Aquatic Center, Tallahassee, Florida. As director of Florida State’s Center for Aquatic Research and Resource Management what he has said about Florida’s pollution, local industry and the state of the water ways in Florida has not pleased anybody in the industry, other or even the regulatory agencies in the state. Suzy Ruhl, Past Director of the Legal Environmental Defense Fund. Tallahassee, Florida. LEAF is a membership environmental organization. They focus their efforts in Alabama, Florida, and Georgia. LEAF also addresses national issues that have an important impact on our region. LEAF's mission is to protect human health and life-sustaining natural resources from pollution and to achieve accountability for the consequences of such pollution. Environmental justice is the heart and soul of LEAF and the impetus for its founding in 1979. Linda Young, Clean Water Network, Tallahassee, Florida. The Clean Water Network is an alliance of over 1,100 organizations that endorse the platform paper, the National Agenda for Clean Water. The Agenda outlines the need for strong clean water safeguards in order to protect public health and the environment. The Clean Water Network includes a variety of organizations representing environmentalists, commercial fishermen, recreational anglers, surfers, boaters, farmers, faith communities, environmental justice advocates,

16 labor unions, urban communities, consumers and others. Dr. Robert Bullard, Founder and Director of the Southern Organizing Committee for Economic and Social Justice, is based in Atlanta, Georgia. When, in 1979, Dr. Robert Bullard wrote a study called Solid Waste Sites and the Black Houston Community, nobody had heard of environmental racism. It would be three more years before anyone used that phrase, but Dr. Bullard had plainly made the connection between toxic siting and communities of color, leading to the first lawsuit, Bean v. Southwestern Waste Management, (filed by his wife) that used civil rights law to challenge environmental discrimination. By 1991, when Bullard helped plan the first National People of Color Environmental Leadership Summit in Washington, D.C., the fight for environmental justice was well- established, with activists from around the country making common cause with each other. Erin Brockovich, Director of Research Law Offices of Marsy & Vititoe, in Westlake, CA. Brockovich conducted the solo investigation that eventually established that the health of countless people who lived in and around Hinkley, California from the 1960's to the 1980’s had been devastated by exposure to toxic Chromium 6. The Chromium 6 had leaked into the groundwater from the nearby Pacific Gas and Electric Company's Compressor Station. In 1996, as a result of the largest direct action lawsuit of its kind, spearheaded by Erin Brockovich and Ed Marsy, the giant utility paid the largest toxic tort injury settlement in U.S. history: $333 million in damages to more than 600 Hinkley residents. Other interviews include: Connie Tucker, Executive Director of Southern Organizing Committee for Economic and Social Justice in Atlanta, Georgia. Margaret Williams, President of “Citizens Against Toxic Expose”. Pensacola, Florida. Ruby Morgan, Member HOPE, Perry Florida. Sarah Paris, Founding member of HOPE, Perry, Florida. Bobby C. Billie, Independent Seminole Nation Spiritual Leader, Member: HOPE. Perry, Florida.

The Following Chapters

Chapter 2 provides a general history of the lumber industry in Taylor County, Florida, and a further examination of the emergence of environmental groups in the United States. Chapter 3 examines the conceptual framework of the social network theory; Chapter 4 introduces the foundations of historical, case study, and data analysis methods and tracks the history of the Procter & Gamble lumber industry in Perry, Florida and describes the development of HOPE and the use of information to bring local; state and national attention to the

17 health threat of the community; and Chapter 5 provides conclusions and reflections of the study.

18 CHAPTER TWO

THE HISTORY OF THE ENVIRONMENTAL MOVEMENT

“Equal Justice Came Out of Community Involvement.” Vernice Miller-Travis, Program Officer of Community Development, Ford Foundation (Florida A&M University, April, 1999).

The impetus, motivation, and stimulus of the environmental justice movement has been to ensure that all communities are safe and healthful environments (Executive Order, 12898), however, citizens have found it difficult to participate in policy-making on issues that have direct impact on their health and safety, their environment, and their future generations. The citizens have had limited ability to gain access to information concerning these issues affecting their lives and their communities. Citizens affected by environmental inequities generally face several barriers related to low level literacy and educational levels, high unemployment, and low-income distribution (Hill, 2000). Many studies support this main thesis. Minorities disadvantaged in terms of education, income and occupation in the United States bear a disproportionate environmental risk (Bullard, 1993). Understandably, socio-economically deprived groups are more likely than affluent whites to live near polluting facilities, eat contaminated fish and be employed at risky occupations (Gould, 1986). Because minorities are statistically more likely to be economically disadvantaged, many researchers assert that “environmental racism” or racial bias in imposing environmental threats, is the central cause of disparities in risks that minorities face (Calderon et al., 1993). Others have argued that race is an independent factor, not reducible to socioeconomic status, in predicting the distribution of air pollution, contaminated fish consumption, municipal landfills and incinerators, abandoned toxic waste dumps and lead poisoning in children (Bullard, 1993). Regardless, it is clear that the influential majority composed of those citizens who comprise the middle class, is not affected by environmental injustice in such direct manner. Both race and socioeconomic status appear to be major factors when assessing these outcomes. It should be noted that there is debate about their relationship to each other. Because they are more likely to be poor, minorities are also more likely to be politically disenfranchised. Thus, they are typically less able to fight unwanted risks. This disability could explain the disproportionate share of environmental threats that minorities appear to bear (United Church of Christ Commission on Racial Justice1987).

19 In these predominantly Black communities of lower socio-economic status, the initial grassroots organizing was carried out to protest against landfills, incinerators, toxic waste, chemical industries, salvage yards, and garbage dumps. Strategies included demonstrations, public hearings, lawsuits, the election of supporters to state and local offices, meetings with company representatives, and other approaches designed to bring public awareness and accountability (Bullard, 1990). In examining the history of the environmental movement in the United States, It is important to recognize that a “veil” exists with respect to explaining the historical perspectives of socially marginalized communities who have experienced environmental inequalities. Sylvia Hood Washington of Case Western Reserve University, issued a report that attempted to reveal the nature of that veil so that readers could see as well as hear the environmental history of communities from the perspective of those who have been environmentally disenfranchised. This history included her own struggles as an African-American who grew up in a segregated Black community that suffered and fought against unfair environmental policies for almost 50 years in Cleveland, Ohio. It also included a comparative history of “white” immigrant and migrant communities who lived around the Chicago Stock Yards who suffered from what she called “environmental ethnocentrism”; the twin of environmental racism. The final report depicted the rich history of environmental activism and advocacy in working class and socially marginalized communities (1997). Kimberly Jemison in her 1999 dissertation, The Determents of Hazardous Waste Siting, argued that all of the studies to date focused on the current community conditions rather than examining conditions at the time of the site selection. The results of her initial findings suggested that race, not economic conditions, supported the allegations of discriminatory siting practices; however, she found that across time periods, overall results yielded conflicting conclusions. Ultimately, Jemison reported that the major factor is economic rather than racial discrimination with poor communities being targets for waste facilities, while racial issues were secondary (University of Illinois, 1999). Another relevant study is The Causes and Consequences of Hazardous Waste Location: Racism, Housing Prices and Long-Run Economic Impact by Karaouni (1997) which directly addressed the key issue of the economics of a community and the relationship to the location of such sites. That economics has played and continues to play a major role is evident when assessing the geographic distribution of land-sensitive operations. This dissertation studied the impact of hazardous treatment plant placement, and landfill or incinerator locations from 1970 to 1999. The results are, indeed, disturbing and add to the store of data reported by other researchers; neighborhoods with large low-income populations are more likely to have one or more hazardous waste facilities. At the same time, Karaouni noted that there were a disproportionately large number of landfills located in minority neighborhoods (1997).

20 Environmental justice is a term that is just becoming familiar. It is an unfortunate reality of life in America that government policy often affects some ethnic groups more than others (Environmental Law Reporter, SARA, 1986). This chilling but hardly surprising revelation can be likened to the discovered inequality among animal species in Orwell’s Animal Farm. Dr. Robert Bullard, a member of President Clinton’s Administration environmental transition team, revealed statistical data, that if not alarming are, indeed, disappointing in a country founded on egalitarian principles. He found a strong correlation between race and class and polluted environment and the effects on individual standards of living (Bullard, 1995). In 1983, a study by the U.S. General Accounting Office, observed a strong relationship between the siting of offsite hazardous-waste landfills and race and socioeconomic status of surrounding communities. It identified four offsite hazardous-waste landfills in the eight states that compose EPA's Region IV (i.e., Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Tennessee).15 The data detailed the socio-demographic characteristics of the communities where the four hazardous-waste landfill sites were located. Race and class appear to be the major factors associated with communities in proximity to toxic centers. Findings such as these serve to place the struggle for environmental justice among the most important health challenges of our nation at a time when the challenges to the health establishment in terms of disease control and prevention are mounting. Bullard was able to point out that minority and low-income neighborhoods had been the toxic “dumping grounds” for the nation and the world (Bullard, 1995). Again, this may not be entirely surprising, but nonetheless is disconcerting. To become classified as an environmental justice community, a community must be: comprised of minority or low-income groups; who are excluded from those who set policy or make decisions on the environment. In an interview with Dr. Robert Bullard, one of the pioneering scholars and activists in the environmental justice movement, I asked him what is environmental justice?” “The environmental justice movement has basically redefined what environmentalism is all about. It basically says that the environment is everything: where we live, work, play, go to school, as well as the physical and natural world. And so we can't separate the physical environment from the cultural environment. We have to talk about making sure that justice is integrated throughout all of the stuff that we do. What the environmental justice movement is about is trying to address all of the inequities that result from human settlement,

15 U.S. General Accounting Office, Siting of Hazardous Waste Landfills and Their Correlation with Racial and Economic Status of Surrounding Communities (Washington, D.C.: General Accounting Office, 1983), p. 1.

21 industrial facility siting and industrial development. What we've tried to do over the last twenty years is educate and assist groups in organizing and mobilizing, empowering themselves to take charge of their lives, their community and their surroundings. It's more of a concept of trying to address power imbalances, lack of political enfranchisement, and to redirect resources so that we can create some healthy, livable and sustainable types of models.” (1992) William Falk and Lyson described the uneven economic development and plight of rural southerners in their book High tech, Low tech, No tech. The authors wrote: “Not all citizens have benefited from the upturn in the southern economy. In fact, many may not have benefited at all. Blacks, women, and people living in rural areas have, in varying degrees, received little or none of the job opportunities and economic affluence that has washed over the region. The quality of life and opportunity for improvement for these people left behind have remained essentially unchanged over the last fifty years” (1988). Bullard points to the convergence of environmental and social justice. People of color and people with low social and economic status are now beginning to understand that environmental justice is a social justice issue (Bryant & Mohai, 1992; Bullard, 1990; United Church of Christ Commission for Racial Justice, 1992). Environmental justice addresses social justice related to human activities that affect both human and natural environments, including the impact of human activities upon human health and values, immediate living and working conditions, natural resources that humans depend upon, cultural values intimately tied with the natural environment, and ways in which the institution of environmentalism affects human relations. This description reveals that social problems are intimately connected with environmental problems and may point in either direction: the social problem may be the cause of the environmental problem or the reverse may be true with the polluted neighborhood being the causal element for subsequent societal isolation and cultural lag. (Figueroa, Debating the Paradigms of Justice: The Bivalence of Environmental Justice, 1999). Social justice, political empowerment, equal education, fair employment practices, and open housing have been major goals of social justice advocates. These factors have different impact for different individuals. It is one thing to advocate “saving trees” and a totally different situation when confronted with “saving jobs for the social disadvantaged” (Bullard, 1987). Unemployment and poverty have been individual social issues different than those concerns voiced by middle-class environmentalists. This points to the dilemma that exists in providing impetus for governmental remediation. Activists are faced with various obstacles, not just related to the economic backlash of closing a polluter:

22 “. . . government officials and agencies have exercised their power to exploit the less politically influential, the less informed and the poorer members of society. Rather than receiving protection from a democratic system designed to protect the minority voice, the ethnic and racial minority communities became a convenient scapegoat for difficult political decisions” (Colquette & Robertson, 1991). At the , John Callewaert’s dissertation centered on the very issue of equitable distribution of environmental benefits and harms. He concluded that in the U.S., environmental injustice primarily involves the disproportionate exposure of minority and low-income groups to environmentally hazardous facilities (landfills, incinerators, etc.) and other environmental problems (2000). His research refutes a common perception that concerns about environmental justice run counter to job creation and retention. Rather, in most situations there are relatively few employment opportunities and/or substantial economic benefits from the disputed industrial activity for the host communities. The environmental justice movement is comprised largely of small, democratically run grassroots groups. Many of the groups may or may not have environment in their names. Nevertheless, they are truly environmental groups that are grounded in the community. It is also important to note that the vast majority of the grassroots groups are led by women, minorities and the Black community–a significant deviation from the leadership of national environmental groups (Chavis 1987). In The New Environmentalism, Mark Dowie analyzes the growth of grassroots community organizations that are emerging around the country to demand participation in environmental decision making. He points out that the large mainstream environmental organizations have failed to attract minorities and the poor. Grassroots activists perceive these organizations to be arrogant and elitist, more concerned with wilderness, wildlife, and natural resource conservation than with the environmental damage to low income communities around the country (1992). Dowie urges the American environmental movement to develop into “. . . a broad-based, multi-ethnic movement that takes a long term global view, challenges prevailing economic assumptions, promotes environmental protection as an extension of human rights, and engages in direct action when necessary. If it pursues this goal, the movement can forge a new society” (1992). Blacks were generally absent from the mainstream environmental movement. The primary activism against environmental injustice emerged from mainstream environmental organizations, including the Serria Club and . Examples include protests, demonstrations, lobbying, and lawsuits against nationally recognized companies including Procter & Gamble (Gaugh, 1991).

23 In the case of grassroots organizations, most people of color who became activists were pressed into duty because of environmental threats to their family, home, community, and workplace. With meager financial resources, grassroots groups have defied all odds. They have stayed together, persevered, and in many instances, won their battle. The groups have been sharing their stories, tactics, strategies, and resources with other groups facing similar up-hill struggles. This flow of information from those who know to those who need to know sustains the continued existence and extension of their activity; it is clear indication of the power and value of information dissemination and the importance of information practices in such circles. Citizen-participation programs were the result of a variety of factors that converged in the late 1960s. Innovative representational strategies were developed within agencies at many levels. They include new environmental protection agencies at federal and state levels. In addition, older regulatory and public works agencies such as the Federal Trade Commission and the Army Corps of Engineers, as well as health planning agencies and a host of others in virtually every area of administration and at every level of government, have been pushed to include more access to the public at large (Hoberg, 1992; Melnick, 1983; Stewart, 1975). Under Presidents Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford, however, the 1967 Air Quality Act had little effect. The Office of Public Affairs at EPA, always under- funded and with little money at its disposal, was in charge of enforcing the Air Act. It was headed by public relations people with clear political agendas heading the agency (Dahl, 1970; 1989). Under President Carter, support and funding increased for citizen participation and the Consumer Protection Agency was created to right certain wrongs (Pertschuk, 1982). The agency had little bite, however, and had limited impact on local environmental issues. Support and funding was dramatically cut under President Reagan’s terms forcing many in the agency to resign (Berry, 1981). President Clinton’s EPA office reopened the door for citizen participation by offering state and local seminars and training. Under the current administration of President George W. Bush, the vision of civic environmentalism has been discussed within various offices at the EPA, but the resolve to continue to serve the public at-large with the streamlining of the government may be in conflict with an activist stance on the part of government. Long before the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) was able to set in place the enormously complex technical and administrative procedures for tracking, managing, and disposing of hazardous wastes, the dramatic and widely publicized revelations of toxic exposure to the community in Love Canal, New York, appeared in the national media in the summer of 1978 (Hadden, 1989). This bellwether event marked the emergence of cooperative activity among fighters for the environment. The Citizens’ Clearinghouse on Hazardous Waste (CCHW) movement soon began to forge links between the workplace and residential community in its campaign for “right-to-know” laws at the State and

24 eventually the federal level (Gibbs, 1990; Hadden, 1989).16 Communities around the country with similar environmental problems began organizing into grassroots community groups. The groups connected and networked and by 1982 a social movement had emerged. Today, the grassroots movement for environmental justice is made up of roughly 5,000 community groups nationwide. Women play a dominant role in the movement as the major leaders and organizers of the community groups. (Gibbs, 1988) Robbin Zeff’s (1990) dissertation explored this very subject. Her study identified both an individual and group level involvement. When faced with environmental issues Zeff found that when people become involved in the movement they experience a shift in “personal paradigm” that involves a progression from discovery of environmental problems, through disillusionment in previously accepted ideas, to personal empowerment. This progression, as illustrated in this report, is the examination of three ideas: trust in the political and judicial system; influence of science and technology; and unlimited good of the community. The theme of social justice runs throughout all forms of movement communication and expression, and becomes an important and sustaining ideology or belief system in the individual.17 On July 1, 2002, President George W. Bush stopped Superfund monies to 33 sites in 18 states, including five in Florida. By doing so, the clean-up cost shifted to the taxpayers and not the polluter (EPA Inspector General’s Report, 1 July, 2002). Grassroots groups sprang up in increasing numbers, especially in communities that were being considered for the placement of hazardous waste treatment facilities, or where contaminated dump sites were discovered (Gibbs, 1999). The most vital element in the rise of environmental justice movement was the emergence of grassroots activists willing to lay everything they have on the line. Over the course of the 1980s, perhaps as many as 10,000 local groups, including many in poor and minority communities, had contacted or affiliated with one of the two major networks in the toxins movement. The Citizens

16 Before 1985, no level of government–federal, state, or local–or any other entity collected information on the amounts of toxic pollution emitted into the air. In fact, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) did not even maintain an accurate list of where chemical plants were located in the United States. 17 In 1986, driven by the worldwide outrage over the deaths of thousands of people from a catastrophic accident at a Union Carbide plant in 1984 in Bhopal, India, community and environmental activists in California mounted an historic campaign to guarantee the public's right- to-know about toxic chemicals in consumer products and the environment. Under the Clinton Administration, Executive Order 12898 expanded the Environmental Justice Administration regulations, now the EPA, to include the public’s rights to “access to information, fair hearings and meaningful participation in the decision-making process. The national protest by blacks occurred in 1982. Demonstrations and protests were triggered after Warren County, North Carolina, which is mostly black, was selected as the burial site for more than 32,000 cubic yards of soil contaminated with highly toxic PCBs (polychlorinated biphenyls). The soil had been illegally dumped along the roadways in fourteen North Carolina counties in 1978.

25 Clearinghouse on Hazardous Waste (CCHW), founded by Love Canal homemaker Lois Gibbs in 1983 and the National Toxins Campaign (NTC) was founded by community organizer and asbestos survivor John O’Connor in 1984. The practice of toxic-waste disposal has generated demonstrations in many communities across the country, with the first national protest on the hazardous-waste issue being held in 1982. Demonstrations and protests were triggered after Warren County, North Carolina, which is mostly low-income and black, was selected as a landfill site for more than 32,000 cubic yards of soil contaminated with highly toxic PCBs (polychlorinated biphenyls) (Pollack & Grozuczak, 1984). The soil had been illegally dumped along the roadways in fourteen North Carolina counties in 1978, and had been collected for ultimate disposal (Bullard, 1993). As executive director of the “United Church of Christ’s Commission for Racial Justice,” Charles Cobb spearheaded the effort to document “environmental racism”–some of which was itself the by-product of more stringent regulation, information dispersion, and the empowerment of some communities to resist toxic dumping more effectively than others (Hadden, 1993).18 Eileen McGurty’s 1995 dissertation at the University of Illinois focused on the controversy over the Warren County landfill and is an important effort since it covers the situation identified by some as the birth place of the environmental justice movement. However, despite the importance assigned to Warren, County; there had been no thorough analysis of the events. Her study analyzed the Warren County situation using the social movement theory. The study reflects how two cultures, black and white citizens, came together over the fear of losing control over a land use decision. The movement was the conceptual link to the birth if the environmental justice movement known today which brought into question the entire hazardous waste disposal policy in the United States.19 Although the demonstrations in North Carolina were not successful in halting the landfill construction, the protests brought a sharper focus to the convergence of civil rights and environmental rights and mobilized a nationally broad-based group to protest these inequities. These early events led to the increased growth of environmental grassroots organizations. Grassroots organizations across the country began to network by exchanging information and ideas. They emphasized community empowerment through legislative

18 Not in my Backyard/Not in Anyone’s Backyard: A Folkloristic Examination of the American Grassroots Movement for Environmental Justice, R. L. Zeff, Indiana University, 1990.

19 The first national protest by blacks on the hazardous-waste issue occurred in 1982. Demonstrations and protests were triggered after Warren County, North Carolina, which is mostly black, was selected as the burial site for more than 32,000 cubic yards of soil contaminated with highly toxic PCBs (polychlorinated biphenyls). The soil had been illegally dumped along the roadways in fourteen North Carolina counties in 1978.

26 lobbying and judicial appeals, and vocalized their concerns to the threat of the health and well-being of their neighborhoods (Hadden, 1989). Hal Aronson’s dissertation (1998) argues that the movement has a remarkably high rate of success, and cites three cases from California in which the movement had stopped every commercial hazardous waste incinerator project and closed numerous hazardous waste landfills. He asserts that there is strength in numbers when a community as a whole mobilizes. The difference in circumstances between the locales in California and the situation in Perry, Florida (the town under study in this effort) is the fact that in Perry, the polluter is number one employer in the community. This situation caused a rift between citizens who became polarized on the issue resulting in an environmental backlash. These circumstances are not unique to American business development, and this case study depicts a condition that is understood to exist around the country. The current study focused on social movement theory including resource mobilization, social constructionist, and social psychological approaches. Various community struggles with environmental issues in the 1980s gained the bulk of the initial national attention at the time, and the campaign against environmental injustice continues today. As pointed out, there is a growing body of evidence revealing that people of color and low economic means are subjected to a disproportionately large number of health and environmental risks in their neighborhoods (e.g., childhood lead poisoning); and on their jobs (e.g., pesticide poisoning of farm workers) (Bullard, 1993; Byrant & Mohai, 1992). The effects of pollution and environmental hazards on people of color, the poor, and the working class have been overlooked by environmental policy makers because it was perceived that those communities were politically powerless and would not protest and could not influence the site selection of such facilities. It was perceived that lines of communication did not exist or would not be utilized. Currently, the nation is confronted with a garbage and hazardous waste crisis with mounting nuclear and toxic wastes from its weapons and military installations. In all likelihood, these conditions are aggravated with increased deployment of the military and emphasis given to terrorist alerts today. Up to this time, tougher environmental regulations and increased public opposition have made it difficult to site any new waste management facilities, ranging from recycling centers and garbage incinerators to radioactive storage dumps without public airing of the issues (Angel, 1992). Citizens who are tired of being subjected to the dangers of pollution in their communities have been confronting the power structures through organized protests, legal actions, marches, civil disobedience, and other activities. Information and its dissemination has been largely responsible for the increased activism. Community newsletters, pamphlets, magazines, classes, lectures, and videotapes have made it possible to recruit large numbers of people (Kuzmiak, 1991). When citizens in the contaminated communities are adequately informed about the hazards, their level of awareness and opposition to the toxic facilities

27 results in active protest (Booth & Jacobs, 1990; Caron, 1989; Mohai, 1990; Noe & Snow, 1989; Ostheimer & Ritt, 1976). It was when these informational practices spurred the attention of local and national media, that publicity given to demonstrations and other resistance measures was maximized and the grassroots movement became a familiar concept in the environmental justice movement. The information provided by the media sparked a nationwide growth in the environmental justice movement. Protests became an essential ingredient of an effective strategy for managing toxins, and the causes of these protests became well-known to the public. Activists used lawsuits, red-tape generating complaints, scientific studies, sit-ins, and picket lines to place pressure on corporations to make information available to citizens about the potential of hazardous waste and the dangers of toxic sites to the health of the community (Mazmanian & Morell, 1992). It is easily seen that parallels can be drawn to the publicized activity for the earlier struggle concerning civil rights of minorities. It is important to explore how people became powerless as the corporations became powerful. “We have to figure out how to speak honestly and act collectively to rebuild our democracy” (Gibbs, 1995). The rebuilding of democracy is what separates the grass-roots environmental movement from the old conservative “enviros.” According to Connie Tucker of the Southern Organizing Committee, conservative or mainstream environmentalists such as the , do not see democracy as an important issue–perhaps because to do so implies a direct challenge to corporate influence over our media, our elections, our courts, our schools, and our legislatures. For example, the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) has refused to endorse campaign finance reform to get the corrupting influence of private money out of our elections. The grassroots movement, on the other hand, believes democracy is the fundamental environmental issue. “Without democracy there can be no justice, and without justice there is no way to protect human health or the environment,” (Tucker, 1995). Public participation includes a broad range of communicative practices and information exchange aimed at voicing public opinion, influencing decision- making, and/or shaping environmental policy. Such practices are undertaken by a variety of individuals and groups, including elected officials, government agencies, scientific and technical experts, citizens, activists, academics, social movement organizations, corporations, public relations firms, and policy research institutes (Environmental Communication and the Environment, 1999). Their opponents have accused them of exaggerating health threats from pollution and standing in the way of progress. As previously stated, the activists’ efforts often fall short of their goals, and many of them have been personally attacked for their activism. “I believe we can win democracy back because I have experienced it myself,” says Gibbs. “Most people, if you ask them if they could attract the attention of the president of the United States, they would say ‘no’. But Love

28 Canal is a shining example of how a small group of blue-collar workers, by luck or by chance, became very sophisticated in effecting change in the political process and in getting the president to come to their backyard and to give them what was right” (1999). Sadly, in spite of President Carter’s admonition, a need for environmental justice continues to create activists. In Pensacola, Florida, Margaret Williams heads Citizens Against Toxic Exposure, a group formed in 1991 to battle the Environmental Protection Agency’s digging on a toxic site near her home. “As with most people, environmental issues had never crossed my mind,” she says. But when residents–most of them elderly and not well off financially–began suffering eye and skin irritations and breathing problems, Williams quickly learned about the poisonous effects of dioxin.20 Although her group lost the battle to stop the digging, it recently was successful in persuading the federal government to pay for relocation of all 358 families. Williams started her fight at the age of 73; in 1982, the retired school teacher fought for her family’s health and the health of her neighbors with the Escambia Treating Company–the nation’s third largest Superfund site. Lois Gibbs called Williams a true hero of her community. “Margaret Williams is absolutely terrific. I met Margaret Williams around the dump site that she is fighting, she called to ask for information. This is a woman who gives 120 percent of herself, of her time. She understands her neighbors, she talks to her neighbors in a way that they understand this very complex, scientific and technical issue. She is courageous, she is not afraid to confront the big power people, she is creative in that she comes up with ideas of how to make the power of people embarrass, how to put pressure on them, putting little crosses on the front yards of lawns, facilitating meetings. She’s just absolutely dynamic. She is another home grown, grass roots activist who I’m real proud to be working next to” (1999). Williams, like Gibbs, is a grassroots pressure lobbyist who utilized the available information channels to make known the plight of her neighborhood. Closer to Perry geographically is the situation involving the Escambia Treating Company (ETC) Superfund site, located in a mixed industrial and residential area in north central Pensacola, Florida. It has been reported that the poisonous chemicals released from the site may have been responsible for more than 40 deaths due to cancer (CATE Report, 1985). The Escambia Treating Company operated from 1943 to 1982, using creosote and pentachlorophenol (PCP) to treat wood for use as utility poles and foundation pilings. Few environmental precautions were taken, as was

20 Williams utilized other networks to educate herself about dioxin. She personally contacted Lois Gibbs to not only learn about the chemical, but also to learn about organizing her community to fight the injustice in your neighborhood. She ultimately organized Citizens Against Toxic Environments.

29 characteristic of the time. Wastes had been placed in an unlined landfill, in an unlined containment pond, and in unlabeled drums. Former workers said “that the treatment cylinders (pressure cookers used to saturate the wood with pentachlorophenol (PCP) would sometimes fly open, releasing hundreds of gallons of toxic solution”. They tell of being sent to pump out creosote and PCP which had pooled in yards north of the plant after heavy rains flooded the waste ponds and to distribute sand over the contaminated areas” (CATE Report, 1985). The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) data confirms that dangerous levels of dioxins had migrated into some residents’ yards. The location of the site, at an elevation of more than 60 feet above much of downtown Pensacola, along with conditions present during the plant’s operation suggest that storm water runoff often carried contaminants well beyond the closest residential neighborhoods. Having ceased operations in 1982, the plant had been abandoned and left in great disarray with numerous violations remaining unchecked. These included leaking drums, a lab full of broken equipment and open containers, an overturned electrical transformer, and crumbling asbestos insulation around a boiler. There was soil, sludge, and groundwater contamination from 40 years of wood preserving activities. By the mid-eighties, the extent of the contamination had become obvious; the site was abandoned in 1991 when the company declared bankruptcy. The Escambia Treating site was dubbed “Mount Dioxin” because the mound of contaminated soil dug up from the neighborhood had reached a height of 60 feet. The contaminated mountain of dirt was covered loosely with a black plastic wrap, and today, the L-shaped mound holds 255,000 cubic yards of soil contaminated with dioxins. Dioxin, of course, is one of the most dangerous compounds ever made. Mrs. Williams took her campaign on the road to EPA’s National Environmental Justice Advisory Council or NEJAC in 1985. She got NEJAC’s Waste Subcommittee to hold a Superfund Relocation Roundtable in Pensacola. She won the backing of more than 100 grassroots organizations. Citizens Against Toxic Exposure (CATE) began to get media coverage in the U.S. and in the foreign press. The Pensacola story became the “Black Love Canal.” It was just a matter of time until EPA had to give in and take steps to correct the condition. The EPA nominated the Escambia Wood Treating Superfund site as the country’s pilot program to help the agency develop a nationally consistent relocation policy that would consider not only toxic levels but also welfare issues such as property values, quality of life, health and safety. This was a monumental achievement and came about through pressure exerted by an influential and informed population.

30 One such informational event came about In 1996, when President Clinton was campaigning for re-election to the presidency in Pensacola, Florida. At that time, CATE was fighting to have their families evacuated from a toxic area, and with the help of donations that CHHW helped to raise, CATE bought a full-page ad in the Florida edition of USA Today for $7,000. The President’s campaign staff became informed at that time. Gibbs said, “They were pleading with the president and on October 3, 1996, the families were given the go ahead for relocation.” American people have been speaking out. We want to regain democracy; we just need to get a whole lot smarter about how we do it” (Gibbs, 1996).21 Information exchange is the key to citizen involvement in environmental policies. In the most basic terms it is simply people working together, providing opportunity for face-to-face dialogue among contending parties. With a combination of such civic dialogue, and the inclusion of good science, and logical discourse through open meetings, public participation is abetted by the information process. It requires that all interested parties–individuals, groups, and formal organizations operate in good faith with a real desire to reach a fair and equitable agreement. (Friedmann, 1987) In summary, this chapter has supplied a brief overview of the impact small grassroots organizations have had on the environmental justice movement. Personal experiences demonstrate the human impact of an environmental disaster, the impact on right-to-know laws, and linkages to other environmental justice movements and environmental activists. There has been a notable effect on federal and state environmental laws. If laws, both federal and state, are to be changed, the process of information exchange among all of the parties involved must overcome barriers of human perceptions, expectations, and values (Caldwell, 1993). Problems are resolved by the sharing of information and power and the selfless promotion of social, community, and economic good. The next chapter provides further explanation of the theory that has guided this research.

21 As of November 1999, EPA said they would relocate all 358 households at a cost of $18 million, however the move will depend on whether the families successfully negotiate purchase prices for their property. Such victories continue to happen for other toxic waste activists Gibbs’s organization has helped to achieve an understanding of the perceived interest or impact on a particular environment issue. The people have spoken in such instances when awakened to the opportunity to participate in the ultimate decisions made on their surrounding environment (Bauer & Randolph, 1999).

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CHAPTER THREE

METHODOLOGY

Social Network Theory

In chapter 1, Social Network Theory was described briefly. It is important to provide a framework for understanding this theoretical orientation since it provides the underlying basis for examination of our topic. This chapter more fully examines the components of that theory and attempts to describe its application to the developmental principles of HOPE, the local grassroots organization in Perry, Florida. Social Network Theory centers on information needs and uses and the participation of individuals and groups, and embraces a broad range of communicative practices aimed at voicing public opinion and influencing decision-making. Social network theory explains “help-seeking behavior” for information strategy. The theory includes how primary and secondary information22 is brought into the population in question, thereby adding insight to information use and users needs (Chatman, 1992). In this case study, social network theory depicts how information and behavior of an organization improves public participation to shape environmental decision-making. Social network theory is exemplified by a network of individuals driven to achieve a particular goal. The term “social network” refers to regular interpersonal transactions that assist individuals in confronting problems (Chatman, 1992).23 The network of individuals, might include family, friends, and neighbors, co- workers or professionals. Integral to the success of the network are several factors that will be covered here, one of which would be the structure of the network, but also would include the existence of relevant sources of information in forging that structure (Chatman, 1992). The network relies on the frequency of

22The primary information bank for this study is HOPE, the secondary information banks include LEAF, DEP, EPA, and CCHW. Refer to Chapter 1 for details on these organizations and their impact on environmental justice movements. 23Information exchanges are undertaken by a variety of individuals and groups, including elected officials, government agencies, scientific and technical experts, citizens, activists, academics, social movement organizations, corporations, public relations firms, and policy research institutes (Environmental Communication and the Environment, 1999).

32 contact among members as well as the content of primary and secondary sources. The continuous and frequent exchange of information among members utilizing appropriate sources strengthens the message or mission and its effects on the members of the base network (Johnson, 1983; Seale, 1998). Social network theory is based on five propositional concepts and statements. These elements serve to explain the relationship between the basis of the theory and the environmental justice issue.

1. Structural Attributes: Structural attributes refer to the size of each set of social contacts (Chatman, 1992; Depner & Ingersoll, 1982). The size of the network provides information about the social functioning of the individual and the availability of resources (Chatman, 1992). The structural attribute within a social network is composed of a set of participants and the relationships that hold them together. Participants include individual people, or a composite of units such as departments, organizations, or families. The participants, within the structural organizations bring “loyalty to the organization or to some person or groups within it that can be either individually or collectively forged” (Chatman, 1992). The members of the structural organization have feelings of attachment, of belonging, or strongly wanting to be part of something; this bonding inspires trust, voluntary self-alignment, and a desire or willingness to follow faithfully the leadership or guidelines of the organization (Adler & Adler, 1988). A primary focus of the social network theory is the direct link of individuals and/or groups to become directly involved with the issue in question (Kochen, 1989). In relation to the social network theory, over the past 20 years a broad grassroots environment movement has emerged with a network structure consisting of direct citizen involvement in exposing toxic hazards, especially toxic waste facilities, and to publicize disproportionate exposure of toxic hazards of communities of low social and economic status. When energized by such an important issue as environmental injustice threatening family health and well- being, advocacy gathers force and influence.

2. Homogeneity: Homogeneity centers on the kinds of relationships between those that make up the network (Chatman, 1992; Walker, McBride, & Vachon, 1977). Homogeneity focuses on both a primary group and secondary groups and how people within those groups acquire, share, and use information in response to a problematic situation (Chatman, 1992). Within the realm of grassroots environmentalism, information and the sharing of the information are vital to taking action against a hazardous situation. HOPE, in this case is the primary organization and is joined by others as combatants in a common struggle. This union or joining of forces is predictable in grassroots organizations, and there exists the developing information exchange. HOPE reached out to the Legal Environmental Assistance Foundation (LEAF) for

33 legal advice then utilized that information to gain access to government documents. Both organizations used the media to force the needed information into “the light” required by Florida Sunshine Laws. Homogeneity on the environmental issue was seen to be a potent force for the developing advocacy.

3. Density: Density refers to the nature and degree of interaction among members of the network (Chatman, 1992; Cole, 1985; Depner & Ingersoll, 1982). The main characteristics of density is frequency of contact between the primary and secondary groups, the substance and degree of interaction among members and the willingness to exchange information and to provide social support (Bates & Peacock, 1989; Chatman, 1992; Monge, 1987). In Perry, Florida, the primary network, Help Our Polluted Environment (HOPE), sought to mobilize enough concern and consciousness to help citizens understand why environmental justice issues are vital to the community’s health. Secondary groups, in addition to the Legal Environmental Assistant Foundation (LEAF), included the Environmental Protect Agency (EPA) and social small grassroots organizations such as Citizens Cleaninghouse of Hazardous Waste (CCHW), and the National Toxic Council (NTC) who provided social and financial support.24 While in its active and influential stage, HOPE members had frequent contact and interacted in cooperative manner to get the movement underway.

4. Content: Content adds social and material resources that are exchanged (Chatman, 1992). Content includes, but is not limited to, information regarding services to mobilize enough concern, knowledge, consciousness to make clear a particular situation by raising widespread consciousness and knowledge about issues, and their clarification to the community (Kochen, 1989). The intensity of the message occurs in stages and is shown in Susan J. Steinberg’s journal article “Diffusion” in which she describes a five stage process: First is Awareness (the individual learns of the information); second is Interest (the individual seeks more information); Third is Evaluation ( individuals assesses the information in terms of benefits); Fourth is Trial (further evaluation to reduce any uncertainties); and finally there is Adoption (the individual adopts the information) (Strinberg, 1984). Within many minority communities this is relevant because of the shortage of knowledge, the lack of consciousness and organization keeps certain people from informed conclusions in lessening the risks within their own living environments (Environmental Institute of Houston, 1994). In such cases, content must be clear and understandable and speak to an irrefutable outcome, in this case, the correction of environmental injustice.

24The Citizens’ Clearinghouse on Hazardous Waste (CCHW), founded by Love Canal homemaker Lois Gibbs in 1983 and the National Toxins Campaign (NTC).

34

5. Dispersion: Dispersion is the social distance between members who are part of the network and a symbolic proximity must exist before a participant will engage in an interpersonal process of sharing information (Chatman, 1992).25 The closer the members are to one another the stronger the influence of information received or disseminated to the network at risk (Chatman, 1992). Of course, influence of the other factors plays a role here, and it is clear that HOPE had formed a social network utilizing the five propositions. Examining the propositions once more we are able to see the connections between HOPE and a functional social network

1. Structure: Action to make the environment of the community a safe haven void of life-threatening illnesses (pollution prevention). In this case of environmental issues and community life, this can be seen under the banner of environmental justice. Local groups had developed into a powerful new social movement applying the language and strategies of the civil rights movement to counter health threats to their communities (Suro, 1993). Individuals become aware.

2. Homogeneity: Understanding of primary and secondary networks goals. The organization develops an interest and the cause of environmental justice is served. .

3. Density: Citizen participation in environmental regulation. Evaluation of the issues begins and the group intensity increases.

4. Content: There is information exchange within the primary (HOPE) and secondary networks (EPA, LEAF, etc.), and various sources are utilized to spread the word. Further evaluation takes place to reduce uncertainties – the trial process.

5. Dispersion: Mobilizing enough immediate community concern for the public’s health and its economic well-being. Adoption take place. The network HOPE evidently formed a social network utilizing the five propositions. As a social network, HOPE sought to activate enough energy (structural), consciousness (density), organization (homogeneity), knowledge (content), and concern (dispersion) to make the environment of the community a safe haven free of life-threatening illnesses for all of its citizens. As a social network, HOPE represents a force for change in the

25 The closer the members of the network are, or become, will have direct impact on the types of information or support they will share. Those who are more strongly aligned are likely to show similarities in attitudes, background, experiences, and access to resources (Haythornthwaite, 1999).

35 community under study. It has operated under the leadership of one individual, Joy Towles, who created this social network utilizing information of primary and secondary sources outlining the environmental justice issue within the community. HOPE disseminated the information in forms the public could understand and over time, the strength of the organization had grown into a social network system.

Method–Case Study, Data Collection

The case study method was used to research the information behavior involved in environmental activism in a small, rural, and poor community in Perry, Florida. The study examines the development of a small grassroots environmental organization, HOPE (Help Our Polluted Environment) and how the members of HOPE utilized information to bring attention to an environmental crisis in their community. As stated in chapter 1 this study is oriented to environmental advocacy and therefore utilizes the thinking of those who struggle for environmental justice. Case studies examine processes relevant to a specific case, draw on multiple sources of information, and tell a story, usually in a chronological order (Wimmer & Dominick, 1991). Adler and Adler (1994) recommend that case study researchers use a “style of writing that draws the reader so closely into subjects’ worlds that these can be deliberately felt.” Also, a case study deals with phenomena in a real life context. It addresses the activities of a program and its procedures (Leedy, 1997). Case study is defined as: “A method of studying social phenomena through the analysis of an individual case. The case may be a person, group, an episode, a process, a community, a society, or any other unit of social life. The approach rests on the assumption that the case being studied is typical of cases of a certain type, so that through intensive analysis generalizations may be made which will be applicable to other cases of the same type” (Adler & Adler, 1994). There are four characteristics or principles of case study method: (1) particularistic–the case study focuses on a particular situation, event, program, or phenomenon, making case study a good method for studying real-life situations; (2) descriptive–the final result of a case study is a detailed description of the topic under study; (3) heuristic–a case study helps people to understand what is being studied; and (4) inductive–most case studies depend on deductive reasoning. Principles and generalizations emerge from an examination of the information gathered (Wimmer & Dominick, 1991). The essence of a case study is that it tries to illuminate a decision or set of decisions: why they were taken, how they were implemented, and with what result (Schramm, 1971). Case study method rests on the assumption that the case being studied is

36 typical of cases of a certain type, so that through intensive analysis, generalizations may be made that will apply to other cases that have similar criteria pertaining to that type (Babbie, 1992). Case study methodology “provides an opportunity for the intensive analysis of many specific details that are often overlooked with other methods” (Davidman, 1992). Case study method includes on-site interviews, observations, and searching for records and artifacts. The study of the information behaviors of grassroots environmental activists is representative of such research. The benefit of the case study method is that it allows the researcher to focus on contemporary events (Yin, 1984). The researcher is able to explore a single entity bounded by time and action and through collecting detailed information by observations and on-site interviews, resulting in qualitative data rather than quantitative analysis. Case studies are used when “how” and “why” questions provide answers to the research questions and the researcher is not in a position to control the events (Yin, 1994). This study utilizes case study analysis of environmental decision-making by investigating documents, reports, pamphlets, letters, and film and audio interviews of key participants. Interviews can bring together a vast amount of information about the case from individuals who actually participated in the events (Yin, 1994). One disadvantage is the researchers’ potential response to the event in question and the effect on the data gathering process (Schwartz, 1949). The researcher has the ability to manipulate the observation directly, precisely, and systematically, in a way that could lead to distortion of the results. Further, one is not able to generalize results beyond the unit being studied, although insight into other units may be transferable (Yin, 1984). Case study is an exploration of a question or questions of interest, and examines the processes of a case, draws on multiple sources of information, and tells a story, usually in chronological order. Case studies are most helpful when the researcher is dealing with how or why questions. Studying the history of environmental movement with a focus on HOPE is especially appropriate. Evaluation of the case is focused on a real life situation.

Data Collection Techniques

There are several sources for collecting evidence in case studies: (1) documents, (2) archival records, (3) physical artifacts, (4) direct observation of participants (possibly participant observation) (5) interviews (Yin, 1989). The researcher must use several of these sources of evidence to create an information framework, and maintain a chain of evidence (Yin, 1989). Using multiple sources of evidence is vital to the validity and reliability of any case study. In collecting data in a case study, there must be an information format to organize evidence collected. How it is collected and organized is left to

37 the investigator. Typical techniques used include field notes, audio and video recordings, on-site observation, and hard copy or computerized documents.

38 CHAPTER FOUR

A CASE STUDY: HELP OUR POLLUTED ENVIRONMENT (HOPE)

This chapter begins with a historical overview of the lumber industry in Taylor County, Florida in which Perry is located. The products of this industry are examined in terms of the toxins it has produced. The chapter introduces the reader to the organization HOPE and its activity informing the residents of the community of the impact of the industry on community health and welfare.

The History of the Lumber Industry in Taylor County, Florida

Taylor County, Florida, has a colorful past rooted in the forest industry. Taylor County, named after General John Taylor in 1846, is located in the northern section of the state of Florida. The town of Perry, the county seat, is located in the center of the county, 50 miles southeast of Tallahassee and 135 miles west of Jacksonville. Forests cover 90 percent of Taylor County, making the lumber industry its main employer. The county’s first census, taken in 1860, recorded 1,384 residents. In the next century, the census showed only 99 additional residents (Perry-Taylor County Chamber of Commerce, 1995). Taylor County and Perry have grown, the population now stands as 7,502. However, even with this growth, Perry remains as a small, rural, farming and low-income community. The lumber industry and the Southern Railway System put Taylor County and Perry on the map. James Howard Stephens founded the first lumber industry in the area in 1842. The mill produced pencils from cedar. Teams of oxen pulled the cedar to a stream that leads to the open waters of the Gulf of Mexico. The cedar was cut into pencil stock, resulting in 1,157,000 miles of lead pencils annually. By 1890, the cedar forests were exhausted and the evolution of the timber industry in Taylor County was underway with the addition of two more mills: Brooks-Scanlon Corporation for yellow pine and the Burton Swatz for the raw production of cut red cypress (Nature Coastlines, 1999). The introduction of the railroad to Florida made the timber industry of Taylor County a multi-billion dollar business. In 1902, the South Georgia Railway first entered Perry.26

26 http://www.esf.edu/coce/cong/htm, April, 1999.

39 The railway made its way through the wilderness, once accessible only by foot or horseback, to supply needed raw lumber materials to the growing South Florida. From the onset, the forest industry became a main topic of debate. As indicated earlier, the forest industry drew national attention to Taylor County. In order to accomplish this growth the industry drew on an untapped labor source– prisoners. On August 10, 1921, the county commission voted to lease prisoners to the Putnam Lumber Company with full support of the Florida Legislature. One House Member remarked, “Lumber companies are anxious to get prison labor and for a very good reason–the fact that free labor can’t be hired for love or money to do the work the convicts are forced to do” (McCory, 1923). To attract business investment and revitalize the local economy after World War II, (24952 Fla. Stat. No.1338), In 1947, the city fathers of Perry, Florida, and Procter & Gamble asked the Legislature to designate the Fenholloway River for industrial usage, hoping to lure jobs to rural Taylor County. Local politicians, envisioning jobs and capital, pronounced this a fine idea.27 Lobbyists went to work. The bill they offered the Legislature designated the Fenholloway an "industrial river. “Any manufacturing or industrial plant in Taylor County”, the bill read, "is hereby empowered to discharge and deposit sewage, industrial and chemical wastes and effluents, or any of them, into the waters of the Fenholloway River and the waters of the Gulf of Mexico into which said river flows" (Laws of Florida, Chapter 24952-No. 1338, 1947). The House passed it April 22, 1947, the Senate the next day. Votes in both chambers were unanimous. The bill allowed the mill to dump any waste, including industrial and chemical sewage, into the river. Procter & Gamble/Buckeye Public Relations Manager, Dan Simmons, said it was a different time for America and industry had the upper-hand: “The company came in and took advantage of the situation and back then the people weren’t as conscious of the need to improve the environment. Senator Leroy Collins voted for the plant. It is hard to go back and vilify him for doing what they thought was right. It was after World War II, people needed jobs, the economy had to be rebuilt. Well here is–a good industry and high paying jobs. They knew it was going to impact the river and that is why they passed the law, so they could legally impact the river” (Simmons, 1999). The Fenholloway River was now classified as an Industrial Class V river. Rivers are ranked as recreational or industrial and by Classes -- I to V, with the highest number belonging to non-navigational (for recreational) or for the support

27 The Southern Georgia Railway still maintains the only transportation into and out of Perry and lumber remains the number one export.

40 of navigation of barges or ships and industrial waste. An industrial class V river, is defined by the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System, as is a body of water with the least stringent water quality standards and is only required to be maintained at a level sufficient to support navigation, utility and industry uses. An example of an industrial class V river is the Mississippi River and an example of a recreational class V river would be the Snake River in Wyoming. Public attention to potential environmental problems grew very slowly. It was after all 1947. It wasn’t until 1962 when Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring was first published documenting the deadly carnage of the pesticide dichloro- diphenyl-trichloriethane (DDT) on the environment and on human life following the increased use of pesticides following the end of World War II. And not until the late 1960s, did the modern "environmental movement" begin to take shape as a direct response to the influence of Silent Spring, promoting state legislatures nationwide to introduced 40 bills regulating pesticides by the end of 1962. During the 1970s, Congress passed a dozen major environmental laws. Outcry over the “eco-destruction “ did push Congress to pass the Clean Water Act in 1972, which regulates the discharge of pollutants into U.S. waters and makes it unlawful for industry to discharge pollutants without a permit. The problem was an estimated 70 percent of the nation's waters were polluted before adoption of the Act, according to a 2002 report by the Clean Water Network, a D.C.-based coalition of 1,000 groups. In the decades that followed, some of the clouded waters started to clear. Yet toxic chemicals remained, embedded in bay sediments, open to the fish that feed on them - the very fish then consumed by humans. The Fenholloway River was now legally designated as an industrial use river to help attract industry to the region. The bill allowed the mill to dump any waste, including industrial and chemical sewage into the river. The agreement is a classic example of “environmental blackmail.” That is, if a state or community will allow an organization to build an environmentally unfriendly plant or dump, and pollute the air, water and land as it pleases, the organization will provide jobs.28 The paper mill located near Perry has been the industrial lifeblood of this otherwise rural region, an hour's drive southeast of Tallahassee near Florida's Big Bend. Federal studies in 1998 and 1999 said the waters there were tainted with dioxin, a carcinogen, and the dangerous neurotoxin mercury pollutants remain today. Southern leaders have long hunted industry. As slavery dissolved with Dixie's loss of the Civil War, the South sought to diversify its economy from cotton. Eager to bring jobs to the economically needy region, Southern leaders

28 In the next decade, however, the nation underwent a cultural change as environmentalism entered the mainstream. Suddenly the project to amend the impact of industry on the environment became a major public concern.

41 throughout the 20th century lured paper mills, phosphate mining, oil refineries and coal-burning power plants. Southern leaders dangled tax breaks and incentives - including free land in some cases - to lure industry. "The South has always been very poor and until recently, almost anything that would get people jobs was looked upon as good and you didn't ask too many questions," said Michael Thomason, director of the University of South Alabama's archives and a history professor. "You'd give them anything you'd have to come here. Give them land, They were desperate. These people were eating possums and, well, possums are not very tasty. It's not like chicken." With heavy industry establishing itself, World War II brought a new wave of industry to the Gulf Coast. Cheap land and labor, rich natural resources and anti-union sentiments lured environmentally damaging industries, such as paper mills and chemical companies. They looked to the South, where states' environmental regulations were looser and most regulators often diverted their eyes for the sake of jobs. Paper and pulp mills settled in Florida in the 1940s and 1950s. Including the paper mill in Perry after the state declared the Fenholloway River an industrial river . "The South, in general, was attractive to the worst types of industries. Florida was associated with the blighted South," said Gary Mormino, a history professor at the University of South Florida in Tampa. "Florida may have been better off not getting them." Few Gulf Coast residents were concerned about the toxins that industries were discharging - until it was too late. "It was out of sight, out of mind," said Sarah Paris, an 82-year-old fifth-generation resident of the Perry, Florida area. "Oh my gosh, it was a way of life. We just took things for granted until we woke up and said, 'What's happening to my back yard?” "We are living with what was left to us by our forefathers," said Joy Towles. By 1997 the company employed more than 800 Taylor County residents with three-quarters of those workers being Perry residents. The earnings in 1997 from all industries in the county reached $187,689,000. Income from the Buckeye Cellulose Plant earned nearly $80,000,000, nearly half of the total earnings of the entire county. The company had a $40 million payroll and paid half the property taxes in the town of Perry and an estimated additional 1,000 jobs, including loggers, suppliers and other allied services, were produced indirectly from the mill. As of 1999, the largest employer in the county was the P&G/Buckeye Cellulose Plant (formerly the Procter & Gamble Pulp Plant) located in Perry. The plant in Taylor County ranks eighth in the state for toxic releases totaling 2,010,024 pounds a day into the air, water and land (EPA, 1999).

42 The Product and the By-Product

In 1954, P&G mill began producing pulp. The process converts pine logs into cellulose, which is used in disposable diapers, plastics, rayons, explosives, film and even sausage casings (NPDES Permit No. FL0000876, United States Environmental Protection Agency). The P&G/Buckeye Plant uses 2.4 million tons of pine trees annually. The process of making cellulose pulp goes on 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. It starts with trees - lots of trees. From there, the trees are cut into chips and turned into pulp, after soaking in strong chemicals. The goal is to separate the cellulose - a naturally occurring substance in cell walls of plants - from the rest of the tree. The pulp gets washed, bleached to a more acceptable color and into a more purified state and then dried. Among the variety of pulp and paper products, Buckeye's pulp is considered the purest because it's used in specialized niche markets. The plant caused immediate environmental problems beginning with clear- cutting large tracts of trees. Hardwoods were demolished and replaced with pines, destroying the groves where animals and birds nested. The bigger problem, however, was the river. Fifty-million gallons of the plant’s discharge began flowing into the Fenholloway River (Environmental Protection Agency, 1990). The unlimited and uncontrolled dumping made the Fenholloway River the worst polluted river in Florida and the 30th worst in the nation. The main pollutant is “dioxin”–a general term to describe a family of 75 different compounds with widely varying degrees of toxicity. Dioxin is the main ingredient of Agent Orange, the compound used during the Vietnam Conflict that killed hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese and caused illness and death to American soldiers as well (Environmental Law Reporter, 1989). In the state of Florida factories dumped enough toxic chemicals into rivers and bays to give the state the No. 13 ranking in the nation for polluted water (EPA, 25 Septemeber 1996). Among the most polluted rivers in the state, according to the study, are the Fenholloway River in Taylor County and the near Live Oak. Also, the Buckeye Florida plant near Perry is among polluters reporting the greatest amounts of toxic chemicals discharged into Florida waters. The totals were compiled from 1990 to 1994 using figures given to the federal Environmental Protection Agency by the manufacturers themselves as part of the Toxic Release Inventory program. The Fenholloway River ranks second in toxic-chemical releases. Between 1990 and 1994, 12.1 million pounds of toxic chemicals were discharged into Florida water-ways, while another 58 million pounds of toxins were flushed into the state's sewage-treatment plants, giving Florida the No. 11 spot in that category. The problem, according to the environmental groups that compiled the figures, is that most producers of toxic wastewater are exempt from having to

43 report their releases, said Susie Caplowe of the Florida Consumer Action Network (Environmental Working Group. Compiled from U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Toxics Release Inventory 1990-1994). From 1990 to 1994 using figures given to the federal Environmental Protection Agency by the manufacturers themselves, as part of the Toxic Release Inventory program, the Fenholloway River ranked second in dioxin- chemical releases. And Buckeye Florida, formerly the Procter & Gamble plant, also ranked a distant second to Ray-onier Inc. of Fernandina Beach among polluters. Rayonier discharged 7,428,844 pounds of toxic chemicals into rivers from 1990 to 1994, and Buckeye Florida dumped 1,896,369 pounds of additional pollutants into the Fenholloway River. Florida factories dumped enough toxic chemicals into rivers and bays to give the state the No. 13 ranking in the nation for polluted water (EPA, Toxic Release Inventory. September, 25, 1996). Among the most polluted rivers in the state, according to the study, are the Fenholloway River in Taylor County and the Suwannee River near Live Oak. Also, the Buckeye Florida plant near Perry is among polluters reporting the greatest amounts of toxic chemicals discharged into Florida waters, and the St. Joe Forest Products Co. of Port St. Joe is among polluters discharging the greatest amount of toxic chemicals into state sewage-treatment facilities. The National Academy of Science Institute of Medicine links a wide range of health problems to exposure of dioxin: soft tissue sarcoma, Hodgkin’s disease, non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma and liver disorders. The Academy also has evidence of its association to other cancers: respiratory, prostrate and multiple myeloma (Capek, 1993). The health risks of dioxin do not stop with cancers. Even at low levels of exposure, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) identifies other serious ailments: damage to the body’s immune system, neurological and reproductive systems (Citizen’s Clearinghouse for Hazardous Waste, 1993). It wasn’t until 1990 that the Environmental Protection Agency had documented severe chemical pollution in the Fenholloway, with apparent heavy impact on fish. Epidemiologists found high rates of leukemia and other illnesses associated with chemical pollution among the nearby human population (Merritt, 1994). The 1990 Environmental Protection Agency study found that the Fenholloway River had dioxin levels 1,900 times greater than the agency's standard. Immediately following the 1990 EPA report, the Florida Department of Health and Rehabilitative Services, in conjunction with the Florida Department of Environmental Regulation, issued a press release announcing a health advisory relating to the Fenholloway River. This health advisory in part urged the public not to consume fish caught in the river because of dioxin contamination. In addition, Procter & Gamble Cellulose Company, Buckeye's predecessor, posted signs at four locations along the river warning in the English language that the Fenholloway was classified as a Class V river and that it was "not designated for recreation or fishing”.

44 Still, in 10 years, neither the state nor the federal government has posted signs along the Fenholloway to warn people not to eat the fish. "It's pitiful," said Joy Towles Cummings. "People are still eating contaminated fish, and nobody's doing anything about it. I mean, how long do we have to wait?" When asked why the Florida Department of Health hasn't put up more signs warning anglers of the dioxin in Fenholloway fish, state toxicologist Joe Sekerke didn't have an answer. "It hasn't been done, and I don't know exactly why," Sekerke said. "Putting signs up doesn't usually keep people from eating the fish anyway" (Phone interview: 02 September 2001). The Environmental Defense Fund reports that dioxin is clearly the most toxic man-made chemical that has ever been studied. It was dioxin that caused the evacuation of Times Beach, Missouri; it was dioxin that closed Love Canal in New York and three-quarters of the Superfund sites in the United States are dioxin related (Gibbs, 1995). To be sure, isolated groups of citizens had voiced their concern about pollution from the Proctor & Gamble plant in earlier years, but such efforts were relatively weak and unsuccessful. In a conversation with Sara Paris, one of the co-founders of HOPE, it was learned that “in the 1970s one group started up to try to do something about this problem (pollution), but it was just totally crushed. The local paper and local politicians pretty much crushed them. The company simply bought up their property and relocated them…their property was bought by the company. They physically relocated these people who complained back then” (Sara Paris, HOPE Co-Founder, 1999). Paris went on to say that since that time not much had changed in terms of the tactics that had been employed. “We’ve been criticized in the local paper. They called us armed radical environmental terrorists. They have tried to run us down and really tried to make us out to be the bad guy in order to get the focus off of the problem. They’ve threatened our homes, our vehicles, and us traveling down the road...: This brief interchange with a dedicated activist seeking to make her community a cleaner, healthier place to live places in perspective the immense task of disseminating vital information to the people when economic interests are threatened. It identifies an extreme social inequity when the forces of the media designed to keep citizens aware of harmful factors are linked to a political system that does not intervene because it is enjoined to the best interests of economic development. In proclaiming the “goodness” of such efforts, it is simple to place obstructionists in the role of troublemakers to the best interests of the community, thus providing the confusion necessary to retain power. With the emergence of Project HOPE, however came a stronger, better organized voice through which information could be disseminated.

45 The Protests Begin: The History of HOPE and Public Information

In 1910, a beautiful resort hotel patterned after the spas of the north was constructed just west of Perry. It was built with wide verandahs, swimming pool, tennis courts, and golf course. Hampton Springs Hotel, built on the Fenholloway River, was a marvel for the area. It had been built on the site of a sulfurous spring which was claimed to have highly medicinal qualities. With its own depot on the spur from Perry, trains delivered the wealthy tourists and weary industrialists directly to the resort. Pools and fountains filled with exotic fish were placed throughout the landscaped grounds. Unfortunately, tragedy struck in early 1954 when the beautiful establishment burned to the ground. No attempts were ever made to rebuild. Also in 1954, Procter and Gamble Cellulose Company built a pulp and paper mill in Perry on the same river, the Fenholloway. The plant immediately began discharging 50 million gallons per day of treated effluent, which on average constitutes 85% of the Fenholloway River’s flow. By 1990, the status of local economic hero, P&G, was being transformed into a national environmental outrage. The “sudden outrage” followed the 1990 EPA report of dioxin in the Fenholloway River and with the warning sign not to consume fish from the river residents of Perry became more fully aware of the full health risks associated with employment of the major employer in the county through information provided by Help Our Polluted Environment (HOPE). Perry residents began complaining about pollution and lack of economic benefits and rallied against P&G. Public attention to potential environmental problems grew very slowly. In 1980 a group of scientists found that the Mosquito fish (Gambusia holbrooki) living downstream from the Foley’s paper mill had masculinized secondary sex characteristics (Howell et al., 1980 cited in Environmental Research Foundation, 1996; Orlando et al., 2002), including altered anal fin development and reproductive behavior, confirming the suspicion that effluents were causing damage. In addition, when Florida was hit by a severe drought in 1989-90, residents near the plant complained to the local health authority that their drinking water from the wells smelled like rotten egg. State officials conducted several well water tests in June 1990 but found “no conclusive evidence” of chemical compounds. Nonetheless residents were advised not to drink water from their wells by the Florida Department of Health and Rehabilitative Services in September of 1990i. Water pollution in the Fenholloway River gained further attention in March 1991 when the Tallahassee Democrat published a Pulitzer prize-nominated story on the Fenholloway (Hauserman 1991). The article stimulated broad debate and encouraged environmental groups to petition the EPA to challenge Florida environmental officials and upgrade the river from its industrial classification to a recreational

46 river where “fish can survive and people can swim” (Multinational Monitor 1991).29 Perry resident, and self-made environmentalist, Joy Towles, became the mainstay of the fight for environmental justice and the major force for dissemination of information. She thus became the spokesperson for the residents and began an environmental justice movement against the billion-dollar corporation (P&G). The dispute between the two was over the release of dioxin into the environment, making drinking water unsafe and affecting the quality of life with respect to fishing, farming, and clean air. In studying the battle for environmental justice in Perry, this study reports the value and power vested in the spread of information, and the necessity of its dissemination to those in need. Indeed, information and its management provide the key elements in the spread of environmental justice.

Communication Begins…

Towles began her task by contacting people who lived near the pulp plant to investigate stories of polluted water. “I had written to the Tallahassee Democrat, I had begged them to do some articles about the Fenholloway, that was way back in ‘91. I’d written to 60 Minutes, I’d done everything I knew to do to draw some attention to this problem, ‘cause (sic) I knew it was there. I knew it was happening and nothing was going on, and all of a sudden, after I had put an ad in our local paper asking people to join a class action suit on the water quality there, that came out in the local paper on a Friday and the very next Sunday, this article came out in the Tallahassee Democrat and I was jumping up and down and screaming–saying finally somebody noticed, good God somebody is finally noticing what’s happening here and that started a whole lot of things to happen a little bit before that. I had met some people in Greenpeace and they promised to help and they have and then in ‘92 a state EPA report came out with this ‘state links the dirty wells to the P&G Mill” (1999).

29 In September of 1990, the Florida Department of Health and Rehabilitative Services, in conjunction with the Florida Department of Environmental Regulation (FDEP’s predecessor), issued a press release announcing a health advisory relating to the Fenholloway River. This health advisory in part urged the public not to consume fish caught in the river because of dioxin contamination. As of January, 2000, a Florida Department of Health No-Fish-Consumption Advisory was still in effect for the Fenholloway River due to elevated dioxin levels in the river's fish.

47 The local ad in the Perry newspaper opened the door of information exchange, and found a ready audience. For the next few days, Towles said her phone rang off the hook with nearly 400 calls in 2 weeks (Towles, 1999). “I was on the phone for over two weeks, I got over 500 phone calls. So, I knew there was a lot of concern here about the water. Lot of people would say "You know that I'm on your side, but I can't get give you my name. I can't get involved in this because my husband or my brother works at the mill. I don't know what could happen to me, they might burn down my house if I get involved with your group, but I'm on your side." Since people have called and said I can't get involved, but I really believe in what you’re doing, so please don't stop. It's given us the dedication to go on. We've got over 300 members now, we've got about 30 really active members, who always come to the meetings and help out and who have really given a lot since we started” (Towles, 1999). Many of those callers were former P&G/Buckeye mill workers who had a story to tell and wanted an opportunity to provide first-hand information on what went on inside the plant and just where illegal discharges were located. Towles also connected with people who lived near the pulp plant to investigate stories of polluted water.30 Her investigations were met with mixed outcomes: “The community didn’t want us investigating anything. For us (HOPE) to say anything, the economic value for the community would be lost. The only thing they're thinking about is the dollar bill. What they (the community) don't (sic) realize is that sure this mill provides jobs, benefits such as retirement, partial health benefits and so on and so forth. It's also their money that's paying for their insurance to treat a disease or an ailment that the company's effluent causes. The only thing they can see is the physical dollar” (Towles, 1999). Obviously, this is a complaint that is not unexpected in situations such as this where threats to financial well-being are perceived to exist. With care and careful direction by Towles, the project was indeed supported by enough people so that Help Our Polluted Environment (HOPE), the organization dedicated to a toxic-free future came to life in 1989.

30 This researcher interviewed Joy Towles and other members of the organization HOPE, former employees of P&G/Buckeye, the public relations director of P&G/Buckeye and members of the community on video and audio equipment. (Appendix X) Joy Towles is a fifth generation Taylor County resident. In 1965 she left to pursue a college degree in agriculture. When she returned to Perry in 1981 with a degree in Agriculture from Florida A&M University, she discovered the ground water had become contaminated from the effluent discharge from the Proctor & Gamble paper mill plant. It took her nearly 9 years to bring public attention to the environmental hazards facing the entire community of Perry.

48 The messages from the phone calls appeared clear to Towles -- not only were members of HOPE concerned with the pollution, but also employees of the plant were concerned. Towles and other members of HOPE knew they had a long road ahead of them to fight for a cleaner and safer community and they also knew a wide array of information would have to be gathered and decimated. “We developed a list (of questions) and sent it out on the mailing list to anybody I thought would help us here. Anybody here that would help or anybody somewhere else that would help us... “Well its not quite as easy as we thought it would be. You got a community that needs the jobs. People that have invested their lives in the plant so its not as simple as we'll fix it or close it down tomorrow. What you actually do is you get the best resources that you can identify the best scientific people the best legal advice, you talk with the regulator, you talk with the stake holders and then you identify with a strategy to make improvements. You go as fast you can as far as you can that the resources will allow you to do that. So then when specific groups come in and say that we want you to eliminate the use of the element chlorine right now cause we are fixing to put a railroad blockade across your railroad track. You aren't going to get anymore in. Then you have to deal with that in the context of a larger theme. Try not to let it distract it away from your larger mission but at the same time be responsive to people who have legitimate concerns, because it may be some things that you can do. And we human beings continue to learn and you can never totally isolate a group and say we won't listen to that group because they might have part of the answer” (1999). Towles graduated from high school in 1965, went off to college and was gone for a long time and finally moved back home permanently in 1981. She immediately noticed a “bad taste in the water”. Her mother’s reply was “…oh yea… oh you know, that mill polluted the water. Yeah, the mill has ruined the water hear. It just tastes terrible”. Ironically Towles had been working for a chemical company while she had been gone selling agriculture chemicals and she knew all too well of the problems with ground water contamination. “People's wells were contaminated and I was very aware of how easy it was for a person's well out in the country to get terminated. I said does everybody know bout this. She said there are a lot of people that know bout it and people don't talk about it much. Well is anybody ytrying to do anything about it. She said oh no you don't say nothing bad about Buckeye around here and I said this is ridiculous and I got all fired up” (Towles, 1999). The information activity began to function for Towles when she discovered through her network of insiders (e.g., workers at the cellulose plant) that P&G/Buckeye had been “scurrying to keep water problems quiet” (Towles, 1999). Many landowners who complained about contaminated wells had been given

49 offers to swap land with P&G, while others had new wells drilled, courtesy of P&G. “P&G/Buckeye was also directly supplying bottled water to those who complained and offered free bottled water to anyone who wanted it” (Simmons, 1999). Employees inside the plant even complained about the bad taste of the tap water there; P&G/Buckeye managers told some to add “powdered drink mixes to the water to make it more palatable” (Towles, 1999). Another step in Towles’ quest for information led her to P&G’s own documents, indicating that sinkholes beneath P&G/Buckeye’s waste-water ponds allowed untreated discharge to flow freely into the river and into the Florida Aquifer, contaminating drinking water, streams, rivers and soil in the county (Buckeye 25th Anniversary Brochure, 1979).31 Members of HOPE, with Towles in the lead, took her allegations to several Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) meetings where lawyers and lobbyists for P&G/Buckeye pleaded for more lenient dumping laws. Towles also filed several lawsuits. The P&G/Buckeye legal teams filed numerous counter motions holding up the suits in the legal system for years. In a private conversation, Towles said that she and other members of HOPE began to get threats, including one call that “threatened to cut out their tongues if they didn’t hush” (1999). Threats or no threats, the HOPE Foundation was ready and willing to wage war against P&G/Buckeye

Public Demonstration…

In an effort to demonstrate the seriousness of the issues, in June 1991, Towles and several HOPE members showed up with two fish dinners and two six-packs of water at the annual EPA meeting in Orlando, Florida. One fish dinner came from the Fenholloway River, the other dinner came from the nearby pristine . She offered Clifford Henry, a P&G/Buckeye official, and Orlando EPA Commissioner, Kenneth Wright the dinners and explained the differences between the two. Wright asked, “which is which?” Towles declined to say and both men declined the meals (FDER, 1991). The tactic worked, the commission delayed a decision on changing dioxin standards pending further review. “We were successful that day. The commission decided they had heard and seen too much conflicting information and they didn’t know what the dioxin standards should be for the Fenholloway” (Towles, 1999). Amidst the debate over water quality in the Fenholloway River, in May 1991, owners of a mobile home park filed suit in the Federal District Court in Tallahassee against Procter and Gamble for water contamination, which they

31 The 25th Anniversary Brochure was distributed at the annual P&G/Buckeye picnic, a community-wide event.

50 argued had decreased the value of their property. By 1992, about 100 local residents filed suit against the company for property damage, creation of a nuisance, and conspiracy with the pulp and paper mill to downplay the dangers of dioxin (Bowman and Toa 1993). As was the case in Hodges v Buckeye Cellulose Corporation (174 So. 2d 565: 1965), the case was thrown out by the District Court because the “plaintiff did not have sufficient standing in court to bring this suit contesting the constitutionality of Chapter 24952. The tensions at the local level came to a head in April 1992 when water conflict over the Fenholloway River caught national media attention. This time, the CBS news program “60 Minutes” aired the brutality and harassment by local residents supporting the plant against those who battled against the main employer in Taylor County. The EPA then ordered the Florida Department of Environmental Regulation (FDER) to form a health advisory committee to study matters relating to the Fenholloway River. Six months later the FDER started providing information warning residents not to consume fish caught in the river because of dioxin contamination (FDER, 1991). Despite the information, local fishermen still fish the area because, for many, it is a vital food source for one reason or another. Also the estuary of the Fenholloway River is full of crab traps that still provide crab meat to local residents and people all over the world (Action Alerts!, 1997).32

Alignment with Larger Organizations and Continued Effort

Towles next move came with the help of the international organization Greenpeace. The protest to follow began an indication of information exchange: “We organized a protest at the mill with the help of Greenpeace. We had a big stop sign and two people got locked onto the tracks. “Stop Chlorine- Save Jobs” is what the message was. We caused them a lot of grief for one entire day and stopped the chlorine train from going into the mill. We got a lot of press on it. It brought the issue to the public. We were roundly criticized for doing this, but at least it brought the idea to the community that chlorine is the problem. We've done a lot of good things. We've served contaminated fish to the Environmental Regulatory Commission and Carol Browner. We have taken live mudfish all the way to D.C. to Secretary Carol Browner's office and effluent from the river. Joe and I caught fish and I drove my pick-up truck to Washington- Joe

32 From an environmental standpoint, the poisoning of the water in Perry, Florida was not an isolated event. By 1987 the public had already witnessed dozens of environmental and public disasters: a fire on the surface of the Cuyahoga River in Ohio, an enormous oil spill in Santa Barbara, the Kepone-poisoning of the wells of Hopewell, Virginia, the inadvertent mixture of a cancer-causing fire retardant with cattle feed in Michigan (Dowie, 1996).

51 and I drove. Took the mudfish to D. C. of course we named them, couldn't catch the names. We've been on '60 Minutes.' We've been in books, magazines, and newspapers” (Towels, 1999). One of HOPE’s boldest moves came when members went to P&G’s home state of Ohio the day before the P&G annual shareholders’ meeting (October, 1992). Group members, accompanied by a television news crew, went directly to P&G’s CEO Edwin Artzt’s house, hoping to speak to him directly. However, they never made it past the driveway. The police had Artzt’s driveway blocked off. Despite this barrier to voice their concerns, HOPE members went to the P&G shareholders’ meeting. Only Towles was allowed in the meeting. She sat in the back of the room waiting for her turn to speak, which was not until the very end of the meeting. Again, Towles had brought fish and water from Perry. But before she reached the stage, a guard confiscated both. Artzt disputed any problems with the plant, noting that P&G Artzt then ordered Towles’ removal from the meeting (P&G Transcripts, 1992). After the meeting, Towles waited for 2 days in the lobby of the P&G headquarters for a chance to meet with Artzt, but he refused. Members of HOPE, with Towles leadership, without question were at the front lines in providing damning information about the plant and the health risks the plant imposed on the community. HOPE members received enormous criticism from supporters of the plant, who continued to see the plant purely in economic and historical terms. For decades the plant had been the source of the area’s economic base. The area has the geography and infrastructure to support the plant, including the Fenholloway River for dumping of the dioxin and the railway system to ship by-products of the plant nationwide. In addition, the plant generated a secondary economy of suppliers and support businesses that employ other citizens of the community.

Resistance and Dangers

Others in the network faced not only criticism but bodily harm. As members of HOPE continued to disseminate information about the health hazards of the plant, P&G/Buckeye officials gathered information about Towles and HOPE’s activities and memberships. P&G supporters even launched a smear campaign against HOPE. The Defenders of Taylor County, a group of local business leaders that supported P&G, sent a letter to a statewide environmental regulator questioning HOPE’s organization calling it a “pseudo- environmental cult”.33 Among HOPE’s charter members were 15-year

33 The letter was authored by Randall Poppel, chairmen of the Defenders of Taylor County. It was addressed to Stephen Humphrey of the Environmental Regulation Commission. 1991

52 P&G/Buckeye employees Linda Rowland, Stephanie McGuire, Maria Kyler and Janice Blair-Jackson.34 Their membership in HOPE quickly drew P&G’s attention. Rowland and McGuire owned a fishing camp, and once their membership became known, the camp was repeatedly vandalized. Animals on the farm were found dead from man-made poisons. "Women in the group began receiving threatening phone calls," Douglas Helvarg reported in his 1994 book The War Against The Greens, "including one from a caller who told them he would cut out their tongues." A local TV talk show host was taken off the air after interviewing HOPE founder Joy Towles; the station owner and a major advertiser said they had been threatened with arson. The Rowland/McGuire fishing camp was repeatedly vandalized. Pheasants they kept caged nearby were poisoned. The first encounter between McGuire and an “uninvited guest” was on April 7, 1992. In a private conversation with Julie Hauserman, a reporter from the Tallahassee Democrat, McGuire told Hauserman about walking out to her landing to greet a boat pulling up at her dock. In the boat was a man dressed in camouflage who said he had shot a cow up the road and wanted the owner’s name. Feeling uneasy, McGuire began to head back to the house. Before she could get there, two other men in camouflage and masks came out of the woods. According to McGuire account, reported by Julie Hauserman,35 the men “burned McGuire with a cigar, cut her throat with a razor, and then she was raped” (Hauserman, 1994). One of McGuire’s dogs may have saved her life, attacking one of the men and biting him in the face, bleeding heavily from his cheek he retreated to the boat. The other men followed and one of them stood up and pointed a shotgun at McGuire but lost his balance and fell. “Following the attack, sheriff’s vehicles drove back and forth over the crime scene” looking for information that could verify McGuire’s allegations (Swasy, 1993). The deputies said there was not enough blood on the ground to confirm her accusations of the incident and left. The deputies never entered the blood-spattered house; nor did they interview the neighbors who went to help her and were the first on the scene after the attack (Hauserman, 1994).36

34 The initial HOPE membership included mostly women and this is typical in environmental grassroots organizations. “Women are quicker to express their concerns about a treat to their families, homes and community (Bullard, 1993). 35 It should be noted, Julie Hauserman lost her job at the Tallahassee Democrat for her reporting of the incident (interview with author, 1998). 36 The incident reminded many of Karen tragedy. Silkwood died on November 13, 1974 in a fatal one-car crash. Since then, her story has achieved worldwide fame as the subject of many books, magazine and newspaper articles, and even a major motion picture. Silkwood was a chemical technician at the Kerr-McGee's fuels production plant in Crescent, Oklahoma, and a member of the Oil, Chemical, and Atomic Workers' Union. She was also an activist who was critical of plant safety. During the week prior to her death, Silkwood was reportedly gathering evidence for the Union to support her claim that Kerr-McGee was negligent in maintaining plant

53 The information was reported in the newspaper by Sheriff John Walker was that McGuire’s injuries were “the result of a lesbian quarrel between the cousins” (Houserman, 1994). Later McGuire was shown to be pregnant from the rape and suffered a miscarriage. Towles was at the hospital when she took the pregnancy test that confirmed her claims (Towles, 1999). Sheriff Walker issued an affidavit charging McGuire with filing a false police report. Florida State Attorney Jerry Blair was pressured to bring charges against McGuire by Dan Simmons, Buckeye P&G public relations manager, regarding P&G’s involvement in the alleged rape. Blair told St. Petersburg Times reporter Elizabeth Wilson, “I think there’s been a tremendous interest in proving that Ms. McGuire lied and I can’t prove that. I think there is a perception down here that if it could be proven in court, that, instantly, the image for the P&G plant would be changed overnight, and that is not going to happen” (Swasy, 1993). This effectively ended their role as participants in the network. Blair refused to prosecute. Dan Simmons said the image of P&G hit an all- time low following the alleged incident. “A woman reports that she’s been raped and beaten and burned and slashed and threatened with murder. The news program 60 Minutes comes down, the F.B.I. is investigating, the Florida Department of Law Enforcement is investigating and now the Center for Disease Control and the Department of Environmental Protection is investigating our water output. The investigation lasted 18 months. The rape story was front page news, the results only made it to a few publications and never on a follow-up on 60 Minutes. The story did tremendous damage to us here at the site” (1999). A short year later in September 1993, fire demolished the camp where McGuire was attacked. Towles and two friends saw smoke, drove to the scene. They were second on the scene; P&G/Buckeye public relations manager Dan Simmons was already there photographing the ashes (Towles, 1999). Rowland and McGuire quickly relocated because they feared for their lives, but in a follow- up report in the Tallahassee Democrat, the paper published Rowland and McGuire’s new address. Immediately following the report, one of their dogs was poisoned with table scraps laced with antifreeze. Fearing for their lives again they moved from Florida and gave up any legal actions against P&G/Buckeye. Simmons said the connection between the alleged rape and the investigation by the DEP and the CDC into P&G water discharge had a bigger impact on the company. According to Simmons:

safety, and at the same time, was involved in a number of unexplained exposures to plutonium. The circumstances of her death have been the subject of great speculation.

54 “The stories on the water contamination were a bigger distraction for the company than the rape and it took longer to resolve. The DEP and the CDC reports water wells in the community were contaminated. We immediately made bottled water available to people and probably spent a million dollars on bottled water. We figured the issue would be cleared up in a couple of weeks. It took several years” (1999).37

Current Situation

Despite these threats, HOPE members continue their fight for a better environment, but the pulp mill continues to dump 50 million gallons of effluent into the Fenholloway River. The Perry saga embodies the complicated politics of environmental justice and its economic impact. It is a conflict over science, law, poverty, economic development and the environment. The P&G/Buckeye Plant and HOPE represent the conflict between economic stability in a community and the rights of citizens to live in a clean and safe environment. It embodies certain prerogatives of U.S. citizenship which presuppose the availability of information necessary to make an informed decision regarding one’s life and residential conditions. It has been reported that Procter & Gamble/Buckeye spent millions diverting attention away from its dioxin-laden discharges (Hadden, 1989). The company had persuaded the EPA to initiate a multi-year “scientific reassessment” of dioxin. While the EPA promptly got the reassessment underway in April 1991, the report is yet to be concluded (State of Florida, Ground Water Investigation, 1991).38

37 P&G also drilled 600 new wells in the community and continues to supply free bottled water (Simmons, 1999). 38 In a meeting with environmentalists and state and federal officials on 8 Decmeber 2003, Buckeye Technologies rejected government-supported cleanup proposals for the Fenholloway River and insisted that it be allowed to construct a pipeline to discharge toxic pollution directly into the Gulf of Mexico. Currently the pulp mill is dumping this pollution, which includes dioxins and nutrients, into the Fenholloway River, which then flows into the gulf. The company has proposed to build a pipeline to circumvent the Fenholloway, but does not want to clean up the damage it already has done. The Florida Department of Environmental Protection (DEP), U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the Clean Water Network and NRDC (the Natural Resources Defense Council) want the company to restore the river and stop discharging hazardous pollutants into it. The agencies and organizations have been working with Buckeye for nearly three years to find ways to clean up the company's pollution. "We spent years exploring options, and we now know we have the technology to clean up this problem," said Linda Young, director of the Southeast Clean Water Network. "But Buckeye still wants Floridians to pay for its mess twice -- with our pocketbooks and our health. Cleaning up this toxic pollution is the price Buckeye is going to have to pay to do business, and we will make sure the company's discharge permit is rewritten to bring the Fenholloway back from the dead."

55 At the outset, with the constant pressure of publicity mounted by the membership of HOPE, especially following the visit to the P&G shareholders meeting in 1992 and the very publicized incident involving the alleged rape of Stephanie McGuire, P&G wanted to avoid any additional public relations backlash. Ultimately, the stockholders ordered the sale of the P&G Cellulose Plant; however, the sale was in name only. In 1994 P&G removed its name, but not its investments, from the mill. Bob Cannon, a former P&G executive bought a controlling interest in the P&G pulp mill. The price included a $40 million 5- year plan to restore the Fenholloway River to “fishable and swimmable” condition and a new name, Buckeye Cellulose. Clean-up of the river and soil, however, is on hold pending additional discussion of which technologies could achieve the best environmental results for the river. Board members of P&G bought the company and changed the name to Buckeye. However, P&G receives all the profits from the plant (Florida EPA Review, 1994). Although successful in bringing about a measure of awareness and public indignation, the membership of HOPE sensed that is would fall short of its goal to close the plant entirely. Instead, a new tactic was initiated in which HOPE would fight to have the plant adhere to state and federal standards regarding discharge from a plant into a river. This would avoid the conflict of economic issues and concerns facing the small community. The campaign by HOPE now focused on making the Fenholloway River fishable and swimmable. The goal is to look at the technical and economic possibility of additional treatment alternatives for the P7G/Buckeye mill that will improve the quality of the effluent, and help the river meet fishable and swimmable water quality standards. “We have always been very interested in seeing the cleanup of the Fenholloway River," said Jessica Landman, senior counsel with the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC). "This is a river whose time has come to enter the land of the living. I am hopeful that there are a lot of things that Buckeye can do to reduce their loadings at a cost that is affordable." The tactic on paper worked; officially the river was reclassified to a Class III on January 1, 1998.39 The reclassification to a Class III river should force the plant to adhere to more stringent pollution guidelines. Buckeye spokesperson Dan Simmons has said that the company is working on solutions (Simmons, 1999). For example, in 1995, according to Simmons, the company spent $3 million on a 3-year study. The study found that dioxin levels in the water and soil are coming down, but the dissolved oxygen levels are the same, “making the river less hazardous for humans but still environmentally unfriendly for aquatic life.” Simmons remarked, “The most dangerous things in the river are the alligators” (Simmons, 1999).40

39 As indicated earlier, a Class III river is one that is fishable and swimmable.

40 According to the 1994 EPA report on most polluted and high health risk rivers, the Fenholloway River ranked in the top 10.

56 This was evidently to represent the involvement of the company in a positive light and perception of cooperation with the efforts to create a clean and healthy environment. Environmentalists and biologists have disagreed, however, claiming the river is “environmentally unfriendly for humans and all aquatic life” (Livingston, 1999). Florida State University Biology Professor, Robert “Skip” Livingston, noted that “his study of the study of the tiny mosquito fish found in the Fenholloway River revealed the fish had taken on both female and male characteristics (Livingston, 1999). Livingston’s study, based on a 1998 study of “Abnormal Expression of Secondary Sex Characters in a Population of Mosquito Fish” (1998), revealed that a few members of the masculinized population were fully hermaphroditic–having sex organs of both male and female in a single individual; therefore, unable to reproduce. The cause was easy to find: discharge (dioxin) from the mill was equal to the entire water flow of the river. This study had been funded by P&G as part of its public relations program of community good will. Buckeye is now working with the Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) in an attempt to develop a solution that will fall in line with Class III River regulations. DEP’s Use of Attainability Analysis (UAA) suggested four alternatives for this classification change: 1) in-mill process change; 2) relocation of the discharge point closer to the mouth of the river (a pipeline); 3) oxygen injection into the discharge; and 4) establishment of wetlands as the head waters (DEP & Buckeye, 1998). The EPA, DEP and Buckeye agreed with the second suggestion: to build an 18-mile, $15 million pipeline from the plant directly to the Gulf of Mexico, virtually dumping the entire flow of the river and the discharge directly into the Gulf. This proposal served to ignite the membership of HOPE to mobilize the network for purpose of confrontation through publicity of the impending construction. First, they filed a lawsuit that requested an evidentiary hearing with the EPA Regional Administrator to contest certain provisions of Buckeye's Permit to build the pipeline. Second, HOPE sent out a press release, locally and nation, and began a phone-tree system notifying residents from Perry to the small fishing communities of the Gulf of Mexico of the reclassification of the river. HOPE’s press release claimed the dumping of the toxic effluent to the Gulf of Mexico is short-sighted solution. “A pipeline cannot solve the serious environmental problems caused by the mill–the contamination of the ground water, the Fenholloway River, the Florida Aquifer, and the soil” (Livingston, 1999). Professor Livingston said the river is finished. The American Canoe Association (ACA)41 joined HOPE to appeal the pipeline permit, and the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) killed the

41 The American Canoe Association is the nation’s oldest and largest nonprofit paddle sports organization, representing more than 50,000 canoeists, kayakers and rafters. ACA is also the country’s most active paddle sports group, fostering canoe, kayak and rafting recreation through event sponsorship, safety education, instructor certification, waterway conservation and public

57 project, at least temporarily. David Bookbinder, ACA Director of Environmental Enforcement said ”The plant still needs a new permit, and with folks as creative as those at Buckeye and as gullible as Florida DEP, we can't wait to see what they try next” (1999). Members of the ACA believe the only solution to the polluted river is for “Buckeye to clean up its own mess, and more tests are needed, not just on the water, but on the soil” (Bookbinder, 1999). Jennifer Fitzwater, DEP Attorney, said the pipeline idea is far from being tabled (Fitzwater, 1999).

The Information Gateway of Environmental Justice

The Environmental Protection Agency states that the goal of environmental justice is to ensure that “all people, regardless of race, national origin or income, are protected from disproportionate impacts of environmental hazards” (EPA Section 309.1.3). Environmental justice proponents say that discrimination is woven into the landscape in ways never officially acknowledged. It can be found in cumulative results of decisions made over decades by agencies that traditionally paid little attention to the concerns of minorities or the poor: zoning boards, economic development bodies, and transit and environmental agencies (Helvarg, 1994). This was certainly true of the case of HOPE and its operation in Perry, community groups have exposed these inequities and by doing so, have seen to it that pressure has been applied on government officials with mixed results. Within the realm of environmental activism, Margaret Mead summed up the conflict under the heading of information exchange: “Information needs and exchanges appear when people are members of groups from which they have no means of escape or of self-betterment, due to ignorance, government regulations, or lack of a culturally deprived belief that escape is possible” (Mead, 1962). Mead’s summation embraces the case of Perry, Florida in which one person served as the catalyst for community action by serving as a data gatherer and information provider for vital matters. Joy Towles, as an activist for truth , raised widespread consciousness and knowledge about the issues and clarified health concerns to the community. Towles’ actions are key elements in a social network group (Kochen, 1975). With the help of environmental groups such as HOPE, and mainstream organizations such as LEAF,42 the media in general, and the DEP, residents have become more conscious of environmental justice, and

information.

42 The professional organization in the study is LEAF (Legal Environmental Defense Fund). LEAF exists to help people protect their water, land and air from pollution and achieve vibrate discourse within the community and outside of the community to achieve environmental healthy communities (LEAF Mission Statement, 2000).

58 their prerogatives to pursue a healthy way of life. At the heart of the environmental justice movement is its strong belief in the right of citizens to participate in environmental decision-making. Community right-to-know laws , citizens enforcement provisions in federal and state legislation, and local input in waste clean-up and the placement of toxic releasing corporations are key issues for the environmental justice movement. It is clear that these issues were played out in Perry, Florida through networking among individuals and with other grassroots-based organizations. Through the social network operation inspired by members of HOPE, the organization was able to utilize information-based formulas already tested by other environmental organizations to raise community awareness of an environmental issue. In reporting the efforts of this and other grassroots organizations, the media played a critical role in bringing the problem to light. A major breakthrough in this particular case was achieved was the coverage given to the plight of Perry, Florida by the popular television program, 60 Minutes, in which it presented a follow-up story of its early 1990's series on dioxin sites (May, 1995).. “Pipeline to Dump Dioxin into Gulf” was headlined in newspapers throughout the state. Local news organizations, including the local broadcast of National Public Radio and “Florida Coast to Coast” also brought attention to the pipeline solution. The impact of the media attention resulted in new sources of information for the public at large. Thus, we have seen that through social networking begun as local activity, a message dealing with health issues can receive nationwide attention. With this activity, the health issues of this small community as well as the alleged attacks and physical resistance to its work are no longer back page news items. At the heart of the environmental justice movement is its strong belief in the rights of citizens to participate in environmental decision-making. Community right-to-know laws, citizen-enforcement provisions in federal and state legislation, and local input in waste clean-up and the geographic placement of corporations that release toxins into the soil, air and water are key issues for the environmental justice movement. Environmental justice is about more than individual battles. It includes the problems of information haves and have-nots, the issue of minority treatment, the reach of civil rights laws, and the changing relationships between people and the land. Although not a consideration in Perry, this issue of racial discrimination is joined to this fight. Mainstream organizations, including LEAF and others (Greenpeace and Sierra Club) have lobbying power and more often than not fight large mainstream environmental issues, including saving the owls in the Northwest and fighting against additional pipelines from being built on the West coast or in Alaska. At the heart of the environmental justice movement and its strong belief is the right of citizens to participate in environmental decision-making. Community right-to- know, citizen-enforcement provisions in federal and state legislation, and local input in waste clean-up and the placement of toxic releasing corporations are key issues for the environmental justice movement.

59 Information and information sharing is a key element to social networks such as HOPE. Similar to the monumental battles for civil rights during the 1960s, the quest for environmental justice has become another standard by which progressive social action is measured. The movement continues to grow as more and more information becomes available in various formats. This assures public exposure. In analyzing the problem associated with providing for the public good, the question of what and how much information is going to be needed. It is clear that problems are resolved by sharing information and power (Pasquero, 1991). The question of social and community values are highlighted, and must be considered as factors weighing in on such decisions. In some situations, information sharing and the forming of partnerships and networks may be as important as researching a solution to a particular problem (O’Leary, 1995). It was shown to be effective in providing needed information to the community of Perry, Florida at a critical time. This enabled the residents to finally become aware and develop a fuller understanding of the level of toxic hazards they faced with the continued and unabated daily work routines of the town’s largest single employer. In helping its citizens become aware of such conditions, the required criteria of a just society has been reached. With such awareness, citizens can then make informed decisions regarding their future. In summary, first it was clear that HOPE was successful in creating a following, developing, then enhancing its membership by utilizing local information channels like the local newspaper, networking with family and community members and holding both informal and formal public informational meetings. Second, HOPE members began to network outside of the primary organization (homogeneity) by reaching out to secondary sources for information and information exchange. They gathered and exchanged information from main government outlets (the EPA & DEP) and national and statewide mainstream environmental organizations (Greenpeace and LEAF). This data was collected, organized, analyzed, and reported through both newspaper articles and public meetings. HOPE, with the assistance of community leaders and P&G/Buckeye insiders broadcast enough concern and consciousness in the community of Perry, Florida to help citizens understand why environmental justice issues are vital to the community’s health (density). The organization brought attention to the contaminated water in area wells, and made sure people of the community were aware of the dangers of fishing or eating fish from the Fenholloway. Members brought attention both national (60 Minutes) and statewide (Tallahassee Democrat, St. Petersburg Times and Florida Public Radio) to the environmental issues facing the community of Taylor County, and scored a victory of sorts for the quest for environmental justice. As an information provider, HOPE brought knowledge and clarified environmental issues to the community of Perry, Florida, a community, like many

60 others faced with low economy levels and low education levels. Since the citizens were relatively unaware of the environmental toxins abounding In their areas of residence, this was an immeasurable act of conscience and self preservation undertaken at first by very few dedicated and brave individuals. By being able to communicate with the people of Perry on their level and with a language they could understand, real enlightenment resulted in definite changes toward a more healthy environment. This was achieved because of the life-long ties to the community held by members of HOPE.. Simply, they spoke the local language. The members of HOPE remain close to each other. They are long-time members of the community with family ties dating several generations. This link only strengthens the influence of the information received or disseminated (dispersion). Trusting the information and the information providers is essential when a community is facing an issue that has the potential to disturb a way of life, the income of the community and the health of a community. As demonstrated earlier, members of HOPE are life-long residents of Perry dating back six and seven generations. Members included past and present employees of the plant. HOPE members are also local business owners and farmers with an economic stake in the community’s fiscal and medical health. In summary, this chapter has treated the impact of information exchange on the effort to establish environmental justice in Perry, Florida. Environmental decisions are often made by relying upon scientific and economic expert opinions and information–to the exclusions of the people the information is impacting. Environmental values expressed by the general population in terms laden with emotions are often discounted in the environmental decision-making process (Caldwell & Schrader-Frechette, 1993). This account of personal experiences of the HOPE Foundation demonstrates the human impact of one environmental disaster, the impact on right-to-know laws, and linkages to other environmental justice movements. It is representative of the continuing impact of environmental activism on federal and state environmental laws. If laws, both federal and state, are to be changed, the process of information exchange by and between citizens is the key Most of all, this work represents the value of communication and the dissemination of needed information of vital nature to those who are affected by public policy. Through information and knowledge-sharing, it has made it possible for citizens to exercise informed choice when decisions are to be made regarding necessary trade-offs they must make in choosing residential areas and vocations.

61 CHAPTER FIVE

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS

“We can’t protect our health and the environment without finding the courage to change the way the government works. To begin this process of change, we have to create a national debate, community by community, on the nature of our government and our society. We have to explore how people become powerless as the corporations become more powerful. We have to discuss why our government protects the right to pollute more than it protects our health. We have to figure out how to speak honestly to rebuild our democracy” (Lois Gibbs, Dying from Dioxin, 1988).

Information Gathering of HOPE

Information gathering began with its founder Joy Towles and her need to understand what was happening to the environment in her community. She began talking with neighbors, workers at the plant and the P/R gut at the plants. Her first move was taking put an ad in the local paper asking those who felt impacted by the mill to contact her. In affect this was the beginning of HOPE as a grassroots organization to seek environmental justice for the community. Person-to-person communication began with people who would soon to become members of this social network. The network than began a chain of information gathering routines that included reaching further outside the immediate network. They sought professional and expert advice from the tri-state based environmental foundation, Legal Environmental Assistance Foundation, and further support from research conducted by the Aquatic Center on Research and Resource Management at Florida State University. HOPE members then traveled out-of-state to Ohio, the headquarters of the P&G/Buckeye Cellulose Plant to bring the attention of the stockholders to the plight of Perry, Florida. This insured coverage in local and national media.

Environmental Justice

American communities face a vast number of problems in our communities and in our environment. Pollution runs rampant through our global environment. The air we breathe, the water we drink and the food we eat are all

62 at risk. The extent of these problems can be overwhelming, and it can be difficult to help solve environmental and other social problems. Awareness and communication within small groups are two elements to open public debate facing so many minorities. It is no longer a secret that economic development in the United States has generated as a byproduct an enormous amount of pollution and hazardous waste. This was clearly illustrated in Perry, Florida with the economic impact that P&G/Buckeye had on the community. In 1986, according to Environmental Protection Agency’s Toxic Release Inventory, the waste created by the chemical industry’s top 50 products amounted to 539 billion pounds of toxins and hazardous substances discharged into the environment (Commoner, 1992). In the last decade, global conferences have formally recognized industry’s detrimental effect on the environment and called upon each country to preserve the environmental integrity of the future while raising current living standards (Rio Earth Summit, Agenda 21, 1992). Meanwhile, the public is increasingly aware of the effects of industrial production on the environment and the public welfare. Despite corporate public relations efforts, polls show that a large number of people in the United States are growing increasingly distrustful of anything corporations say (Meeker-Lowry, 1995). “Environmental Justice” is the fair treatment and meaningful involvement of all people regardless of race, color, national origin, or income, with respect to the development, implementation, and enforcement of environmental laws, regulations, and policies. Fair treatment means that no group of people, including a racial, ethnic, or a socioeconomic group, should bear a disproportionate share of the negative environmental consequences resulting from industrial, municipal, and commercial operations or the execution of federal, state, local, and tribal programs and policies. Meaningful involvements require that: (a) potentially affected community residents have an appropriate opportunity to participate in decisions about a proposed activity that will affect their environment and/or health, (b) the public’s contribution can influence the regulatory agency’s decision, (c) the concerns of all participants involved will be considered in the decision-making process, and (d) the decision makers seek out and facilitate the involvement of those potentially affected. What the environmental justice movement is about is trying to address all of the inequities that result from human settlement, industrial facility placement and industrial development. Over the last 20 years grassroots organizations have tried to educate and assist groups in organizing and mobilizing, empowering themselves to take charge of their lives, their community and their surroundings. It’s more of a concept of trying to address power imbalances, lack of political enfranchisement, and to redirect resources so that we can create some healthy, livable and sustainable types of models (Bullard, 1999). Grassroots organizing was carried out to protest against landfills, incinerators, toxic waste, chemical industries, salvage yards, and garbage

63 dumps. Strategies included demonstrations, public hearings, lawsuits, the election of supporters to state and local offices, meetings with company representatives, and other approaches designed to bring public awareness and accountability. In sum, environmental justice is the goal to be achieved for all communities and persons across this Nation. Environmental justice is achieved when everyone, regardless of race, culture, or income, enjoys the same degree of protection from environmental and health hazards and equal access to the decision-making process to have a healthy environment in which to live, learn, and work. “All communities and persons across this Nation should live in a safe and healthful environment” (President Clinton, February 11, 1994). With these words, President Clinton issued Executive Order 12898 on February 11, 1994, to establish environmental justice as a national priority. This was the first Presidential effort to direct all federal agencies with a public health or environmental mission to make environmental justice an integral part of their policies and activities. The Order focuses federal attention on the environmental and human health conditions of minority populations and low-income populations with the goal of achieving environmental protection for all communities. Promises of economic growth and prosperity by polluting corporations and elected officials are too often empty. Workers in toxic facilities are often given the most hazardous and unsafe jobs. Economic dependence on toxic and hazardous industries cause conflicts between workers who rely on such industries for their jobs and residents and environmentalists concerned about the effects of these industries on human health and the natural environment. More than likely, though, this situation causes “highly depressed economies and alarming unemployment rates,” among people of color and working class residents, according to a study by the Racial Justice Commission of the United Church. “The environmental justice movement has basically redefined what environmentalism is all about. It basically says that the environment is everything: where we live, work, play, go to school, as well as the physical and natural world. And so we can’t separate the physical environment from the cultural environment. We have to talk about making sure that justice is integrated throughout all of the stuff that we do.” (Bullard, 1960) Access to information is key to the environmental movement. To cope with complex situations, such as environmental justice, there is a need to utilize all the relevant and useful knowledge that exists, partly to understand the situation fully and partly to help the stakeholders change it. A great deal of potentially useful knowledge is still under-utilized by people responsible for coping with complex situations (Kochen, 1992). Scientists readily admit that our knowledge of the environment is limited because human society is also complex (Caldwell, 1993).

64 Information and education, according to Robert Bullard (1998), are the two key areas in which grassroots organizations must participate. “We’re not saying that people are evil and that these organizations are setting out to do harm, but we’re saying that we have to educate ourselves and learn about each other. We have to cross those boundaries and go on the other side of the tracks, go to the meetings downtown and learn from each other. That’s what we’ve been doing for the last twenty years: trying to get a handle on how we can work together in a principled way. And in 1991 we had the first national people of color environmental leadership summit and we developed 17 principles of environmental justice. Basically, how can we as people of color, working class people and poor people work on agendas that at the same time may conflict with the larger agendas of the big groups.” (Bullard, 1998) When Lois Gibbs learned in 1978 that 20,000 tons of toxic chemicals were buried under her Niagara Falls, New York, neighborhood, she tried to make sense of all the information and scientific names. She turned to her local library, wading through medical journals and old newspaper articles to understand the chemicals and the diseases they caused. She credits her success of the closing of Love Canal to the open channels of information found in libraries, understanding the Freedom of Information Act,43 and public and open discourse (Gibbs, 1999). In addition, communities now have a little more information for attending to local business issues because of the federal Community Right to Know and the 1990 Toxic Pollution Prevention Act (Sobol, 1991). The Right to Know law requires manufacturers to report their emissions to air, land, and water of over 300 toxic chemicals (Emergency Planning and Community Right to Know Act, 42 U.S.C. § 1100111050 [1988 and Supp. V 1993]). The Toxic Pollution Prevention Act requires that any facility that is required to report data must also report on its toxic pollution prevention (Pollution Prevention Act, 42 U.S.C.A. § 13101 to 13109). The growth in available information has provided a powerful tool for exposing the truth of environmental degradation. Government officials and agencies have exercised their power to exploit the less politically influential, the less informed and the poorer members of society. Rather than receiving protection from a democratic system designed to

43 The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), which can be found in Title 5 of the United States Code, section 552, was enacted in 1966 and provides that any person has the right to request access to federal agency records or information. All agencies of the United States government are required to disclose records upon receiving a written request for them, except for those records that are protected from disclosure by the nine exemptions and three exclusions of the FIOA. This right of access is enforceable in court. The Federal FOIA does not, however, provide access to records held by state or local government agencies, or by private businesses or individuals. All states have their own statutes governing public access to state and local records; state agencies should be consulted for further information about them.

65 protect the minority voice, the ethnic and racial minority communities became a convenient scapegoat for difficult political decisions. Pollution Prevention Act, 42) As public awareness grows, minority opposition to environmental racism will continue until the neighborhoods in which they live are no longer treated as safe places for polluters.

Conclusions

Much remains to be learned about environmental health and environmental justice. Great strides need to be taken in terms of interrelated topics of research and education before society can ensure environmental justice in its broadest sense.44 Environmental justice needs to become a higher priority in the fields of public health, research and communication. The grassroots environmental movement involves women, the poor, and people of color confronting environmental hazards in their neighborhoods. Affected groups have been successful in bringing changes to the environmental agenda through demonstrations, consumer boycotts, shareholder suits, and nonviolent protests. Protests against incinerators and toxic industries in minority neighborhoods have forged a powerful coalition that has gained many important victories through local protests and marches, lawsuits, attendance at hearings, notification of voters, demonstrations, and picketing. Environmental justice activists and academics alike need to join forces to form a much stronger, action-oriented movement. The voices on environmental justice and equality under the Carter and Clinton Administrations exerted some influence in policy making, as in the case of the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDT), and the National Institute for Environmental Health Services (NIEHS). As a social movement, environmental justice, has made a mark on the political landscape with the above noted agencies. Also, new methods among small organizations are developing reflecting a clear pattern among various groups:

44 The environmental justice movement has basically redefined what environmentalism is all about. It basically says that the environment is everything: where we live, work, play, go to school, as well as the physical and natural world. And so we can’t separate the physical environment from the cultural environment. We have to talk about making sure that justice is integrated throughout all of the stuff that we do. What the environmental justice movement is about is trying to address all of the inequities that result from human settlement, industrial facility sitting and industrial development. What we’ve tried to do over the last twenty years is educate and assist groups in organizing and mobilizing, empowering themselves to take charge of their lives, their community and their surroundings. It’s more of a concept of trying to address power imbalances, lack of political enfranchisement, and to redirect resources so that we can create some healthy, livable and sustainable types of models. (Bullard, 1999).

66 1.Collaboration among various communities, interest groups, and government agencies. Direct evidence of this pattern is seen within this report. The Center for Health, Environmental and Justice, the EPA, Florida’s DEP, and various small grassroots organizations, including CATE in Pensacola, Florida, exchanged information to further HOPE’s approach to make Perry a healthier place to live and work.

2.Deliberation among and within communities, interest groups and levels of government. There is clear direct evidence with regards to the Perry study. The EPA, The Florida State University Aquatic Institution, and the Legal Environmental Foundation all joined together to share information with each other and with the main network HOPE. This element is vital for information within a community: “What I would tell folks if they want to get involved is the first thing they need to do is talk to some other people, find out what is in your community and talk with other people. Most people belong to a church or a Girl Scouts or PTA, I mean people have community groups that they could start talking to folks about what the problem is. And one conversation will lead to another conversation and soon you will find that the whole community is very concerned about that issue as well and willing to get involved.”

“A single individual can do a spark in a community, get people educated about the problem, get them motivated and energized and help them figure out how to go about making change. Then those people in the community can actually achieve change. I think historically we always thought about justice being won by hundreds of thousands or millions of people marching on Washington, DC or the state capitol, and that is not how change happens. Change in this country happens by people changing their own community, and so an individual will find a problem, will educate their community and mobilize the community to find the answers and putting pressure on decision makers. And it is extremely successful, and has been all across the country” (Gibbs, 1999).

3.An extensive use of nontraditional tactics including protests, newspaper ads, and national recognition by CBS on “60 Minutes,” networking through community sources including area churches.

4.Focusing on long-term solutions for the betterment of the entire community. The Buckeye Cellulose Plant wants to save jobs in Taylor County and save the Fenholloway River by bypassing the river and building a tunnel to dump the waste from the mill directly into the Gulf of Mexico. The proposed solution had yet to be finalized as of October 2003.

67 Rather than relying on top-down government control to address specific needs, communities themselves are learning how to supplement the need for direct government or corporate assistance in addressing community development. The emerging environmental justice movement, for instance, has engendered a shift in local leadership as women, people of color, and indigenous people play a more active role in their communities (Collie & Collin, 1994). The U.S. government has made attempts at responding to the crisis, but has been generally unable to address the environmental and health hazards endured by local communities at the hands of corporations. Over the last quarter of a century, Congress has passed scores of statutes piecemeal in reaction to highly publicized crises (e.g., Love Canal), however, regard for how each specific emergency response could be melded into a coherent environmental management system has been insufficient (Futrell, 1994). A legal specialty called Environmental Poverty Law helps minorities and the poor fight their environmental battles in the courts. The Environmental Poverty Law working group was formed to serve as a clearinghouse for poverty lawyers who handle environmental cases. Legal strategies pursued by this “new breed” of lawyers are designed to get government agencies to release data, forcing municipalities to hold public hearings on projects that may pose health hazards, and filing lawsuits against companies and government agencies who use racial or ethnic bias in pollution projects. Attorneys involved in environmental poverty law have been successful in delaying construction of incinerators, cleaning up abandoned factories and warehouses, gaining access to information on hazardous projects and other issues (Hayes, 1991). Grassroots groups have formed alliances with established civil rights and environmental organizations such as the American Civil Liberties Union, the NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund, and the Sierra Club Legal Defense Fund to support their legal struggles. Title VI of the Civil Rights Act prohibits discrimination on grounds of race, color, or national origin in programs or activities receiving federal funds. Local and state environmental and health programs and activities often receive federal funds and must abide by Article VI. Other remedies include public hearings when companies apply for permits and compliance with state and federal environmental impact provisions. Citizens should attend those hearings and demand that state and federal authorities enforce environmental laws.

Suggestions

Environmental issues have become more and more a political issue with each changing administration. In 1998 news reports indicated that the Environmental Protection Agency had substantially increased investigation, prosecution, and penalties for companies who violate environmental laws. It appeared that environmental concerns became a growing concern for

68 governmental priority (Watson, 1998). The EPA’s crack-down on polluters was short-lived. As of July 2002 cleanup work at toxic waste sites in18 states, five in Florida, was stopped under a George W. Bush administration plan to reduce spending for the nation’s Superfund program (EPA, IG Report, 1 July 2002). 45 Instead, the Bush plan will shift the cost of clean up of the abandoned sites to taxpayers. The fact is that the environmental justice movement over the last 10 years has really matured onto developing policies and issue statements and working on issues ranging from housing, transportation, health to economic development, and community revitalization. A number of environmental justice centers around the country are working with communities–not organizing communities–but working with, in support of and providing technical assistance and training. Grassroots organizations are making a difference especially working across disciplines and geographic, racial and economic spectrums, we’re the most powerful and that’s when the grassroots organizations are the strongest.

Suggestions for further research are given below: 1. Additional studies need to be conducted regarding the impact of grassroots organizations on community awareness with in-depth studies of communication techniques.

2. Studies of the value or impact of individual person-to-person contact, neighborhood networking, phone banks and similar publicity-generating measures employed by these organizations should be examined and compared.

3. Cult of personality studies should be conducted to examine the lives and the behaviors of leading environmental activists in order to determine optimal methods of operation.

4. Qualitative studies employing interview techniques are needed to examine possible roles and activities of environmental organizations with respect to their responses to the lack of water, air and land restrictions as experienced under the current administration.

45 Although one of the Superfund sites on the cut list is the American Creosote Works, Inc., in Pensacola, Florida, Margaret Williams and the organization CATE has not given up her fight for relocation of the hundreds of families that continue to live next door to the largest dioxin/Agent Orange waste site in the country.

69

APPENDIX A: Interview Guide

In-depth interviews took place on site(s). The interviews will focus on key issue areas, including information needs, nature of dispute, organizational tactics, who is/are the leader(s), and what strategies these leaders used to form and sustain a social network in order to restore the health of the community. 1. What did the role of membership in HOPE play in allowing the members to deal with issues of environmental pollution of their property? 2. How did the activists get their information and was it reliable to help solve some of the critical problems? 3. Why did the community-based group HOPE lead the fight against the dominant economic influence and provider in their community? 4. How did the activists use their information to convince others in the community to come out of their everyday roles as “normal” citizens to join HOPE?

70 APPENDIX B: Principles Of Environmental Justice

WE, THE PEOPLE OF COLOR, gathered together at this multinational People of Color Environmental Leadership Summit, to begin to build a national and international movement of all peoples of color to fight the destruction and taking of our lands and communities, do hereby re-establish our spiritual interdependence to the sacredness of our Mother Earth; to respect and celebrate each of our cultures, languages and beliefs about the natural world and our roles healing ourselves; to insure environmental justice; to promote economic alternatives which would contribute to the development of environmentally safe livelihoods; and, to secure our political, economic and cultural liberation that has been denied for over 500 years of colonization and oppression, resulting in the poisoning of our communities and land and the genocide of our peoples, do affirm and adopt these Principles of Environmental Justice:

1. Environmental justice affirms the sacredness of Mother Earth, ecological unity and the interdependence of all species, and the right to be free from ecological destruction. 2. Environmental justice demands that public policy be based on mutual respect and justice for all peoples, free from any form of discrimination or bias. 3. Environmental justice mandates the right to ethical, balanced and responsible uses of land and renewable resources in the interest of a sustainable planet for humans and other living things. 4. Environmental justice calls for universal protection from nuclear testing, extraction, production and disposal of toxic/hazardous wastes and poisons and nuclear testing that threaten the fundamental right to clean air, land, water, and food. 5. Environmental justice affirms the fundamental right to political, economic, cultural and environmental self-determination of all peoples. 6. Environmental justice demands the cessation of the production of all toxins, hazardous wastes, and radioactive materials, and that all past and current producers be held strictly accountable to the people for detoxification and the containment at the point of production. 7. Environmental justice demands the right to participate as equal partners at every level of decision-making including need assessment, planning, implementation, enforcement and evaluation. 8. Environmental justice affirms the right of all workers to a safe and healthy work environment, without being forced to choose between an unsafe livelihood and unemployment. It also affirms the right of those who work at home to be free from environmental hazards. 9. Environmental justice protects the right of victims of environmental injustice to receive full compensation and reparations for damages as well as quality health care.

71 10. Environmental justice considers governmental acts of environmental injustice a violation of international law, the Universal Declaration On Human Rights, and the United Nations Convention on Genocide. 11. Environmental justice must recognize a special legal and natural relationship of Native Peoples to the U.S. government through treaties, agreements, compacts, and covenants affirming sovereignty and self- determination. 12. Environmental justice affirms the need for urban and rural ecological policies to clean up and rebuild our cities and rural areas in balance with nature, honoring the cultural integrity of our communities, and providing fair access for all to the full range of resources. 13. Environmental justice calls for the strict enforcement of principles of informed consent, and a halt to the testing of experimental, reproductive and medical procedures and vaccinations on people of color. 14. Environmental justice opposes the destructive operations of multi- national corporations. 15. Environmental justice opposes military occupation, repression and exploitation of lands, peoples and cultures, and other life forms. 16. Environmental justice calls for the education of present and future generations which emphasizes social and environmental issues, based on our experience and an appreciation of our diverse cultural perspectives. 17. Environmental justice requires that we, as individuals, make personal and consumer choices to consume as little of Mother Earth’s resources and to produce as little waste as possible; and make the conscious decision to challenge and reprioritize our lifestyles to insure the health of the natural world for present and future generations. Adopted today, October 27, 1991, in Washington, D.C.

72 APPENDIX C: History Of The Environmental Movement

1863: The Emancipation Proclamation, issued by President Abraham Lincoln, frees all slaves in rebellion against the Union. 1875: The Civil Rights Act of 1875 guarantees to all Americans the right of access to public accommodations. For decades, the act is not enforced in most cases involving African Americans and other minorities. 1896: In the case of Plessy v. Ferguson, the U.S. Supreme Court rules that segregation is not illegal as long as equal accommodations are made available to African Americans. 1899: The nation’s first environmental law, the Refuse Act of 1899, is passed. The act was originally written to protect navigable waters from pollution by sediments, disease-carrying organisms, and oil discharges, but it was broad enough to cover many environmental problems through the early 1970s. 1947: The Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act of 1947 is passed. The act originally deals only with pesticides shipped across state lines. The act is amended and extended in 1972 to cover broader aspects of pesticide production and use. 1948: The Water Pollution Control Act of 1948 is passed by Congress. The Act is written with good intentions, but is never implemented because almost no funds are appropriated for it. 1956: A stronger version of the 1948 Water Pollution Control Act is adopted. The Act is amended and strengthened a number of times in following years, including in 1961, 1965, 1966, and 1970. 1957: The Voting Rights Act of 1957 is passed. 1960: The U.S. Supreme Court rules that segregation in interstate bus and train stations is illegal. A year later, the Interstate Commerce Commission officially prohibits such practices. 1964: The Twenty-fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution is adopted. The Amendment abolishes the poll tax, a primary means by which people of color were long prevented from voting, and thus participating in the political process in many southern states. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 is adopted, guaranteeing to all American citizens equal access to employment and public accommodations, regardless of race, creed color, sex, or national origin. 1965: The Voting Rights Act of 1965, strengthening its predecessor, the Voting Rights Act of 1957, is passed. The Fair Housing Act of 1968 is adopted. The act is later strengthened by amendments adopted in 1988. 1970: The National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 is passed by Congress and signed by President Richard Nixon. The act is the single most comprehensive legislative action dealing with environmental issues in the nation’s history. One of the provisions of the Act is the creation of the Council on Environmental Quality, charged with publishing an annual report on the status of the nation’s environmental elements. The Clean Air Act of 1970 is passed by Congress and

73 signed by the President.The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is created as an independent agency in the Reorganization Plan No. 3 of 1970. Senator Philip Hart (D-Michigan) arranges a meeting among environmental groups, labor unions, and minority organizations to consider issues of the urban environment of concern to all such groups. April 22: is declared to be Earth Day. By some estimates, more than 20 million people demonstrated on behalf of improved environmental conditions in the United States and the world. 1971: The annual report of the Council on Environmental Quality acknowledges that environmental quality is affected by the racial and class status of communities. 1972: The Water Pollution Control Act of 1972 is adopted. The Act represents a giant step forward in the nation’s commitment to protect its water resources from pollution. 1975: The Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act Amendments are adopted. 1976: The Toxic Substances Control Act of 1976 and Resource Conservation and Recovery Act are adopted. A conference on the urban environment is held at Black Lakes, Michigan. The conference is organized by the United Auto Workers and includes representatives from unions, environmental organizations, religious groups, and those concerned with economic justice. The Urban League creates Project Que: Environmental Concerns in the Inner City. 1977: The Clean Air Act and Clean Water Act are revised and updated. Grants totaling $66,000 permit the Urban Environment Conference to fund 11 nationwide conferences on issues related to environmental justice. 1979: City Care: A Conference on the Urban Environment is held in Detroit, Michigan. Organizers include the National Urban League, the Urban Environment Conference, and the Sierra Club. One result of the meeting is a sense that traditional environmental groups are going to be uncomfortable with the inclusion of social justice issues in their agenda. 1982: Residents of Warren County, North Carolina, supported by the United Church of Christ, stage a demonstration in opposition to the siting of a polychlorinated biphenyl (PCB) landfill near the community of Afton. More than 500 African American protestors are arrested in an unsuccessful attempt to block construction of the landfill. This event has been described by some authorities as the real beginning of the modern environmental justice movement. 1983: “Taking Back Our Health–An Institute on Surviving the Toxic Threat to Minority Communities” is held in New Orleans, Louisiana. The conference is sponsored by the Urban Environment Conference, shortly before it loses its funding and goes out of business. A report by the General Accounting Office states that three out of four hazardous waste sites in EPA Region 4 are located in African American communities. 1985: The grassroots committee, People Concerned about MIC (methyl isocyanate), is organized in Institute, West Virginia. Consisting largely of African

74 Americans, the group is created in response to a chemical leak from a nearby Union Carbide plant that resulted in about 135 residents being sent to the hospital. The EPA commissions the Council of Energy Resource Tribes to conduct a study of potential hazardous waste sites located on or near Indian lands. The survey reveals as many as 1,200 hazardous waste sites on or near 25 Indian reservations. 1987: The Commission for Racial Justice of the United Church of Christ publishes a report, “Toxic Wastes and Race in the United States,” showing that race, even more than income level, is the crucial factor shared by communities exposed to toxic waste. Four thousand tons of toxic wastes are dumped in Koko, Nigeria. Studies later show that an increase in health problems may be related to this act. A shipment of 13,476 tons of toxic municipal incinerator ash from Philadelphia is dumped in Haiti. The Haitian government has issued a permit for the import of fertilizer, but the actual delivery consists of toxic wastes. 1988: The U.S. Supreme Court rules that the development of geothermal energy plants in the Hawaiian Islands does not impinge on the First Amendment right to freedom of religion among native Hawaiians. Native Hawaiians had claimed that the development of such plants would destroy the rain forests and interfere with their worship of the volcanic goddess Pele. A shipment of garbage and incinerator ash from Philadelphia, originally rejected by both Haiti and Panama, is accepted by the Guinean government. Later reports claim that the trees on Kassa Island, where the shipment is dumped, turn brown and die. The Federal Insecticide, Fungicide and Rodenticide Act is passed, establishing standards for the use of pesticides. 1989: Residents of the “Cancer Alley” section of the lower Mississippi River organize the Great Louisiana Toxic March in an attempt to bring attention to their polluted living conditions. Thirty-three nations sign the Basel Treaty, an international agreement dealing with the shipment of hazardous materials across international borders. Eventually, more than 100 additional nations become party to the agreement. Mothers of East Los Angeles (MELA) successfully protest the construction of a $29 million incinerator designed to burn 125,000 pounds of toxic wastes per day. 990: Students at the Harvard Law School, the New York University Law School, the University of California at Berkeley Law School, and Washington University in St. Louis hold conferences on the issue of environmental justice. The Michigan Coalition Conference issues a report on “Race and the Incidence of Environmental Hazards.” The EPA establishes the Environmental Equity Workgroup. A number of grassroots environmental justice groups, including the Gulf Coast Tenants Organization, the Southwest Organizing Project, the United Church of Christ Commission for Racial Justice, and the Southern Organizing Committee for Economic and Social Justice, jointly write to the Big Ten of mainstream environmental groups, expressing their concerns about the groups’ historic lack of attention to the special needs and interests of people of color and other minorities and challenging them to end their racist and elitist policies and

75 practices. New York City adopts a “fair share” act intended to ensure that every part of the city receives a fair share of hazardous facility sitings. 1991: First National People of Color Environmental Leadership Summit is held in Washington, D.C. The Summit adopts a 17-point Principles of Environmental Justice statement. The Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR) initiates a number of actions relating to environmental inequities, including the Minority Environmental Health Conference and a study of minority communities located near National Priorities List hazardous waste landfills. 1992: Students at Columbia University and the Universities of Michigan and Minnesota hold conferences on the issue of environmental justice. The EPA establishes an Office of Environmental Justice. The EPA releases a report “Environmental Equity: Reducing Risks for All Communities.” A report in the National Law Journal, “Unequal Environmental Protection,” claims that the EPA pursues discriminatory practices in enforcement of environmental laws and regulations. A national workshop, “Equity in Environmental Health: Research Issues and Needs,” is held at Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, under the sponsorship of the EPA, ATSDR, and the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences. Congressman John Lewis (D-Georgia) and Senator Al Gore (D-Tennessee) introduce the Environmental Justice Act of 1992. Congresswoman Cardiss Collins (D-Illinois) introduces an amendment to the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act that would require a “community information statement” for the construction of any new hazardous facility. The statement would include a description of the demography of the proposed site as well as a projected estimate of the impact of the facility on the area. 1993: On Earth Day 1993, President Bill Clinton pledges that he will issue an Executive Order instructing federal agencies to take cognizance of the issues raised by the environmental justice movement and to take actions that will reduce the problems emphasized by that movement. The EPA establishes the National Environmental Justice Advisory Council. Congressman Lewis and Senator Max Baucus (D-Montana) reintroduce the Environmental Justice Act. Hearings on the proposed promotion of the EPA to cabinet status include discussion of environmental justice issues. The Air Control Board and the Texas Water Commission jointly create a statewide Task Force on Environmental Equity and Justice to deal with basic issues, such as reasons that hazardous facilities tend to be located in minority communities, policies and procedures of the two agencies that relate to issues of environmental inequities, methods by which the agencies can become more “user friendly” to communities of color, and data-gathering methods by which the government might become more aware of environmental inequities in hazardous facilities sitings.

76 1994: President Bill Clinton signs Executive Order 12898 on Environmental Justice ordering federal agencies to abolish and prevent policies that lead to a disproportionate distribution of environmental hazards to communities of color or low income. An Interagency Symposium on Health Research and Needs to Ensure Environmental Justice, sponsored by the EPA, is held in Arlington, Virginia. A Federal Interagency Working Group on Environmental Justice is created. The United Church of Christ issues an update of its 1987 report, “Toxic Waste and Race Revisited,” providing further evidence on the relationship between race and toxic waste facilities. 1995: The first public meeting of the Interagency Working Group on Environmental Justice is held in Atlanta, Georgia. The EPA announces the award of $3 million to assist 174 community-based organizations, tribal governments, and academic institutions to address environmental justice issues in their communities. The awards reflect an increase from the $500,000 awarded to 61 recipients in 1994. A conference, Environmental Justice and Transportation: Building Model Partnerships, is held in Atlanta, Georgia, under the joint sponsorship of the U.S. Department of Transportation and the Clark Atlanta Environmental Justice Resource Center. The conference is a part of the department’s public outreach plan as mandated by President Clinton’s Executive Order 12898.

77 APPENDIX D: Full Transcripts of Interviews

Robert Bullard and Linda Price Question: Environnemental racism. SOT: Environmental racism is simply the targeting of communities of color for locally unwanted land use, landfills, incinerators, based race or color and not protecting communities that are being poisoned. Because they are poor because they happen to be black or Latino. Environmental justice also means that even when we discover that children are being poisoned bad – not acting. And it’s a matter of saying that some communities that are require, equal protection that’s what environmental racism is all about.

Question: Green movement historically white… SOT: Well the environmental movement basically has been white and has been affluent middle class. But the environment justice movement has redefined what environmentalism is. It has redefined environmentalism to include where people live, work and play as well as the natural world. Environmental justice has really provided the vision for changing this whole green movement to include Pensacola and farm workers or workers who are poisoned in Silicon Valley or where else. Environmental justice, economic justice and justice period. It’s not a green movement, it’s not a white movement, it’s a movement for justice.

Question: Describe ghost town impact… SOT: Environmental racism devastates a community, it creates the mechanisms where people that can leave do leave. Those people that are trapped, often times are trapped in poverty, they have no way of getting out, no way of escaping. They are trapping by poverty, pollution, and powerlessness. What this movement attempts to do is to say that no community should have to become a sacrifice, no community should have to live with poisons and toxins and no future and what we’re saying is that it makes sense to protect all of our communities whether it’s whites in Appalachia or whether it’s blacks in urban inner cities areas or Native Americans on reservations. Environmental justice is simply a common sense approach.

Question: What is environmental black man? SOT: Environmental blackmail basically says that if you are poor and you are unemployed then you should accept any job. Low paying, dirty job, hazardous job. We are saying that environmental blackmail, environment extortion, is unjust, unfair and it should be illegal. No worker should have to trade off his/her health for a job. And we are saying that this playing field should be leveled and just

78 because you poor, just because you are unemployed doesn’t mean that you don’t have a right to safe work environment. And we are saying environmental and economic justice is the only way that we can move forward to become a just and sustainable society.

Question: What would you say to someone who wants to put a stop… waste? SOT: I think what I would say most often and consistently is that you have to get involved, you have to organize yourself, you must educate yourself. You cannot wait for someone else to do it for you. And that even though you may be a organization or small group, you may not have “environment” in your name but you are concern about family, home and community. You can make a difference. We have a lot of victories. …The whole question of environmental justice is not about whining, its about winning. And we have had many victories along the way. From Florida to New York to Texas to California and grass root group and community organizations, church base groups can make a difference. You don’t have a big organization with a big budget and accounting firm to handle your monies to win. But you have to have perseverance, you have to be a long distance runner and you have to stick it out.

Question: We are you going to put the dump? SOT: I think that what we have to do is we have to take notice of who is baring burden and historically who has born the burden. And in fact if we must have certain types of facilities we must say that now its time for us all to share. Since we produce waste we have to all share in the disposal. Ultimately we have to talk all about reducing the amount of waste that we produce. …But ultimately we must all share in the burden of this industrial society, this chemical society, this throw away society that we live in. And if a community has born historically a greater burden, we should not community with anymore waste, any more landfills and incinerators. We should basically look about other communities sharing in that cost, sharing in that burden. That’s only fair, that’s only just. And I think in that way we can really talk about really having a society that we can all live together in peace and harmony other wise we will always be at each other’s throats.

79 Answer: (Linda Price) Well in November 1994 Dr. Satcher who is head of CDC and STDR made some promises to us as communities who were concerned about getting health services in the communities. Dr. Satcher met with us, saw our demands, what we wanted and needed. He said he would respond quickly but never returned the call. Received a letter that didn’t have their demands and was four months late…

Question: As I watched these breakout sessions sounds like they are telling you what to do (governmental organizations)… they are shutting citizens out of the meeting. What is your assessment on that? Answer: Well that’s one of the reasons we are here. We felt it was unfair for citizens to be locked out of these conferences. ASTDR was using the conference as a propaganda tool to say look how great we are…

Question: Last time we met was in Pensacola and the reason was the Superfund site. The site is always in the black community. Community activists, why is it important and why one voice like Margaret can make a difference?

Answer: Community activism is the only thing, community voices are the only things that are going to beat the powerful lobbyists. And the new congress… who say people don’t count…

Question: What is a dis- importation impact? Answer: (Bullard)There should be a sharing of the burden. We all produce waste. Assumption in calculating impact and risks. Equity assessments and distributive impacts. Adverse and dis-importation impact. Community Impact: Community Health: -housing -employment -Education -infrastructure -transportation Public participation and access to information. Identify high impact population. Create mechanisms to broaden our state quota participation in the decision making process. Pressure to move congressional mandates and regulating policies from a position of protection to one where cost of public health protection are measured against the benefits of safe guarding public health. Consideration of certain aspects of the distribution of risk- typically or average risk to an individual. EPA's new draft policy regarding "Assessment of Risks to

80 Children." The principle driving force behind the development of the new policy was the 1993 Research Council report titled, "Pesticides and Diets of Infants and Children." Two examples where the "Assessment of risks to Children" makes a difference are leading poisoning and pesticides.

Question: The Green Movement as a White Movement, what is your opinion? Answer: Well the environmental movement has been historically white movement…

Question: Describe the ghost town impact of environmental racism. Answer: Environmental racism devastates a community…

Question: What is an environmental blackmail? Answer: Environmental blackmail is if you are poor or unemployed you should accept any job… Question: What would you say to one individual that wants to put a stop to some type of waste dump…? Answer: You have to get involved…

Question: Where are you going to the dump? You had a suggestion… Answer: We have to take notice at who is bearing the burden and historically who's going the burden now its time to share. What is the environmental justice movement? Bullard: The environmental justice movement has basically redefined what environmentalism is all about. It basically says that the environment is everything: where we live, work, play, go to school, as well as the physical and natural world. And so we can't separate the physical environment from the cultural environment. We have to talk about making sure that justice is integrated throughout all of the stuff that we do. What the environmental justice movement is about is trying to address all of the inequities that result from human settlement, industrial facility siting and industrial development. What we've tried to do over the last twenty years is educate and assist groups in organizing and mobilizing, empowering themselves to take charge of their lives, their community and their surroundings. It's more of a concept of trying to address power imbalances, lack of political enfranchisement, and to redirect resources so that we can create some healthy, livable and sustainable types of models.

Question: How have environmental justice groups organized themselves?

Bullard: For the most part, a lot of the small grassroots groups operate from a bottom up model. They don't have boards of directors and large budgets and large staffs but they do operate with the idea that everyone has a role and we are all equal in this together. The environmental justice groups are more

81 egalitarian, most of them are led by women, and its more democratic. Not to say its perfect but it does bring out the idea that power rests in all of us and when we operate as a collective, that's when we are most powerful and we move forward as a unit, as a body and not necessarily with a hierarchy. But I think a lot of it is when you can have an issue that can mobilize, organize and create the catalyst that gets thousands of people at a meeting, saying this is what we want and we're not going back up till we get it. I think that's where the environmental justice movement is more of a grassroots movement of ordinary people who may not see themselves as traditional environmentalists, but are just as much concerned about the environment as someone who may be a member of the Sierra Club or the Audubon Society.

gh: How has the environmental justice movement come into conflict with these traditional, white environmental groups? Bullard: There's been a lot of conflict and misunderstanding about what the role of some of the green groups are as it relates to environmental justice and particularly working in communities of color. And what we're saying is that its just one environment. You're talking about planet earth, where we live, and if in fact we are going to have a global movement for environmental justice, we have to understand what environment is and what the agendas are. A lot of grassroots groups and communities of color are saying that we have to work in our communities and take care of educating and empowering our people before we can talk about having other people do stuff for us. I think to a large extent a lot of grassroots groups have come head-on with a lot of the larger groups that have to understood exactly what environmental justice is.

We are saying that environmental justice incorporates the idea that we are just as much concerned about wetlands, birds and wilderness areas, but we're also concerned with urban habitats, where people live in cities, about reservations, about things that are happening along the US-Mexican border, about children that are being poisoned by lead in housing and kids playing outside in contaminated playgrounds. So we have had to struggle to get these issues on the radar on a lot of the large environmental groups. We've made a lot of progress since 1990 when a letter was written to them charging them with environmental racism, elitism, looking at their staff, looking at their boards and saying that we need to talk. And there's been some talking and sharing and working together along the way. We've made progress but there's still a lot of progress that needs to be made because to a large extent the environmental movement, the more conservation/preservation movement, really reflects the larger society. And society is racist. And so we can't expect a lot of our organizations not to somehow be affected by that. We're not saying that people are evil and that these organizations are setting out to do harm, but we're saying that we have to educate ourselves and learn

82 about each other. We have to cross those boundaries and go on the other side of the tracks, go to the meetings downtown and learn from each other. That's what we've been doing for the last twenty years: trying to get a handle on how we can work together in a principled way. And in 1991 we had the first national people of color environmental leadership summit and we developed 17 principles of environmental justice. Basically, how can we as people of color, working class people and poor people work on agendas that at the same time may conflict with the larger agendas of the big groups. And what we're saying is that we may not agree on 100 percent of the things but we agree on more things than we disagree on. And I think that we have to agree to work on the things we are in agreement on and somehow work through those things where there are disagreements.

gh: What kind of role has race played in the siting of toxic facilities in this country? Bullard: Race is still the potent factor for predicting where Locally Unwanted Land Uses (LULUs) go. A lot of people say its class, but race and class are intertwined. Because the society is so racist and because racism touches every institution--employment, housing, education, facility siting, land use decisions, you can't really extract race out of decisions that are being made by persons who are in power and the power arrangements are unequal. When we talk about the institution of racism as it exists in environmental policy, enforcement, land use, zoning and all those things. All of that is part of the environment and we have to make sure that our brothers and sisters who are in environmental groups understand that's what we are saying. Environmental justice is not a social program, it's not affirmative actions, its about justice. and until we get justice in environmental protection, justice in terms of enforcement of regulations, we will not even talk about achieving sustainable development or sustainability issues until we talk about justice. A lot of the groups that are trying to address these issues in the absence of dealing with race may be fooling themselves. When we talk about what's happening along the US-Mexican border and the devastation that is happening along the border, the health conditions of children and workers and not understand that it's also related to our consumption patterns, consumption behavior and who has the most money to consume the most. And those are the issues that may be unpopular when we sit in rooms and talk but I think that's how the environmental justice movement is forcing these issues on the table and really getting a lot of people to think about how we can start to address disparities and the inequities and the privileged position that some people have only because of the skin color that they were born in. And that's where the justice issues come into account. Now all of the issues of environmental racism and environmental justice don't just deal with people of color. We are just as much concerned with inequities in Appalachia, for example, where the whites are basically dumped on because of lack of economic and political clout and lack of

83 having a voice to say "no" and that's environmental injustice. So we're trying to work with groups across the political spectrums; democrats, republicans, independents, on the reservations, in the barrios, in the ghettos, on the border and internationally to see that we address these issues in a comprehensive manner.

gh: Are you seeing more of a convergence between the traditional, white environmental groups and the people of color movements? Bullard: We haven't seen a total convergence; what we've seen is a better understanding of the various sides that are there, the various elements, the various components and priorities that are there. And for a long time historically, for example, black people in the south were not even allowed to visit state parks, because of Jim Crow and segregation. And somehow we were blamed for not having appreciation for state parks. I mean, it wasn't our faults, we couldn't go to them! So we're finding as the more urban folks get to visit parks and wilderness areas and are able to appreciate that these are national treasures and not just treasures for people that have money to visit them, its everybody's. We all pay taxes. And so we are seeing more and more young people being able to take field trips to see the beauty of nature. And more and more people who are in environmental groups are now beginning to understand that what happens in cities also impacts their lives. So we can't just let cities buckle under and fall into this sinkhole. We have to talk about this convergence of urban, suburban and rural and talk about the quality of life that exists and talk about the issue of urban sprawl. Basically everybody is impacted by sprawl. People who live in cities face disinvestment, in suburbs with the trees being knocked down, chewing up farmland. So you talk about this convergence, a lot of it is happening now, but it has to happen with the understanding that we have to include everybody, that it has to be an inclusive movement or it won't work. gh: How can you pose these issues to people when organizing in low income and politically disenfranchised communities, especially communities with very little open space or access to natural areas? Bullard: The first line is that we have to start early. We have to educate young people that it is their right to have access to open space, green space, parks, outdoors, as opposed to people thinking that their supposed to be living in an area where the only park is a basketball court with no net. We have to give people this idea that it's their right to have access to open space and green space and we have to provide funds to make sure that we get them early on and take them on field trips, take them to a wilderness area, a refuge, a reserve, to a park- a real park and to integrate this information into our curriculum. In your geography course, in your social studies course, or science course make sure you integrate this into it, and have videos that you can show, but ultimately the best example that you can have is that young people

84 visit these places and see for themselves what nature is. If you talk about people of color, African Americans for example, we are land-based people. Africans are land-based people. Native Americans are land-based peoples. We have been pushed off land and we now find ourselves in cities but that doesn't mean that the institutional memory of what the land was to us and how we are tied to the land and how our whole existence was based on community and being tied to the land. And so I think we've gotten away from that but the reintroduction of those concepts can be achieved if we make a concerted effort at trying to do that. And some of that is being done if you look at the environmental education curriculum that is integrating environmental justice into it. We're trying to do that but there is a whole lot of resistance. Traditional environmental education is to basically do it by the numbers the way it's been done for the last 50 years and that's not working. It's not working for our communities. gh: What is the EJ perspective on the population/border debate within the Sierra Club? Bullard: Well, you know... My position--and I can only speak for myself, is that immigration is not the problem in terms of environmental degradation. If we talk about having no borders and addressing issues of economic justice--we can address lots of the environmental injustices around the world. If we talk about respecting life and respecting people and respecting communities, if we do that we can end a lot of the international friction that results from trans-boundary waste trades, and imbalances created as a result of NAFTA--people call it "ShAFTA". We can do a lot of things and I think this whole anti-immigrant wave is just another wedge that is driven between folks that are organizing and mobilizing. I don't think it will work. This country is changing demographically and it is scaring a lot of people. The year 2050 is supposed to be the magic year when people of color will be in the majority in this country. But at one point in time this country was people of color, it was indigenous people. So when we talk about these issues, we have to put them in the context of the long term. We need to address things within US borders but at the same time we cannot export problems abroad and create problems in areas that we know do not have the capacity to handle garbage and environmental waste and the risky technologies that are being exported and the unsustainable development policies that are being exported abroad, most of it by our government. So I think that environmental justice folks are saying that we are going to have to work across borders and those ties are already there and it is just a matter of making sure that we strengthen those and we expand and keep reaching out. gh: How has the environmental justice movement attacked the mode of production, the way that things are made, as well as the fact that things are being dumped on people. Bullard: Well, as a matter of fact, there was a meeting in Detroit on

85 clean production. And what we're saying is that clean production can be a major component in the environmental justice movement because if we are talking about clean production, changing the way things are made and what goes into the manufacturing of products, we can save a lot of headaches for communities that are surrounded by polluting industries. So if we clean up the production and a lot of communities that are living on the fence lines with these facilities, a lot of their problems can be solved immediately. So EJ and clean production go hand in hand. What we are saying is that we have to make sure that as these new movements come along we integrate EJ into it. We've done that with the clean production movement. The EJ movement is an inclusive movement. What we are saying is that everything on the spectrum as it relates to siting, pollution, industrial contamination in communities, non-sustainable development, non-sustainable patterns of production, I think everybody has a role in that. The EJ movement is an anti-racist movement and I don't think you can get anymore radical than fighting racism. Because when you talk about fighting racism, you make a lot of enemies because racism permeates everything. I think Earth First! can really embrace a lot of the environmental justice principles that we have and see that there are a lot of things that environmental justice groups are advocating and trying to implement that cut cross some of the issues that you're addressing. And I'm not saying that you are gonna get a lot people of color inundating your organization [sic] with membership but we can work together without being members and that's where I think the collaboration, coalitions and signing onto supporting specific campaigns has really made a difference in some of the more recent campaign victories that we've had on EJ.The fact is that the environmental justice movement over the last ten years has really matured onto developing policies and issue statements and working on issues ranging from housing, transportation, health to economic development, community revitalization, you name it. I think that the mere fact that we have a number of environmental justice centers around the country now that are working with communities--not organizing communities-- but working with, in support of and providing technical assistance and training, we've been able to do some things that no thought we could do 10-15 years ago and that's really making a difference when we talk about working across disciplines and geographic, racial and economic spectrums, we're the most powerful and that's when we are the strongest.

Strategies to achieve environmental justice: a definition of environmentalism is: Environmentalism is where we live, where we work, where we play as well as the natural world. E.J. has put forth this whole paradigm in terms of equal protection, equal enforcement, pollution prevention, right to know what exists in the workplace, in the home as well as on the playground. E.J. also includes protection of workers and finally E.J. includes community empowerment and meaningful participation. Over the past years change has not come from government organizations, it's come from the bottom up Grassroots activism.

86 1983- Warren County, North Carolina, PCB landfill, 500 people arrested demonstrating the location.

This demonstration also led to 1983 GAO study- the correlation of landfills and the racial socioeconomic status of surrounding communities. That study showed that 3 out of 4 hazardous waste sites in the south were located in or near African- American communities. Even though African-American' only made up 20% of the region's population.

The commission for Racial Justice Toxic Waste and Race's (1987) first international study that correlated hazardous waste sites and demographics. Again race was the most potent variable in predicting where these facilities were located. More powerful than poverty- land values- home ownership, etc. Dumping in Dixie to dispel the myth that African Americans and people of color aren't concerned with the environment and hazardous waste, lead poisoning of our children- we're also doing something about it. Five regions of the South have used various strategies to confront this issue of environmental injustice. 1991- The first people of color leadership summit held in Washington D.C.- to address this whole question of toxic racism, environmental injustice, environmental inequities and the whole problem of disproportionate impact. "Race and the incident of Environmental hazard"- Bunyon Bryant and Paul Moorehigh.

It wasn't only these activities books, conferences that led government to respond, but these were the important ones. Government's response? In 1990, ATSDR held a historic National minority health conference focused on contamination. In 1992, EPA established office of Environmental Equity- after meeting with community leaders, academics, and some civil rights leaders and basically admitted there was a problem and something had to be done about it. The central theme is that we have to take on our interdisciplinary approach. We have to take a multi-media approach and we have to involve the public and particularly impacted communities in decision-making. Whether it's talking about community driven research, the question of examining what health risks are present around a superfund site. And developing a method of involving those affected residents in the process, equal enforcement of the laws in terms of compliance.

Environmental Justice Executive Order: is it a new law? No. Is it anything new? No. The Environmental Justice Executive Order basically says: We should ensure that all communities are protected equally: We should use our existing laws to make sure we have healthy and sustainable communities. The executive order examines two pieces of legislation, one over 30 years old- The Civil Rights Act of 1964, which says no federal monies can be used to promote discrimination based on race or color, education, employment, housing, or any other area

87 including the environment.

The Civil Rights has not been used to the extent it should have been used when we talk about enforcing the law equally in a non-discriminatory. Environmental Policy Act of 1969: it says that in terms of federal actions that have potential for impact need to be assessed mitigated. Including environmental health and socio-economic impact assessments have not been done to the extent to protect all populations and particularly children. Children's bodies metabolize toxins in very different ways than adults.

We use these two laws to pinpoint the fact that not all communities are created equal. There are some communities on the other side of the tracks that don't get adequate treatment, don't get adequate attention and we all know this to be true. The executive order means that we'll finally be connecting new data on ethnic and racial minorities and also to assess disproportion and adverse impact. Not everybody has access to information.

There is a process that we're advocating to level the playing field when it comes to getting information in a timely manner and used friendly manner. The last part of the executive order deals with the whole question of subsistence fishers and wildlife consumers. Everybody does not get their fish out of the super- market, there are many people who are subsistence fishers and many people who are not anglers who fish for protein who basically subsidize their diets and their budgets by fishing from rivers, lakes and streams, etc. We need to factor those elements in when we talk about calculating risk, etc.

Whether it's water quality standards in dioxins or other types of toxins that may be added to our food and water supply. People who hunt and fish based on geography, based on culture, based on location, often times can be under protected when we calculate and make our assumptions. If we look at the Civil Rights Act- Title 6 Equal Enforcement of the laws, equal protection, compliance analysis, we have data on distributive impact and regressive impacts.

Resource allocation- some cases, the money is placed one side of town to enforce of the law, on the other side of town, we look the other way. That has to end. That is immoral, that is illegal it is uncertain and we say that should end. We should look at investments and impact where we put our money and what kinds of results we're getting. Looking at the possibility of targeting enforcement, targeting resources where there are the greatest risks. This is not a Republican issue, this is not a Democrat issue, this is an issue of justice. Involve impacted populations in the process whether its around a superfund site or whether it's in the process of abating lead in public housing. We have to involve people in the process, particularly those people that have the greatest to gain from that involvement. We have to bring in the whole idea that all impacts do not have the

88 same effect across the board.

We have to focus our assessment to determine what is significant and this is a significant problem only because it affects large numbers of people or the fact that a smaller number of people are being affected at a level that would be intolerable if those people happened to be white, affluent and happened to live on the right side of town. Those are issues that are not addressed in policy and by not being addressed in policy, the whole cycle of inequities, whether it's groups that are medically underserved or it's populations that are at great risk when it comes to health, and whether it's geographic areas that are under ecological strain.

There needs to be a mechanism to provide feedback to impacted populations. Not getting that information back to people has to change. There have been that have literally studied to death and they don't understand why action has not been forthcoming. There are some communities that are at the end of the line when it comes to getting their points on the table. There are many cases right now where we don't have the data to assess multiple cumulative effects and possible synergistic impacts in terms of chemicals and other toxins.

We don't get any action. We continue to look at the flavor of the month- one chemical at a time. Where as in the real world, in many communities, whether it's on the south side of Chicago… where there are multiple chemicals that are in the waste stream that are in the communities that need to be, risks need to be assessed and prevention methods need to be put in place. I don't think this is anything that's unusual that people are asking for. It's the common sense approach. In addition, there is a requirement in the executive order calls for research data collection and analysis.

Here we're talking about examining qualitative and quantitative data, there are many qualitative data that will not show up in the census tapes. We have to do in many cases ethnographic studies, we have to do on-site visits, we have to do in- depth interviews and we have to do health surveys. We have to add to the data, and again we have to use qualitative and quantitative data. We have to use demographic information, community rights to know, SIRI data to plot emissions and track emissions.

Develop pollution intervention programs, emission reduction programs, and waste minimization programs. We also have to consider that when we change units of analysis, we may change may change what we find. When we go from a census track to block groups to zip codes to counties, etc. And understanding that in many cases communities or neighborhoods existed long before there were geographic configurations called census stripes. In some cases, maybe all cases, pollution does not necessarily stop at a political boundary or it does not

89 stop at a fence or state line. We have to assess what the unit of analysis and the zone of impact is. We have our policy makers, our analysts, working with communities working to identify what the socio-historical nature of that neighborhood and community is.

Community is more than a spatial definition, it is both spatial and social. We have to have our databases go across jurisdictions and planning districts. Our research analysis also must look for health effects and vulnerable populations. Low income populations that might not have balanced diets, we're talking about proposals to cut school lunch programs for poor children, at the same time we're talking about proposals that would get the Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, and Endangered Species Act. I say to those people who speak out against cutting these acts, they must also speak out against cutting school lunch programs for children, or housing programs, and programs in terms of lead abatement. Those are environmental justice issues whether they be about the built-in environment or the social environment.

Land use and economic development are environmental justice issues. In many grass root struggles in communities have not been addressed at the federal level because they say it's a local land-use issue. That's a local zoning issue and the federal government, the EPA say we don't want to get involved in local issues if there is inequity built in to a system where people of color have been locked out of zoning boards and all this nasty stuff, locally unwanted land uses, LULUS, are placed on the other side of the tracks.

And if it's a local issue then I think the issue of justice, fairness, equity must be addresses at all levels. If it's wrong to put all the landfills, all the hazardous waste facilities, all the nasty stuff, just where poor people here, and people of color are than in those local land use issue, a local zoning issue, I think there's an issue for the federal government. When it comes to equal protection, Title 6, of the Civil Rights Act, when it comes to the fact that no community should be burdened with a disproportionate of our industrial society.

Disproportionate impact going to our original issue, what is it? Environmental justice does not mean taking all the nasty stuff out of black communities. That is not justice, that is madness. What the environmental justice paradigm says is that there should be a sharing of the burden, since all of us produce waste and there is a direct relationship between per capita income and waste generation, and there is an inverse relationship between where the waste is disposed and per capita income.

We're talking about those communities that have borne a greater shape a greater burden- should not have to bear any greater burden whether it's this generation or the next generation. What it means is leveling the playing fields.

90 Those communities are at the greatest risk when it comes to health comes to impact on entire generations and future generations. Those questions of whether or not we should place another facility in that community to add to that risk burden.

The environment justice paradigm should kick in. And there should be a moratorium on any future siting of facilities in communities that have borne their fair share. That is not asking affirmative action that is not asking for special treatment that is asking for justice. Assumptions in calculating impacts and risk, we have to make sure we're not building in a situation that perpetuates inequities. Equity assessment and distributive impact, we have to adjust our methodologies to deal with some of these issues. As I said before, because in many cases when we're talking about who gets who, what, where, when, and why, may not necessarily be based in science it may be based on is political science. Oftentimes it may not be epidemiology, toxicology, hydrology, but maybe sociology. We have to understand that all communities, all neighborhoods, all regions do not bear the burdens when it comes to toxic waste, to pollution, when it comes to the whole topic of equity. We also have to look at adverse and disproportionate impact, in term of social, economic, air quality, energy, environmental, we have to look at community impact.

What is community health? Health is more than, as the environmental justice paradigm justice states health is more than health of the physical body, health is more then cleaning up a super-fund site. Health also includes the whole issue of sustainability. The fact that drugs are an environmental problem, is a toxic problem, crack cocaine is one of the most hazardous substance known.

There aren't that many poppy fields, coca bushes, and marijuana bushes growing in the ghetto. This stuff is imported, just as other kinds of chemicals that these companies operate in many of our communities. The question of how we define community health includes housing, employment, education, infrastructure, and transportation all these things are interrelated. So this is whole concept Brownfield's and cleanup standards and trying to reinvest, reinvigorate inner-city urban areas, we have to talk about it's more than just cleaning up a superfund site, in order for us to re-invigorate in order to create a sustainable and healthy community. We have to work at the whole community and community is just that. Where we live, work, and play as well as the natural environment. Finally, the executive order and the environmental justice community calls for public participation and access to information.

It's not enough to say that the info has been collected, but people, the public, the disenfranchised public have not been able to get info in a timely manner, have not been able to get access to the public library, and again when I wrote "Dumping in Dixie," it was not by accident that I focused in on the Southern

91 United States, it was not by accident that Jim Crow gave us the Civil Rights Movement in the South, and it was not by accident that the environmental justice movement was born in the South. This is not to say environmental inequities do not exist in other parts of the U.S. This is not to say environmental inequity is a domestic U.S. issue. Environmental justice cuts across the globe as we resolve many of our environmental health problems in our country many of the same problems are now being exported.

Trans- boundary waste trade dealing with the whole question of border disputes that are growing around the question of waste that is coming into Mexico form the U.S. The mequiladores program, NARTA, GATT, the whole question fairness and equity. We have to identify high impact populations and at risk populations, children, older people, pregnant women, people with anemia, people with susceptibility to certain kinds of chemicals in terms of the way they metabolize them. These are issues we have to work together on in terms of science, scientists, and in terms of public policy makers and in terms of environmental organizations and grassroots impacted communities. We have to design our communication strategies and outreach strategies that are sensitive to cultural groups, language groups, groups that may be geographically isolated from the main stream, whether it's in Appalachia or on reservations or inner city neighborhoods.

The environmental justice movement attempts to bring to the table real diners in the process about what's happening in their communities. Whether it's about a lead smelter in West Dallas, a hazardous waste superfund Cadillac of landfills in the South… The whole question of making sure the laws, regulations, and policies do not make some communities more vulnerable and allow those populations to be under protected. This is what the whole environmental justice paradigm is all about. We have much success since 1983, we've come a long ways, but the environmental justice leaders and activists that I work with are not sprinters, they are long distance runners much of the action and changes that were begun actually started under the Bush Administration and Clinton Administration picked up on some of the changes that had been put in place.

So environmental justice leaders and activists and people in the grassroots are not dismayed by the 104th Congress and their somehow disdain for equal protection be it the environment or employment we're saying that we don't retreat. A line has been drawn in the sand and environmental justice is about justice not about a political ideology, it's about justice. That's where we will take our position and that's where we are headed.

Today, we have identified such sites and cleaned them up or at the very least fenced off and contained these wastes and now we have laws in place to insure that handling and disposing such waste is done in a proper fashion. New

92 environmental paradigms such as right- to- know, which empowers communities to understand about the wastes that are generated in their own neighborhoods. Paradigms such as pollution prevention that allow us to prevent the generation of waste in the first place. Reduce, reuse, recycle these are the paradigms of the 1990's. We have also learned there are better approaches to waste clean- up. Some of the new approaches to reform superfund law.

There is still much to be accomplished. Across the country, there's still too many clean- ups that have not been done and too many communities who still have questions about their health. All of you are integral to answering these questions and getting the job done. Though we've done much to protect the environment, we have failed to protect children and low-income, minority community to the fullest extent we should. I know from my experience in public health that children are the focus of concern for adverse effects by exposure to toxic chemicals for all communities.

LOIS GIBBS I’m Lois Gibbs, work for Citizen’s Clearance House. Started back in Love Canal in Niagara Falls, New York.

Question: What would be the way the first step in starting when they have a problem in their backyard, what would they do? Your suggestion.

Answer: What people have to do because there is no other way is by talking to other people. Although simplistic it is extremely difficult to do… Went to system put together a petition… What if someone slams the doors in my face… Went back and started talking to people… Start talking and one wall I say oh yeah my son had epilepsy and the neighbor had and so on.

As communication got better and finding the common threats… Now they have people behind it.

Question: A lot of people are calling the environmental justice the parallel to the civil rights movement. Do you see that?

Answer: I think that there are very similar tactics and strategies to justice and civil rights movement… The justice of environment is similar because it’s the right to choose what comes in your environment… What you will be exposed to or not… Control system…

This is a life and death situation, for you tell me about it?

Love Canal…if we didn’t move our families out of there we would have lost our children…Pensacola it’s the exact same thing… No one will do anything… and

93 so are hundreds of other communities… What’s in common? They are working class, poor communities of color and that’s the only thing ever done wrong…

Question: Did you live in this neighborhood? Answer: I stayed on the next street for about 10 to 15 years… I was aware of all of this back in the 1960’s… I had to stay in the house and play (when he was little). It was white lime snow….Acid ate up the fence and paint off cars… Closed down high school and elementary… Been in Marine Corp about 23 years… Just came back in the picture now…

Question: What part of the environmental justice category? Answer: The health issues that predicate throughout are the basics… When people are frightened that health problems are in jeopardy they become active…

Question: Where do they start? Answer: There isn’t a total picture of what toxins form… There is a recent study that shows that doctors do not know how to treat environmental illness… It took six years to find doctors to help me… More education… The organization helps to get to point A to point B – doctors - use data to power yourself…

Question: Contract on America. Back lash on America? Answer: Master mind strategy… Using power and money… Energy, health, and safety environmental health is at risk… If HR-9 is passed we will not have the ability to protect our families… To allow industry to do whatever they want… Contract is to lessen government to regulate industry… Superfind back to states – small state (southern) that makes industry not enough people to regulate… The states don’t want it…

(Horning) That’s been happening over a decade… The more we get involved with NAFTA the more we deal with toxins… A part of international waste trade. out and do things that were outside of my experience. Allowed me to go out and talk to other moms to say, "Are your children being poisoned? How sick are your children? What is it that we need to do here? How do we bring about justice in our community?" And it was a very difficult struggle. But what was real rewarding about it is as, when I went and knocked on doors, as I went talked with folks with my knees shaking, and nervous as all heck, people were real receptive, people were saying, "Gee you know, I've been waiting for someone to come to my door and talk to me about this. My kids have been sick for a long time" or "I've had miscarriages" or "I have cancer" or "My child has cancer" and "I'm so glad you're here. And come on in and sit down and let's talk about it, I'll make some coffee." So it was a, you know, my movement, and my sort of activity was really very simply me talking to someone else, who talked to someone else, who talked to someone else and through that we organized one

94 of the most powerful citizen's groups in this country. You don't need a college education I found out. You don't even have to be a great, wonderful speaker like Martin Luther King. All you need to do is be honest and talk to folks and ask folks to talk to somebody else, and that's how we built Love Canal Homeowners Association.

Gibbs: I was the spark in Love Canal. And I did that, because ... first of all I did that out of anger and people have to understand that I was never a TV star or an activist wanting to be an author, but I was a mom who had a high school education with a "C" average, who found out that somebody was poisoning my children and made a decision to poison my children. And that anger the fact that somebody said that it was okay, because my husband makes 10,000 dollars a year, to poison my children made me so angry and that anger allowed me to go Q: Do you see a change in the definition concerning environmental justice? There is a big change in the definition of environmental justice. In that it began really around toxics and hazardous waste sites, and now environmental justice is very broad, it's about where people live, work and play. It's about getting jobs at fair wages, it's about being able to educate their children in low income communities, and it's about them being poisoned by corporate decisions and policies passed at all levels who say because the folks are poor, because the folks are, for the most part, communities of color, it's okay to poison them. So it's a very broad based definition today, and I think, a much more holistic approach to what we want to do in changing society.

Q: We so often hear that it takes a huge group of people to change things, but we're seeing, or at least I'm seeing, and I'm sure you've seen it more than I on first hand, of one person making that change. How do they do that? Well, one person can help make a change, it actually does take a lot of people. But one person could make the spark, and then they need other people to fan the fires. So a single individual can not, but a single individual can do a spark in a community, get people educated about the problem, get them motivated and energized and help them figure out how to go about making change. Then those people in the community can actually achieve change. I think historically we always thought about justice being won by hundreds of thousands or millions of people marching on Washington DC or the state capitol, and that is not how change happens. Change in this country happens by people changing their own community, and so an individual will find a problem, will educate their community and mobile the community to find the answers and putting pressure on decision makers. And it is extremely successful, and has been all across the country.

Q: You were the one voice that kicked it off in Love Canal. How did you do that? I was the spark in Love Canal. And I did that, because ... first of all I did that out of anger and people have to understand that I was never a TV star or an activist wanting to be an author, but I was a mom who had a high school education with a

95 "C" average, who found out that somebody was poisoning my children and made a decision to poison my children. And that anger the fact that somebody said that it was okay, because my husband makes 10,000 dollars a year, to poison my children made me so angry and that anger allowed me to go out and do things that were outside of my experience. Allowed me to go out and talk to other moms to say, "Are your children being poisoned? How sick are your children? What is it that we need to do here? How do we bring about justice in our community?" And it was a very difficult struggle. But what was real rewarding about it is as, when I went and knocked on doors, as I went talked with folks with my knees shaking, and nervous as all heck, people were real receptive, people were saying, "Gee you know, I've been waiting for someone to come to my door and talk to me about this. My kids have been sick for a long time" or "I've had miscarriages" or "I have cancer" or "My child has cancer" and "I'm so glad you're here. And come on in and sit down and let's talk about it, I'll make some coffee." So it was a, you know, my movement, and my sort of activity was really very simply me talking to someone else, who talked to someone else, who talked to someone else and through that we organized one of the most powerful citizen's groups in this country. You don't need a college education I found out. You don't even have to be a great, wonderful speaker like Martin Luther King. All you need to do is be honest and talk to folks and ask folks to talk to somebody else, and that's how we built Love Canal Homeowners Association.

Q: Love Canal was one of the first in grass roots organization with environmental justice, or injustice, is probably a better word, but we're seeing it sort of snowball, we hope, in the United States and one particular person in Florida, her name is Margaret Williams. Tell me what you know about Margaret Williams. Margaret William is absolutely terrific. I met Margaret Williams around the dump site that she is fighting, she called to ask for information. This is a woman who gives 120 percent of herself of her time. She understands her neighbors, she talks to her neighbors in a way that they understand this very complex, scientific and technical issues. She is courageous, she is not afraid to confront the big power people, she is creative in that she comes up with ideas of how to make the power of people embarrass, how to put pressure on them, putting little crosses on the front yards of lawns, facilitating meetings, she's just absolutely dynamic. She is another home grown, grass roots activist who I'm real proud to be working next to. Q: She's trying to clean up, or get some relief at one hundred superfund sites in Florida. What is superfund? Superfund is ... actually people call me the mother of superfund. Superfund came from Love Canal incident, and it was supposed to go in and clean up contaminated sites to protect the people to protect the environment and then later go after the responsible parties to sue them to recoup the money and put it in back in Superfund. Superfund is the most dangerous sites in this country. If you have one of the worst sites in this country as it relates to health, public health, the

96 environment, drinking water supply, air contamination, you are put on the superfund list. So it's not just a list of toxic waste dumps, it's a list of this country's worst toxic waste dumps. And unfortunately, Superfund over the last many years, has never worked right. Instead of going in and protecting the people, as it was intended, and as they should do just morally, instead Superfund hires lawyers, consulting firms and everyone else to try to figure out how not to do for the people what needs to be done, how not to move the people, how not to study the people, how not to spend money. It's a very sad program at this point and not even close to what it was intended to be when President Jimmy Carter passed it in 1980.

Q: What's happening now with the Contract on America and the surge to get rid of the Clean Water Act, and etcetera? Are we seeing some backlash? Well, we are really at a crossroads in this country with the Republican Congress, they want to deregulate everything, they want to pretend like the environment is no longer at threat. They are going to let corporations do their own thing and trust them. It is extremely frightening, and if we don't do something as a society I think we are going to be in really sorry shape in the very near future. The interesting thing about the Contract on America is when that was passed, so to speak through the election process, there was never any mention of environment. There was talk about budget, there was talk about welfare, there was talk about health care, but there was never any mention of the environment. And now people are, even the Republicans, who voted for the Contract on America are getting very frightened. It is also very frightening because it is a double standard. For example they say, we'll let corporations do the right thing, they don't need to be regulated, they're good corporate citizens. Yet you and I, they don't say we'll trust people, we'll take the police force out of our neighborhoods, and people will do the right thing, they won't steal from one another, they won't kill one another. Well, that's just not true. If you don't have enforcement of private laws and public laws, you have chaos in this country. And if you don't have enforcement of those corporate laws and you take those laws away, we are going to have chaos in our environment and our public health is going to be dramatically, seriously hurt.

Q: One of the things that I want to do in this piece for the layman, for that community activist is tell them what dioxin is. Tell us. Dioxin is a chemical that is not deliberately made. It is a chemical that is a byproduct of a process, and it is mostly chlorine that's being heated. Medical waste incinerators, solid waste incinerators, hazardous waste incinerators, pesticides, paper and pulp facilities: they all release dioxin in their processes. Incinerators burn plastic, for example, and in the burning process of the plastic, it comes out of the stack. And what is very frightening about dioxin, is that it is everywhere. Corporations have crossed the line. That they have poisoned every man, woman and child in this country. According to the Environmental Protection Agency, every man, woman and child in this country is at or near full of dioxin. And that comes from your food supply, 90 percent of it. Cause as it falls out of the

97 stack, it falls on the grass and when it falls on the grass, for example, the cow eats it and eats a little bit each day and it accumulates in their body and then we drink the cow's milk it is transferred through the milk into our bodies. So every time we have a glass of milk, every time we eat yogurt, every time we have a hamburger, we are eating a little bit of dioxin and it is stored in our bodies for up to 10 years. So whatever you ate today will be in your body for at least 10 years. The outcome of that exposure is very serious. EPA is saying that it is the most potent cancer- causing chemical that they have ever studied that effects the entire population. That it causes cancer of a number of organs, immune system problems, reproductive problems, birth defects. It just has a whole host of problems associated with it. But the tragedy in dioxin is not just that every man, woman and child is poisoned, but people who live in Pensacola, people who live in communities that have extraordinary exposure, those people are going to be very, very, very, very, sick or if they aren't already very, very sick. Because you and I are at or near full. So someone who lives with dioxin and little children, and fetuses in their mamma's tummy are exposed to dioxin plus the dioxin from the site means that those children have a huge risk. And the chance of them surviving and living a normal life are pretty slim.

Q: If you could give one piece of advice, one piece of advice, what would it be and where would you tell the person ... if you need to start community activism because a medical incinerator is coming to your neighborhood or a toxic waste dump is coming to your neighborhood or there is a mount dioxin next to you, what would it be? What I would tell folks if they want to get involved is the first thing they need to do is talk to some other people, find out what is in your community and talk with other people. Most people belong to a church or a Girl Scouts or PTA, I mean, people have community groups that they could start talking to folks about what the problem is. And one conversation will lead to another conversation to another to anther conversation and soon you will find that the whole community is very concerned about that issue as well and willing to get involved. But really all people need to do is educate themselves about what is in their community and what is the danger and what needs to be done and then go to those organizations or go knock on doors as I did of their neighbors and begin to talk to them about the problem. People in these communities will come up with the solutions themselves. People are very smart are very skilled. They don't need a trained person to come down and tell them what to do. They'll find their own way, because they have found it in the past, and they know their community better than anyone else.

Q: So why are you here? Why are you in Tallahassee? I'm in Tallahassee because I'm talking about dioxin and because I'm trying to do something that's very ambitious, which is rebuilding democracy. I believe and CCHW believes that if we organize community by community around these issues and if we invite the broader population, because dioxin has poisoned everybody, into these issues and talk to people about we need to take our country back, that

98 we need to take it away from the corporate polluters, we need to take it away from those power sources that are out there, take it back just like it was 200 years ago and begin to build our own communities around things we care about and that that's the only way we are going to survive as a society and it's the only way we are ever going to have a just society. Right now the those who are wealthy, those who are powerful don't have to be concerned about the Pensacolas of this world, and that's just not fair. We need to rebuild our democracy, we need to take back our country from corporations and part of my visit to Tallahassee is to deliver that message and to try to get people to work together.

Q: What do you say to people that say that if you do that you are taking away jobs? By rebuilding democracy and cleaning up our environment, we in fact are not taking away jobs, we are creating an opportunity for jobs. For example, if you shut down a medical waste incinerator or a solid waste incinerator you have all of this so called waste left over that needs to be dealt with in some fashion and the way to deal with it is multifaceted so it will employ more people. If you are talking about recycling you are talking about shredding and reuse when you are talking about the paper and pulp facility you are talking about making process changes. This is not an issue of jobs and environment, this is an issue of clean jobs and fair living wages and a clean environment. And you will find if you look around this country, and I'm sure it is true of the State of Florida, where there are pleasant, environmentally safe communities, you have a good economy. In areas where you have the pits, where everything is dumped, you have a terrible economy. So that history and stats will show you that in fact a clean economy attracts industry.

Q: Love Canal , explained what it is was exactly. Love Canal is a community upstream from Niagara Falls, the seventh wonder of the world, that has twenty-thousand tons of chemical poisons buried in the center of the neighborhood by Oxidental Petroleum and it had leaked out into the homes that surrounded, there were 900 families, and poisoned the people there and it took us two years but we received evacuation of all 900 families by the state and federal government, a cleanup of the site and some payment to the people for personal injuries and health care benefits. So it was a very successful fight. Unfortunately, at Love Canal they now are trying to move new families back in there. And the new families they're trying to move back in there of course are low income people. They are looking at homesteading those homes to people and saying that Love Canal is now habitable. They will not say Love Canal is safe. And I think the last part of it is that there are still 20-thousand tons of chemicals in the center of the community. All they did under their so-called cleanout was to put a clay cap over the top and a trench around it to catch anything that leaks out further, but they've never done anything about the waste that leaked out there for twenty some years, that poisoned my two children killed little John Kenny who was seven years old who died from dioxin poisoning and just created havoc on our

99 community. Fifty-six percent of our children for example were born birth defected so we can imagine if low income families move in there who have less health care benefits and other sort of things, that the chances of them getting very sick are very high.

Q: Where are some of the top sites of dioxin poison that are on the list for the program that you were talking about. I think the most nasty sites with dioxin are what they call the reservoir sites like Pensacola and there are several hundred of them that dot the nation. One I just visited in Tacoma, Washington is very similar to Pensacola where they have old wood treatment facilities the down-wind of the medical waste incinerators the hazardous waste incinerators and the paper and pulp facilities are another big source of dioxin, and so they are spotted throughout the nation, which is why, cause most hospitals for example have a solid waste incinerator, is why the American public as a whole have become poisoned because it is in almost every single person's backyard and the only way to protect yourself from dioxin is to shut yourself is to shut those sources off. You can't lifestyle yourself out of it, even if you ate the most organic yogurt, you would still be eating a little bit of dioxin. I was the spark in Love Canal. And I did that, because ... first of all I did that out of anger and people have to understand that I was never a TV star or an activist wanting to be an author, but I was a mom who had a high school education with a "C" average, who found out that somebody was poisoning my children and made a decision to poison my children. And that anger the fact that somebody said that it was okay, because my husband makes 10,000 dollars a year, to poison my children made me so angry and that anger allowed me to go out and do things that were outside of my experience. Allowed me to go out and talk to other moms to say, "Are your children being poisoned? How sick are your children? What is it that we need to do here? How do we bring about justice in our community?" And it was a very difficult struggle. But what was real rewarding about it is as, when I went and knocked on 65s doors, as I went talked with folks with my knees shaking, and nervous as all heck, people were real receptive, people were saying, "Gee you know, I've been waiting for someone to come to my door and talk to me about this. My kids have been sick for a long time" or "I've had miscarriages" or "I have cancer" or "My child has cancer" and "I'm so glad you're here. And come on in and sit down and let's talk about it, I'll make some coffee." So it was a, you know, my movement, and my sort of activity was really very simply me talking to someone else, who talked to someone else, who talked to someone else and through that we organized one of the most powerful citizen's groups in this country. You don't need a college education I found out. You don't even have to be a great, wonderful speaker like Martin Luther King. All you need to do is be honest and talk to folks and ask folks to talk to somebody else, and that's how we built Love Canal Homeowners Association.

100 Joy Towles Cummings Someone was asking how much the EPA knows...Gloria, I think you were wanting to know how much the EPA come out with and why are they down playing it so much. In 1992, the EPA staff briefed their deputy administrator and this is a copy of the briefing that they gave out at the briefing, we're not supposed to have this by the way. They told the that enzyme thing we were talking about...that's the hormonal problem, that's all those problems other than cancer recent data indicates that there may not be a threshold for certain responses to dioxin however, the implications for specific risks assessments, such as for cancer are not yet clear. This was in 92. Recent evidence has strengthened the conclusion that the sensitivity of humans is similar to that of experimental animals cancer immunotoxicity the AH receptor binding, etc. Current exposure levels to dioxin-related compounds appear to place people at or near a body burden where sensitive responses may occur especially for subpopulations at high end exposure such as nursing infants, recreational subsistence anglers, and I might add people who live in pulp and paper communities like mine. Continuing research into the risks from dioxin exposure should result in continuing process of reassessment as new data come available and are incorporated into a new, more flexible model that's not the way they talked a couple of weeks ago, is it? And it says the Office of Research and Development scientists have reached the tentative conclusion that dioxin exposure may have been responsible for the decline of lake trout in Lake Ontario as the result of the reproductive toxicity of dioxin now I can tell you something else that's happening where I live, there is an EPA researcher named Dr. Will Davis who has done a study and that study is called the "the effects of affluent on the Sexuality of fishes - - an environmental early warning" Well Dr. Davis has found some fish out of the Fenholloway River and called the “busie species”, what we would call them mosquito fish, there are a little tiny fish those little tiny then busie species fish are the female fish are exhibiting male sexual characteristics, now they know this to be a fact the scientists that I've talked to tell us that that's our canary in the coal mine when something like that is happening to the wildlife, then you need to be really aware that things like that may be happening to the human population, too and of course like we say we are much higher up on the food chain, we eat fish we eat beef, we eat dairy products, we were talking about...someone was asking about the beef end of the thing, I raise calves on my place, I take them over to Madison to the livestock market and they go to the feedlots out west and when they come back to you at the Winn Dixie and Publix its comes back as boxed beef, its been feed god-knows what all from the feedlots out there but those cows were raised in Taylor County Florida and they got a bad start, they were exposed to dioxin when they were, before they were born, they were exposed to dioxin in the grass they ate and in the cow's milk that they drank, I don't have any control over them after they leave

101 Taylor county and I don't have much control over them in my community, on my place, on my farm. There's not much way I can avoid them being exposed to dioxin and that's what really makes me mad my calf may be responsible for you have dioxin in your fatty tissues and that really worries me and the EPA not telling me how I can avoid that all these risk assessments and the EPA's cluster rules that they're talking about don't address how do we really avoid this problem and there is only one way we can really do that is to stop the use of chlorine the only incinerators that we have in Perry is the medical incinerators there and it is a really small one and I don't think its contributing a whole heck of a lot to the problem it may be contributing to it some, but I would say that 99 percent of our dioxin problem comes from that mill, that pulp and paper mill you were asking a little while ago about how this is created, how is dioxin created at a paper mill what happens is when they take the trees into the mill, they chip them up and they have these huge boilers -- digesters -- and as they are cooking these chips they add chlorine to it which makes the fibers stronger and supposedly it makes them whiter and prettier but it's a chemical reaction that takes place that they don't intend for it to happen, but it does but a chlorine molecule is one that will attach itself to almost any organic substance that comes by chlorine attaches itself to organic property and it creates -- it is a chemical reaction -- that takes place and it creates dioxin it is pretty simple when some of these knowledgeable people explain it there is no way they can avoid doing it as long as they use chlorine so it comes out of the mill Greenpeace has done a wonderful piece that's called "It's About Time" now this is our discharge pipe down in Perry, Florida on the front of this Time Magazine out of this discharge pipe comes 50 million gallons of black, toxic affluent everyday into the Fenholloway River and it travels about 20 miles down to the Gulf of Mexico now that's bad enough by itself but the fact is that this affluent is contaminating our ground water there and that's been proven, we know its happening and none of the agencies are doing anything about it. So I rant and rave about all the time about this problem you can't be drinking toxic pulp mill affluent and not expect some bad things to happen the health of the people in my community is showing it so I for all of you to be sure to get one of these and read it, its really good and it shows how we can avoid this problem. Gloria was asking me a little while ago how all of this come about, Julie Houserman of the Tallahassee Democrat wrote some articles called "Florida's Forgotten River." I had written to the Tallahassee Democrat, I had begged them to do some articles about the Fenholloway, that was way back in 91 I'd written to 60 Minutes, I'd done everything I knew to do to draw some attention to this problem, cause I knew it was there I knew it was happening and nothing was going on, and all of a sudden, after I had put an ad in our local paper asking people to join a class action suit on the water quality there, that cam out in the local paper on a Friday and the very next Sunday, this article came out in the Tallahassee Democrat and I was jumping up and down and screaming -- saying finally somebody noticed, good god somebody is finally noticing what's happening here and that started a whole lot of things to happen a little bit before

102 that, I had met Linda and met some people in Greenpeace and they promised to help and they have and then in 92 the state came out with this "state links the dirty wells to the P&G Mill" some of you probably remember seeing that in the paper here in Tallahassee, there have been a lot of articles about it in the Tallahassee papers, as a matter of fact all over the state we know that our wells in Taylor County are contaminated with pulp mill affluent, there is not much question about that, even thought the state agencies want to say you know, bad test, we have to do it over again, and all that. There are several thousand organic chlorinated compounds in our drinking water in Taylor County that scientists cannot even identify there's so complex and they change as they're being tested, those chlorine molecules will attach themselves to anything that comes along and so they change as they're being tested so how do you know if you can't even tell what a chemical is, how is a risk assessment like the dioxin supposed to tell you what's going on in your body if you are consuming that? Now the mill down there gives away free bottled water, yes, you can go pick up your bottle water every day from ... yes, its free ... the health department gives away coupons for bottled water so that you can take those coupons to the grocery store and get free bottled water most of us have, I have bottled water delivered to my house because we use so much, I use it in my all my cooking and in anything that we drink, I use bottled water Crystal, their big well is over in Jacksonville, if you know anything about Jacksonville, you know there are a couple of mills over there so I don't know if we're getting away from it or not, but I think theirs is, the Crystal water is probably a little cleaner that our well water, most likely okay, now, let's talk about that fish thing some more, okay -- all these mills, I'm gonna talk just about the Gulf of Mexico because Linda and Scott are going on to Palatka and over in the Jacksonville area and I feel like my expertise is more the Gulf of Mexico when you have all these mills over here in North Florida, and they're dumping this affluent into the Gulf of Mexico every minute of every day, and have been for the last forty or fifty years, there is some changes out in the gulf these mills have paid millions of dollars to their experts to test the affluent which now says that they are now no detection, what they're saying is that they're just testing the affluent, they're not testing the sediments, and if they're testing the fish, I'm really surprised they're probably only testing only down to a certain level, they haven't told us how low they're testing those fish yet, to what level they go down to, so when you talk to them you have to know their lingo and you have to understand their language and you have to know what kind of testing procedures they use and I'm not an expert, I 'm sort of an amateur scientist, I guess, I've had to be since we've gotten involved all of this kind of thing but it's pretty scary, and you know, one thing I might caution you to do is to find out where your seafood is coming from try to find out where the beef is coming from find out, try to find out where your dairy products are coming from about the only thing you can do is to try to get organically grown products and that's hard to do you can limit your amount of beef that you eat, and I'm a rancher I grow calves and I'm telling you things like this -- you've got to know that I'm

103 serious about this I hardly ever eat beef anymore, and I used to be president of the Florida Cattlewomen and it was my job to promote beef I also used to sell chemicals, I sold pesticides for quite a few years, those restricted use kinds with the skull and crossbones on the labels and that helped me to understand this problem when I moved back home in 81, if I hadn't done that I might not understand some of this chemistry maybe I wouldn't quite be as scared if I hadn't done that we've done a lot of things to draw attention to our problem down there, we ah Greenpeace protesters thwart the P&G supply train, this was in 92, we stopped the chlorine train from going into the mill, and of course we were just roundly just scolded at home in the local paper -- we were bad people, bad folks to do something like that, but it brought attention to the problem -- that sign says "save jobs - stop chlorine" lot of people have criticized me, saying oh she just wants to close down that mill cause she's mad at them, you're damned right I'm mad at them but I don't want to close the mill, I want them to stay there and be accountable for what they're done to my community. I want somebody, if it has to be me by myself, to hold them accountable but this is not a new problem, this was from 1966, the report from Washington by Michael Booda, and this was in a Sports and Field magazine, right here it says President Lyndon Johnson signed the Water Quality Act of 1965, and he says some things in that, "no one has the right to use the American's rivers and American's waterways that belong to all the people as a sewer" "the banks of a river may belong to one man or one industry or to one state, but the waters which flow between the banks belong to all the people." There is no excuse for a river flowing red with blood from slaughterhouses there is no excuse for paper mills pouring tons of sulfuric acid into the lakes and streams of the people of this country. There is no excuse in which to call a spade a spade for chemical companies and oil refineries using our major rivers as pipelines for toxic waste. There is no excuse for communities to use other people's rivers as a dump for their raw sewage. This was 1966, amazing? In 1963, Senator Pete Gibson wrote a letter to a friend of mine in Perry, "I am hopeful that a bona fide announcement will be made soon, regarding definite construction of a canal which will clear up our pollution problems on the Fenholloway River. This information has been made almost directly to me. However, I always believe it when I see it. Yours sincerely, Pete. Back in 1963. So they were talking about building a pipe to the Gulf of Mexico to take that affluent instead of using the river. That's not the answer to that problem. Governor Leroy Collins in 1956 wrote to my fiend Pharo Morgan, and he says they're going to study this problem. He said that when he campaigned he would ask the legislature to set up a water resources study. Well, the mill knew about dioxin in 1956, those companies already knew, we have documents which show that pulp and paper mills in the United States knew that they were creating dioxin back in 1950, amazing! 1965, Mr. Adams, who was our Lt. Governor at that time, I believe he was, there is something really wonderful right here that I think that everybody ought to know

104 about, in 1965 he said, this was the Secretary of State, Tom Adams, at that time was what he was, number 4 coastal waters from miles off the mouth of the Fenholloway River carry pollutants which close spawning grounds for crabs, fish, oysters and other marine life, that could be harvested commercially. Now I've never known about them closing those oyster beds or closing those fishing areas, not even in 1956 -- not 1965 or not even now when we know about this problem. There are still crab traps in the mouth of the Fenholloway River. And it is not the crabber's fault that those crabs are contaminated with dioxin. When we were in Atlanta a couple of weeks ago, I asked Dr. Farland who has done this wonderful dioxin reassessment, he was the main, his name is in the front of each one of these books, so I guess he is the man you need to point at and say you've got to do something here,I asked him, I said, Don't you live in Washington, DC? I live about 40 miles outside of Washington, and I said, Well I was up there about a month ago and I was going to your office and I said there is a seafood market right around the corner from the EPA office, and I said have you ever stopped there and bought any seafood? and he said, well yea, and I said well I stopped in there when I was there and I got to talking to those people and I found out that they sell three kinds of fish, blue crab, stone crabs, oysters and scallops and shrimp from the mouth of the Fenholloway River, and he had the most shocked look on his face, and I said so see. We're not keeping it all for ourselves, we're spreading it around. And that's the problem, is our food supply is moved around so much that it is not just the people in Taylor County that are being exposed to dioxin in the seafood, its everywhere. And if you eat seafood, you may be being exposed to it, too. we got pretty scared after we saw all of this, and I got pretty mad, and she sent out this poster this announcement about this meeting she said "if you're not outraged, you're not paying attention" Well that's the truth. If you're not outraged yet, you're not upset about this, then you haven't learned about it and you haven't listened. So, I think everybody ought to be upset about it. I've tried to do everything that I know to do, to draw attention to this problem where I come from There is one of those documents is in those dioxin books is estimating exposure to dioxin-like compounds, those EPA scientists can tell you exactly how much dioxin is in your fatty tissues if they know where you live. They know the places where you have lived, they can tell you, they know what kind of diet you eat, they can tell you how much dioxin is in your fatty tissues. That's pretty amazing. So, what we have to do is our job, once we know these things, and once we see that the EPA knows these things, is our job then to tell them what do with this information, because obviously they don't know. Or they would have done something already, right? They wouldn't have taken all this time and done all these studies and then give draft reassessments and have all these public meetings and asked for public comment if they knew what to do So I would ask each of you to write to the EPA and tell them to stop the use of

105 chlorine. It will help because of our incinerators. It will help from dioxin from coming from pulp and paper mills and from all the other sources that we can control. If you want to know more about Proctor and Gamble, let me suggest a book to you. Alishia Shawzie is the lady who writes for the Wall Street Journal and she wrote this book, The Inside Story of Proctor and Gamble, Soap Opera a couple of years ago, it is out in paperback now, and I think it costs about $14.00. They have it at Books A Million and most of the larger bookstores have it. There is a chapter in there called "Fear on the Fenholloway" and she mentions us throughout the book several different places throughout the book and its a pretty shocking story, but it's the truth. She's writing another book right now about all of these big layoffs at all these big companies do and how they get tax breaks and such and she told me she was pretty tired of writing about Proctor and Gamble but she said that HBO is making a movie out of this book and that will be coming out soon and so I'm pretty excited about that I brought an article that's over here on the table called "One in Nine" and it's about breast cancer and regardless of what some of the EPA researchers might be willing to say out in public, there is a terrible increase in breast cancer in our nation and I know there is a terrible number of women in Taylor County that have breast cancer and I think it is because of chlorine. So I'd encourage you to read that. Alishia was talking about that and she said well, she said the only person that I could think of was ... Sally Fields ... and I said yea she would be good that suits me just fine. Okay. P&G once we started complaining about the water situation in Perry, and I talked to people in other Proctor & Gamble pulp and paper communities and we sort of formed an alliance and we compared notes with each other and after this issue came out on CNN and 60 Minutes and all of these national programs, Proctor & Gamble sold all of their mills they sold all of their other mills to Weyerhaeuser, the one in Perry was so bad that they couldn't sell it. And so they had to end up forming a sham sale to a group of their retired vice presidents ... okay, that's not really a sale, the papers say that they sold 51 percent of the management of the mill to this group of investors, however, Proctor & Gamble supplied the money for these investors to buy the mill. One of the mills there can, they make two different ... there's actually two mills there, one mill has to use chlorine to make the products that they make, which is a very high quality rayon product and they say they can't make that product unless they use chlorine the other mill has switched to chlorine dioxide which is not a whole heck of a lot better, because dioxin is still the unwanted byproduct that comes out of the process the mill number two which is the one that uses the chlorine dioxide makes cellulose for disposable diapers, probably the least environmentally friendly product that I can think of they use rayon for tires, for fabric, for a whole lot of different things, the cellulose that come out of mill number one is also used in photographic film and the company says that there is no way

106 that they can make those products without using chlorine so my suggestion is that they make those products somewhere else, because the problem is the chlorine, and they cannot keep on contaminating our ground water and our fish and our wildlife and our bodies for ever and if they close the mill, that is their management decision not because of anything that I did, that mill is 40 years old, it is an antique, it is out of date and P&G is not going to come in there now and put money into this thing that they say they have sold to upgrade it unfortunately not, I've talked to the Chamber of Commerce, I've talked to everybody I know there, to try to get them past this, but unfortunately, they're still in denial in Perry. They don't want to even admit that this is a problem, they won't believe these stories in the Tallahassee paper, [audience inaudible] we have a new prison there, absolutely, it's the only industry in Perry, and that's what's created such a controversy. It's been jobs versus the environment. And the way I see it, it's that chlorine and the dioxin from that mill versus our health. Now if they really wanted to they could find some other products to make at that mill that they don't have to use chlorine. And they could stop this dioxin problem and they could stop the ground water contamination problem. There are a lot of things they could do. This article, "Closing the Loop" they could stop the use of chlorine and they could reuse all of that 50 million gallons of wastewater that they put out every day, they could use it all over again. They wouldn't have that discharge problem that they have...money, money they've made so much money there that they don't want to stop ... until they absolutely have to. The industry as a whole, the pulp and paper industry as a whole would save about 1.4 billion dollars a year in North American industry by eliminating chlorine because of decreased chemical costs, energy costs, liability, you wouldn't have a toxic, you wouldn't have a contaminated sludge that you had to dispose of ... [interject] law suits ... all those things, they could actually save money if they would do it the problem is that the mill is so old that they are not going to put the money into it. Other mills around the state and around country, however, they are poised to interruption. I graduated from high school in ' 65 went off to college and was gone for a long time and finally moved back home permanently in ' 81. My grandmother was getting old and when I moved back I said something about the water at her house. "Mom, the water tastes bad. " She said, "Oh you know that mill has ruined the water here, it just tastes terrible. " And I had been working for a chemical more years went by I remember the day that I heard on TV, I knew about dioxin in Vietnam and Agent Orange with the herbicides and all that. You see I was going to school to school to get my masters all this time and I was going in agriculture. Working with chemicals and stuff. I put two and two together and it finally dawned on me. I remember the day it happened. That the dioxin from this mill here is the same dioxin in Agent Orange. And then this light came on and I thought, "We are being exposed to some of the worst stuff in the world right here where 1 live and this is ridiculous. " This is stupid. And at that time I thought, it comes out of that mill it's in the water. And that was before I learned that dioxin

107 goes probably to the sediments but it wouldn't be in the water column, it would probably be in the sediments. But it worried the hell out of me. So the first thing I did, since I couldn't get any information from here anywhere. I went to Tallahassee DEP building and walked right up there and asked questions of people. And little did I know that Julie Houseman was asking the same questions. And they just wanted me to leave, they didn't want to give me much information. But I talked to a few people that said yes the water down there is in really bad shape. And it is from the mill more years went by I remember the day that I heard on TV, I knew about dioxin in Vietnam and Agent Orange with the herbicides and all that. You see I was going to school to school to get my masters all this time and I was going in agriculture. Working with chemicals and stuff. I put two and two together and it finally dawned on me. I remember the day it happened. That the dioxin from this mill here is the same dioxin in Agent Orange. And then this light came on and I thought, "We are being exposed to some of the worst stuff in the world right here where 1 live and this is ridiculous. " This is stupid. And at that time I thought, it comes out of that mill it's in the water. And that was before I learned that dioxin goes probably to the sediments but it wouldn't be in the water column, it would probably be in the sediments. But it worried the hell out of me. So the first thing I did, since I couldn't get any information from here anywhere. I went to Tallahassee DEP building and walked right up there and asked questions of people. And little did I know that Julie Houseman was asking the same questions. And they just wanted me to leave, they didn't want to give me much information. But I talked to a few people that said yes the water down there is in really bad shape. And it is from the mill and yes we know its true. And I asked well why aren't you doing something about it? Well because there hasn't been a public out cry. Well there's fixin to be. [Laughter] And I got frustrated because they wouldn't give me as much information as I thought they should hand over to me. So I went to Atlanta to the EPA office. I found out where they were and I went up there and I visited them. And they were pretty matter of fact. Yeah we know the situation down there. The water is bad. But because it's the only job in town we really haven't pursued doing anything about it. And I said you mean to say because it hasn't been in the newspaper you haven't done anything about it? And they said that would probably spur them on to greater action. But this all came about in ' 89, I think it was ' 8 8 or ' 89 when I went to the EPA. And that was when the first article was coming out in the local paper about the water being contaminated. Just a couple of little things. Nothing that would make you, nothing that would educate the local people on what was going on. And I was getting really frustrated cause I thought I was the only one who understands what this means. I'm the only person in this country, normal regular person, not somebody at the mill, who understands how bad this is. And I got to feeling really bad about it. It rocked on and Julie when she was doing her studying up there, research and all. Let's see her first article came out in '91. It was like in February or March. Early part of ' 91. The Friday before the Sunday when her article came out in the Tallahassee newspaper, I

108 had brought an ad, a quarter length ad in the local newspaper that said if any body wanted to join in on the class action suit concerning the water quality of the people in Taylor county to call me. And I put my name number in there. That came out on a Friday and Julie article came out on a Sunday. And Dan Simmons still believes to this day that I am the on that talked Julie into writing those articles. And I didn't even know who Julie Houseman was. The next morning, on Saturday morning there was a little thing up on the Tallahassee Democrat that said coming tomorrow a feature on the Fin Holloway, Florida's Forgotten River. Something such as that. And I was jumping up and down that Saturday. Hey man this is my next to being in the news. And I was up the next morning at five o'clock waiting for the newspaper man to the paper in the box. And I cried and laughed all the way home.

HOPE Members Roundtable Interview Sara Paris: raised in Taylor County Gil Cutter: Perry-25years Joy Cummings: 5th generation Ruby Morgan

Question: How did all this start? Answer (Joy): "Back in the '40's Proctor and Gamble sent representatives to this area to check it out to see if we had enough natural resources. Mainly, they were interested in water, to site a brand-new type of paper-mill, pulp mill here in our community and what they found is that our community here, our area was totally rich in natural resources. We had many, many thousands of long-leaf pine, which are native to the area. We had rivers, which were clear- flowing and we had an aquifer here that was known of before. The Floridian Aquifer is just at one time was an endless supply of fresh clean water. So that's what they were looking for. So they sited an experimental lab for the mill here and started to work on it in the late 40's, but before they started doing that, they got the Legislature with the help of a few local business people who didn't really know what was going to be happening. They got the legislature to change, or to make a law in 1947, which made the Fenholloway River and "Industrial River, " now called a "class 5 Industrial River." And what that meant was that the company could put any kind of toxics they wanted into this river that they wanted to. They could use it as their own sewage disposal river to the Gulf of Mexico.

So that the state of Florida passed a law in 1947 that made the Fenholloway an "industrial river," and it also made this county an industrial county and what that meant was is that pretty much exempts us from federal and state laws for pollution. An "industrial river" is one that a company can put almost any kind of

109 toxic into and any amount that they wish. So, the company came here and they built a lab first to see if the process they wanted to use to turn pine trees to cellulose for use in all kinds of consumer products. They built the lab to see if they could get this process to work and then they found out that it would work in 1951, they started building a giant pulp mill. Now the only one that we know of that's built like this mill is built in Siberia. On Lake Bacall, Procter and Gamble also built that mill. It's still there and totally polluting Lake Bacall and the people are getting very upset about it, just as some of us here are about our river and our water supply. So, in 1954, the company completed the mill and started up operations and held the effluent at the mill in some settlement ponds. Later on in 1954, after the mill had been operating for just 3 or 4 months. The news came out that they had an accidental spill of over 500,000 gallons of black liquor, which in the process out there is one of the most toxic stages of the process.

So, instead of trying to treat this toxic in any kind of way that they just put it into the Fenholloway River and it killed all the fish from the discharge pint all the way to the Gulf of Mexico. [(She stutters here). And the river there is about 19 miles from the discharge out to the Gulf of Mexico.] The river is about 19 miles from the discharge pipe out to the Gulf of Mexico so there were millions and millions of dead fish on the Fenholloway and the people here were pretty upset about it because they had no idea what was going to happen once the mill started putting this discharge into the river and there was a little bit of uproar about it at the time. But people didn't know what to do. Here was this giant company that had come here-promising thousands of jobs- giving jobs to select people in the community.

They sort of picked and chose which families they gave jobs to. Particularly, they would pick one person out of the family and that person would win over the rest of the family as being amenable to the company being here. Not saying anything about the pollution, too. Before, they totally polluted the river, the company went around-they got their lawyers to go around different landowners in the community, Ruby's family and Ruby's husband's family owned property on the river, back then and still does. They got the people to sign what they said a " Right of Way" a "Pollution Agreement" was what it was called. They got permission from the landowners who owned land along the river to pollute the Fenholloway to say that it was ok for the company to put toxins in the river.

However, Ruby's husband's mother made them add a clause that said they would not put anything toxic into the river-Anything Harmful to Human Health- so we still have those agreements and we'll probably use those in our lawsuits. We filed about 160 cases in federal court against the company for polluting our groundwater, and that's what's happened is that in North Florida, the rivers, most of them recharge in the groundwater. Instead of just flowing along atop of the ground- there are springs that actually put water into the rivers, but there are swallow holes which take water in rivers down into the aquifer and that's exactly

110 what we have here with the Fenholloway. It actually recharges the groundwater with the swallow holes in the bottom of the river.

The other problem with the mill is that they built these huge settlement ponds and the settlement ponds through the years developed sinkholes and so every time a sinkhole develops there's a huge influx that came out of the mill into the groundwater.

So, tests now show that the groundwater is contaminated who knows how far away from the river. We know that the river's contaminating the aquifer and the groundwater. The state has been very conservative in doing the studies as far as how far away the wells are actually contaminated, how far away from the river their actually contaminated. Hydrologists tell us that they're probably have contamination in them at least 10 miles north of the river and at possibly 45-50 miles south of the river. I live 20 miles south of the river and our wells are contaminated there. We use bottled water to drink and to cook all the time.

Question: So, what has the community done?

Answer (Joy): The community doesn't want us to say anything. We will lose… For us to say anything, you will lose the economic value for the community. The only thing they're thinking about is the dollar bill. What they don't realize is that sure this mill provides jobs, that income but where they're giving them employee benefits such as retirement, partial health benefits and so on and so forth. It's also their money that's paying for their insurances and all this stuff and money may have saved up is paying to treat a disease or an ailment that the company's effluent charges you know that causes it and you can make them realize that they're not benefiting them a bit that they're endangering their health.

The only thing they can see is the physical dollar. Some of them say this town, if Buckeye leaves or if Procter and Gamble leaves that this town will dry up and ghost town. It might for a little bit, but we can remember when it wasn't a ghost town. We can remember when people lived off of the land, off the fish, off of the game in the woods and the cabbage and the fruit and all that the woods produced and everything. We don't have that anymore.

Procter and Gamble went in there and wherever they cut a yellow pine, a long leaf pine, they have put back sand pines. Sand pines all they do is draw from the earth. They put nothing back. Not nothing. You can go up in any of the woods and it is strip cut. There's no cypresses, there's no hardwood. There's no berry bushes. What game is gonna stay in woods like this? And what game can you eat that is living in an area where they have the strowed the sludge under the

111 excused that it was an herbicide and that it was a fertilizer and it is, that's the truth. It is, it'll stop any foliage from growing, but it’s a fertilizer for these pine trees and is an evergreen. But then when we do get the rains, this sludge and the residue from it is going directly into our aquifer and into our water. And you can't make people realize this. They tell us or they try to tell us that it is natural phenomena for the red water of this county to foam. That's not true! Before that mill started dumping we never saw any foam on red water. We never saw any dead fish on the side of the banks.

You never seen any dead animals other than dead animals other animals had killed for food and stuff like that.

But its everywhere now you go, everywhere. They have 9 wells. Each one of those is capable of pumping 30 million gallons-a-day out of the aquifer. There's no monitors on those wells. The only thing people have or what the state has to go by is what they tell them, that they're pumping out of there. They Procter and Gamble or they Buckeye.

But yet all of our farmers all around here has monitors on them. They can't pump but so much. Is this fair, and we do know that when they're pumping full blast, we have wells that go dry that never went dry until they started putting in these pumps like this. When they drained the aquifer to work. The springs are not putting out anymore. Every spring on that river is an injection well because it starts sucking everything they're doing and you know and I know that when water is discharged, it goes a certain way and when it is pulled out it comes another way and it isn't common sense that tells you that its mixing. And we have about 50 miles in any direction and it's unrestricted this aquifer there's nothing to stop it. And they've cut away everything that would be a filter like the hardwoods and the cypresses. So what've we got left is the residue of what they done. That river is supposed to be a 22-mile mixing zone and you get the word supposed to be. There's no water in the river… So, what's mixing, what's in the river. Nothin', but what they done.

They relocated the river above the mill in some sections. And those section which are east of the mill is aligned with the well lines so every spring to the east of the mill is being drawn dry to what they call the cone of depression from the wells themselves.

And the first three wells at the mills- they can't use them. They're too contaminated, they've been shut down. Even the company can't use them because they've contaminated their own well. The state hasn't done a thing to stop it. The last ERC meeting…fecal chloroform is present in the river and the test wells. There's no permit in this country that allows for the discharge of these bacteria, they aren't chemicals, they're bacteria. And they're still doing it. And

112 then people say why does things like happen and why do we have so many militia groups in this country? People wake up and look. You go to the law, the government is supposed to protect your lives and your children's lives and they allow big corporations like to poison you to death. You going to have more of it, before its over.

I don't agree with what's going on in this country, I hate what's going on because it's destroying millions of people, but somebody has to stand up and say enough is enough. You know you're doing it to the generations to come. We've got a deficit that won't quit and who's going to end up paying it, but our great grandchildren? This is unfair to them. They're starting out life in a hole.

And the pollution here in Taylor County, they've got to do something. Somebody has to stand up and do something and say enough is enough. Just look at our school system: we had the highest number of children with learning disabilities in this part of the world. The highest cancer rate and no one will admit to it. You go to a doctor and the doctor will say we don't know that that's caused it. And he's right. He don't know. He only doctors the ailment, he does not doctor the cause. He doesn't look for the cause of the ailment and like people dying here now from cancer, they're not recorded here, because we have no place to take care of patients with terminal cancer. They go to Tallahassee, Leon County, Lake City or Gainesville and when they die, their deaths are recorded in that county.

They don't record that they're Taylor County residents and so even Joy and Ascot, the health organization that come in here. They were going to do a health study. Now, the way they were gonna do a health study. Now, this health study was funded with tax dollars. They were gonna take the records from the local health department, which was absolutely useless because it is not the truth. If they had said, 'Well, we're gonna look at the families that had cancer in them , how many died, where they died at and put 'em in line in the county they lived in, they would find it's very high in Taylor County, extremely high. Not only that, people here now, the elderly especially. I know it's not unique to Taylor County but yet, it is in a way because people are having broken hips, broken arms…their bones are dissolving.

You talk to the doctor and they says we just don't understand why their bones are so brittle. And if you look at the technology and read the reports about what some of these chemicals cause that are being dumped in our river. You'll find out why them bones are being so brittle.

Question: So what are y'all doing as a group or as an individual to get Procter and Gamble to own up? Answer (Sara):

113 Since, the mill started in 1954, one group started up in the 1970's to try to do something about this problem, but were just totally crushed. The local paper, the politics that be pretty much crushed them back. The people who wanted to move from where they lived back then because their wells were contaminated back in the 70's were moved. Their property was bought by the company. They physically relocated those people who complained back then. Until we came along and got started on this about 89, people were very quiet. Even when the news came out in 1991 that the water here was contaminated that you shouldn't drink the water, the mill was giving away free bottled water. The health department gives out coupons for people to get water. Our community here even in 1995 is still in total denial about this problem. And I think the reason for that is that it's so serious that people are afraid to face it. They are absolutely afraid of what they might come up with if they seriously investigate this. And it is very scary once you start to read about it, it's very frightening to find out that your water here is contaminated with the most toxic substances that have ever been created. The fish in the Fenholloway and common sense will tell also in the Gulf of Mexico, are contaminated with dioxin, organochlorines, furines, phenols, … God know what all kinds of toxic chemicals. When you start to consider all these problems, you really don't know exactly what to do. And so that's why we formed our group so that we could put our heads together and perhaps come up with some solutions to this terrible problem.

We've been criticized in the local paper. They called us armed radical environmental terrorists. The local has tried to run us down and really tried make us out to be the bad guy in order to get the focus off of the problem. They've threatened our homes, our vehicles and us traveling down the road. We don't scare easily. When we have meetings like this, it doesn't matter where we are, 9 times out of 10, there's someone listening. They watch us.

Telephones are tapped. They have accused us of trying to destroy the plant and this is one thing we've tried to express from the beginning. There's no way we want that plant destroyed. There's no way we want anything done to that plant because there are things in there that could be destroyed by an explosion or whatever. There's gonna be a fallout 50 or more miles around worse than the atomic bomb. It would be a total disaster. And we don’t want that. Of course we all have cousins and family that work there.

The thing that amazes me is now, I, Joy and all of us tend to be at the ERC meetings and DEP meetings and all you take proof in there that they are in violation of permits, they 're in violation of state and federal laws. I took one tape in and showed them where they were discharging into a sinkhole. After I reported that amazingly that pipe disappeared. Now they try to make me look like a liar at all those meetings saying that the pipe was never there. But, I will show you today the pipe. I will show you the ditch with the 5- foot drum in it.

114 They removed it after I reported it. I also have some video- tapes of the discharge pipes inside of the mill that's running directly into the river and their permit says they shall have no bypasses.

Everything must go through the treatment pond. These are clear violations of the law and permit. But the fact is, because this is an industrial river and this is an industrial county, and this company has such tremendous political power and so much money that our situation has just fallen through the cracks and the law. We've just fallen through the regulatory facts everyway that you could possibly imagine. Even on the coast out here. On the gulf, the area around the Fenholloway River at the mouth of the river in the Gulf is exempt from the coastal management zone. And this happened back in the 50's. The company got this area exempt from any kind of coastal management by the federal government and it's been a comedy, a sad tragic comedy of errors here, since the 50's.

The army corps of engineers came in the '50's and drained the wetlands, the headway to Fenholloway and all the other rivers and creeks in the county were drained by the army corps of engineers so this company could plant pine trees in what used to be a water recharge area for this whole part of Florida. And so through the years then, the company would take the pine trees into the mill, cook it, they use chlorine dioxide and every kind of toxic chemical you've ever heard of and they cook the lignin out of the pine tree and what's left is cellulose and they bleach it and put it through this huge chemical process and the product that comes out is bleached white cellulose product.

The discharge from all the toxic process is a sludge, which is thick, black, hot and very toxic. It contains the most concentrated amounts of dioxin and chlorine of anything that comes out of the mill. Now there's a settlement pond out there at the mill that has a sinkhole in it. That's where the toxic sludge has been going for many, many years. Now, eventually this pond fills up and they have to remove the solids so they remove the solids and they put it out on the land and they call it land farming. What happens is the chemicals in the sludge are very effective herbicides. They kill any kind of broad-leaf, any kind of grass.

They don't kill pine trees, though. So, it’s the perfect thing to put down on land and plant pine trees because it kills all the vegetation. The problem is that you're putting something very toxic on top of the soil and this is used to be wetlands, this entire county so what happens when it rains, those toxics leach into the groundwater. They go into the rivers and creeks so our whole county has become a totally toxic place. The company owns about a million acres of timberland. 850 thousand acres of timberland here in this county. Over a million acres total and they have put this sludge out on nearly all that property. So they have totally contaminated our area.

115 Question: Here we are in the Sunshine State and Florida is becoming the most polluted state in the union. What's happening with our lawmakers, our Environmental officials.? Answer: It appears that this company, Procter and Gamble, has so much political power that the individual states don't have a chance against them because they have the best lawyers, the best what they call lobbyists, I call professional bribers to do what they want them to do. It's not just Procter and Gamble, but you take the power corporations, all the generating power plants, Georgia Pacific Mill. All the industries are so strong in lobbyists. They have so much money that they can, they certainly don't pay any tax, they don't have to pay any as long as they're paying off these politicians and that's what appears to me. Now I don't know this as a fact about them paying anyone any money, but there has to be a reason behind it and if you dig for the reason, it's going to come out because they have so much political power with their top-notch lawyers and lobbyists that they get just about what they want in this country and it’s a shame to see the state of Florida as beautiful as it was when I first came to Florida to turn out to be a toxic waste dump site. That's the way it's gonna end up if it keeps going the way its going.

Question: So, what can the individual person do? Answer: Only thing I can find the individual can do is just what we've been doing is go to these public meetings, have yourself heard. Write to your politicians- continuously write to your politicians. Tell them to not vote for this, not to vote for that now. That's the only option we have and at election time we can vote them out of office.

Joy- People think that they can't do anything, but individual people can do a lot. It's helpful to form a group then you have people you can sound your ideas off on, and try things out with. You can help each other and you can organize and can get more done. It only takes just a few people to get things going on and that's what we did. In 1991, I put an ad in the local paper, a quarter page ad, asking people who were concerned about water quality in our community, who might want to join a class-action suit to call me. Ruby's husband was the first person I got. I was on the phone for over two weeks, I got over 200 phone calls. So, I knew there was a lot of concern here about the water. Lot of people would say "You know that I'm on your side, but I can't get give you my name. I can't get involved in this because my husband or my brother works at the mill. I don't know what could happen to me, they might burn down my house if I get involved with your group, but I'm on your side."

116 Since people have called and said I can't get involved, but I really believe in what your doing, so please don't stop. It's given us the dedication to go on. We've got over 300 members now, we've got about 30 really active members, who always come to the meetings and help out and who have really given a lot since we started. With the help if Green-peace we organized a protest at the mill. We had a big stop sign and two people got locked onto the tracks. Stop Chlorine- Save Jobs is what the message was. We caused them a lot of grief for one entire day and stopped the chlorine train from going into the mill. We got a lot of press on it. It brought the issue to the public. We were roundly criticized for doing this, but at least it brought the idea to the community that chlorine id the problem- and chlorine is the problem here. We've done a lot of good things. We've served contaminated fish to the ERC and Carol Browner.

We have taken live mudfish all the way to D.C. to Carol Browner's office and effluent from the river. Joe and I caught fish and I drove my pick-up truck to Washington- Joe and I drove. Took the mudfish to D. C. of course we named them, couldn't catch the names. We've been on '60 Minutes.' We've been in books, magazines, and newspapers.

Sara- We've got fishes all over the place. There's no way any of our homes could be raided and destroyed. A lot of people are asking why we call ourselves H.O.P.E, we decided it needed to be something that wasn't so depressing. I heard a quote not long ago, "Through time fear gives way to HOPE." I thought it was so true. If you just keep working, trying to do the right thing- people are gonna notice. You can educate people by being kind and telling the truth. That's all we have to do here. Our situation is so terrible, we don't have to add to it. It's interesting that people far away from Taylor County know more about our toxic problems here, our pollution problems, our health problems than the local people and that's a real shame, because the people here deserve to know the truth.

Joe- You asked what we can do as individuals. Well, we tried to get media coverage here. I have a video-tape you might be interested in. The local chamber of commerce had called Mike Smith at Channel 6 News down here at the hall of the Catholic Church and went up one side of him and down the other for doing a story on Fenholloway River. They told him he shouldn't do bad publicity on Taylor County. They were virtually telling the man what he could put on the news and what he couldn't. I videotaped the meeting. This shows you how much clout the company has in the community. It holds the Chamber of Commerce at bay.

Sara: Julie Hauserman, the reporter who did such a good job is no longer with the Democrat. Also, Procter and Gamble has the same attorney as the Democrat. So guess who gets the benefit of that report, the "Gainesville Sun" and the "Orlando Sent" and others that really reported our story. Whenever they

117 would be getting out, they'd be somebody pulling the papers out of the boxes.

Joe: "The Sun," stopped bringing papers to Taylor County. They quit because someone would put 50 cents and take all the newspapers.

Joy: The Sun's reporters Cindy Swirled, who has writing articles about pollution here and every time there was a story we'd go to get a paper and the boxes would be empty. One of the ladies that worked at the Minute Market told me a man from the mill was waiting on the papers and took all the papers. I said, you're kidding and she said no I stood right here and watched him. So they were trying to keep the community from finding out about the problem. Our approach to that was, ok if you're no going to educate the community then let's educate the world. Sooner or later the pressure would come down on this county, and thing would have to change. If you can't educate people from the inside then bring outside pressure in on them.

Joe: And that's what we've been doing for the last two years. Bring outside, keep on, keeping on. You know the thing that has kept them at bay though when Procter and Gamble came in late 40's, early 50's that was at the end of WWII and right here was a military base. They used to train fliers here. The community was labeled a defense necessity. The only other 2 industries that have come in, one is closed down now, it's a superficial site. Maryland Industries and Martin Electronics, both of those produced training products for the military.

Joy: Both of them are pretty toxic. The only reason they could come here is because this is or industrial county.

Sara: And the only other thing they have let come here is the prison and where's they put the prison out there at the landfill. And they've been trying to close the landfill for years. It's seeping stuff from Martin Electronics and Procter and Gamble-DEP keeps fining us (the county) for the seepage. There was three times we went out and pushed stuff from Martin Electronics that wasn't supposed to be there. We don't know what it was and three days later it was back in there because we marked the box.

Joe: Sara, let me tell you in the next ten years Taylor County will experience the biggest growth in the next 10 years. That's a true fact, not because the community is growing it's because the prisoners are being brought here. If anybody had any sense at all they could see that it's prisoners.

Joy: I was going through some old records and the population here is exactly the same as it was in the 20's, 30's, 40's, 50's, 60's, 70's, and 80's, it hasn't grown. So that ought to tell you something is going on here.

118 Joe: Not only that the mill says they'll mostly employ Taylor County people. Only 1/3 of the people are from Perry. Some are from Madison. Plus Procter and Gamble brought in 100's of people from outside and put them on our property with contaminated wells and didn't tell them. Once they found out, a lot of them quit their jobs and went back to where they came from. If it's going to be a responsible company don't do this to humans. Move them where they know their workers will be poisoned, their children will be poisoned.

Sara: We know our water is contaminated because it causes abrasions on our skin, if we brush our teeth in it, our breath stinks, it decays our teeth.

Sara and Joe tell a story about a retiring Procter and Gamble worker the company moved to Perry and set him up in of the houses with a polluted well. He sues the company, but Procter and Gamble sold the mill- supposedly so the judge threw out the case.

Joy: The mill is now owned by a group of retired Procter and Gamble vice presidents. It's strange because Procter and Gamble still gets all the products out of the mill. It seems that Procter and Gamble still tells these Vice Presidents what to do. Selling the mill is a way to keep Procter and Gamble away from the legal liability and that is a legal way to do it. If we turn around and sue this new company since the liability from Procter and Gamble it would nullify our old court cases against Procter and Gamble, so we're not gonna do that. Joe: Plus, if the mill has been sold anytime somebody buys property they naturally get a deed for it. No land has changed hands at the county courthouse. It's still under Procter and Gamble it's not Buckeye of Florida even the mill site is under Procter and Gamble control. The only they got from Procter and Gamble was to manufacture the mill and sell the product.

Joy: The sale was guaranteed because the product goes to Procter and Gamble anyway.

Joe: The thing is the pollution isn't just hurting people in Taylor County. I can show you videotapes of cows wading in that river. The meat and milk is shipped all over the world.

Tell me what info did you first come aware of that concerned you about the possibility of water and air in Perry was becoming polluted. Or whatever the situation may have been. I graduated from high school in ' 65 went off to college and was gone for a long time and finally moved back home permanently in ' 81. My grandmother was getting old and when I moved back I said something about the water at her house. "Mom, the water tastes bad. " She said, "Oh you know that mill has ruined the water here, it just tastes terrible. "

119 And I had been working for a chemical more years went by I remember the day that I heard on TV, I knew about dioxin in Vietnam and Agent Orange with the herbicides and all that. You see I was going to school to school to get my masters all this time and I was going in agriculture. Working with chemicals and stuff. I put two and two together and it finally dawned on me. I remember the day it happened. That the dioxin from this mill here is the same dioxin in Agent Orange. And then this light came on and I thought, "We are being exposed to some of the worst stuff in the world right here where 1 live and this is ridiculous. " This is stupid. And at that time I thought, it comes out of that mill it's in the water. And that was before I learned that dioxin goes probably to the sediments but it wouldn't be in the water column, it would probably be in the sediments. But it worried the hell out of me.

So the first thing I did, since I couldn't get any information from here anywhere. I went to Tallahassee DEP building and walked right up there and asked questions of people. And little did I know that Julie Houseman was asking the same questions. And they just wanted me to leave, they didn't want to give me much information. But I talked to a few people that said yes the water down there is in really bad shape. And it is from the mill more years went by I remember the day that I heard on TV, I knew about dioxin in Vietnam and Agent Orange with the herbicides and all that. You see I was going to school to school to get my masters all this time and I was going in agriculture.

Working with chemicals and stuff. I put two and two together and it finally dawned on me. I remember the day it happened. That the dioxin from this mill here is the same dioxin in Agent Orange. And then this light came on and I thought, "We are being exposed to some of the worst stuff in the world right here where 1 live and this is ridiculous. " This is stupid. And at that time I thought, it comes out of that mill it's in the water. And that was before I learned that dioxin goes probably to the sediments but it wouldn't be in the water column, it would probably be in the sediments. But it worried the hell out of me. So the first thing I did, since I couldn't get any information from here anywhere.

I went to Tallahassee DEP building and walked right up there and asked questions of people. And little did I know that Julie Houseman was asking the same questions. And they just wanted me to leave, they didn't want to give me much information. But I talked to a few people that said yes the water down there is in really bad shape. And it is from the mill and yes we know its true. And I asked well why aren't you doing something about it? Well because there hasn't been a public out cry. Well there's fixin to be. [Laughter] And I got frustrated because they wouldn't give me as much information as I thought they should hand over to me.

So I went to Atlanta to the EPA office. I found out where they were and I went up

120 there and I visited them. And they were pretty matter of fact. Yeah we know the situation down there. The water is bad. But because it's the only job in town we really haven't pursued doing anything about it. And I said you mean to say because it hasn't been in the newspaper you haven't done anything about it? And they said that would probably spur them on to greater action. But this all came about in ' 89, I think it was ' 8 8 or ' 89 when I went to the EPA. And that was when the first article was coming out in the local paper about the water being contaminated. The whole lot of things to happen a little bit before that, I had met some people in Greenpeace and they promised to help and they have and then in ‘92 the a state EPA report came out with this "state links the dirty wells to the P&G Mill."

Now the mill down there gives away free bottled water, yes, you can go pick up your bottle water every day from ... yes, its free ... the health department gives away coupons for bottled water most of us have bottled water delivered to our houses because we use so much, I use it in my all my cooking and in anything that we drink.

I also used to sell chemicals, I sold pesticides for quite a few years, those restricted use kinds with the skull and crossbones on the labels and that helped me to understand this problem when I moved back home in 81, if I hadn't done that I might not understand some of this chemistry maybe I wouldn't quite be as scared if I hadn't done that we've done a lot of things to draw attention to our problem down there, we ah Greenpeace protesters thwart the P&G supply train, this was in 92, we stopped the chlorine train from going into the mill, and of course we were just roundly just scolded at home in the local paper -- we were bad people, bad folks to do something like that, but it brought attention to the problem -- that sign says "save jobs - stop chlorine" lot of people have criticized me, saying oh she just wants to close down that mill cause she's mad at them, you're damned right I'm mad at them but I don't want to close the mill, I want them to stay there and be accountable for what they're done to my community I want somebody, if it has to be me by myself, to hold them accountable. Just a couple of little things. Nothing that would make you, nothing that would educate the local people on what was going on. And I was getting really frustrated cause I thought I was the only one who understands what this means. I'm the only person in this country, normal regular person, not somebody at the mill, who understands how bad this is. And I got to feeling and all. Let's see her first article came out in '91. It was like in February or March. Early pert of ' 91. The Friday before the Sunday when her article came out in the Tallahassee newspaper, I had brought an ad, a quarter length ad in the local newspaper that said if any body wanted to join in on the class action suit concerning the water quality of the people in Taylor county to call me. And I put my name number in there. That came out on a Friday and Julie article came out on a Sunday. And Dan Simmons still believes to this day that I am the on that talked Julie into

121 writing those articles. And I didn't even know who Julie Housserman was. The next morning, on Saturday morning there was a little thing up on the Tallahassee Democrat that said coming tomorrow a feature on the Fin Holloway, Florida's Forgotten River. Something such as that. And I was jumping up and down that Saturday. Hey man this is my next to being in the news. And I was up the next morning at five o'clock waiting for the newspaper man to the paper in the box. And I cried and laughed all the way home.

Joy Cummings and the History of P&G/Buckeye

In 1965 Lt. Gov (not named) talked about pollution 5 miles into the Gulf and its effects on commercial fisheries. Her friend Faye Morgan wrote a letter to Gov. Leroy Collins – Collins responds. “So it’s not a secret that back then the Fenhalloway was badly polluted.” Our senator (state) 1963 Pete Gibson wrote to Faye regarding a canal to be constructed to solve our problems – Cummings disagrees. LBJ said in 1966 – no excuse for a river flowing red from the blood of slaughter horses. No excuse for paper mills to pour sulphuric acid into lakes and streams. We should call a spade a spade. For oil companies and chemical refineries using our rivers as pipelines for toxic waste. There’s no excuse for communities to use other people’s rivers as a dump…for their raw sewage. 1947 state passes law, making Fenhalloway and Taylor Co Industrial sounded good at time for jobs. Turns but not a good idea because no restrictions are made as to what can be dumped in river. P&G got the law passed in 1947 and the community went along with it. P&G immediately sets out to get an easement for the river. A right was way giving them permission to pollute the river and the land along the river. Got property owners to sign the right of ways. All owners along the river to say that it was okay to pollute the river. One lady wanted some dumping restrictions. The effluent must not be harmful to human health – 1952. The county has issued pollution bonds throughout the years. So in a way the taxpayers have helped the pollution problem along. Mill celebrates its first 25 years. Referring to a program booklet about the 25th anniversary the P&G talks about an upgrade in 1972 to treatment facilities – A lagoon for holding the contaminated in case another sinkhole developed. In 1971 a fault developed near the base of a retention dike. This info is from their own anniversary book. In 1972 it says the company has blasting and filling sinks in the lagoon for many months now. This was a whole year of blasting and filling.

122 It seems somebody from the state or federal government should have noticed that there were sinkholes falling in out there where the toxic sludge was being treated. Things rocked on pretty much the same through the 50s and 60s. In the 1970s the local folks started complaining about their water tasting bad. They complained enough that the health department agreed to have some tests run. And some local people had some tests run. And lo and behold they found out their wells were contaminated. There was quite a bit of controversy in the early 70s about this. But it just died down. The mill was able to buy people’s property or move them to other place so people wouldn’t complain so loudly. So there was an opportunity in the 70s for people to have this changed. But unfortunately they let it slip by compromising with the company. In ’81 when I moved back home, things hadn’t changed since I graduated from high school. When you move away from a place you grew up in, for a while you kind of expect things to change. But that doesn’t happen in Perry. A lot of people were complaining about what’s going on. That their water tasted bad. This was during the 80s. I finally gathered up all my information and headed to Tallahassee and all the state agencies to see just why my water wastasting bad. In 1987 I started making a little headway. The thing that helped me along the way was that I sold chemicals – I didn’t know much – but I knew enough to be afraid. First thing I did was to come to Tallahassee to badger state agencies. That didn’t help. I realized going to the EPA wasn’t going to help either. People doing similar things had wrong their hands for several years to no avail. They (state agencies) wasted my time so I got in touch with some lawyers. I got some good advice from other environmental groups and lawyers who live far away from Taylor County. If you want to make them do right, you’ve got to sue them. So that was the first thing that I did. I had a timber contract with the company and they had refused to keep up the fence, which was part of the contract. And I complained and I told Dan Simmons that I thought something was wrong with my water. He said that couldn’t be true because I lived too far away from the mill. I said what do you mean, are people living around the mill having problems? And Dan said yes, we’ve had some problems there. And I told that I knew about them through my research. So I placed an ad in the local paper asking citizens concerned about water

123 quality to join a class action suit. And I had people calling for weeks. The phone rang night and day. I had over 200 phone calls the first two weeks the ad was in the paper. My ad went out on a Friday and as a coincidence, I know Dan doesn’t believe this, the following Sunday, Julie Hauserman’s article came out about the forgotten Fenhalloway. Couldn’t get any cooperation from the Tallahassee paper either. One of the first things we did was put up signs on the river. I have to cross the river every time I go town or back home. Went by one day to see some black guys fishing. So she stopped and started telling them about the pollution problems and that they shouldn’t eat the fish. It upset me so bad. They told me the fish don’t taste very good. You can’t eat them, they got chemicals in them. So I realized that some people didn’t know that. So we put signs on the river telling people that. And we were roundly criticized for doing that. I think we did the right thing though. The only other signs that went up were because DEP told P&G to put them up but they really didn’t say anything except that the Fenhalloway was an industrial river it is not meant for fishing or swimming but nobody understood what that meant. We also put up signs in Spanish because we saw some Mexican workers out there. We formed our group HOPE in 19991. I realized there was unity and support in numbers. There was something like 30 people at the first meeting. It grew to over 360 members. They’re very dedicated. We sent out a newsletter, we try to keep people informed and we support each other. We’ve had quite a bit of fun doing all these things. I went to the shareholders meeting in Cincinnati two or three years ago and we issued the first annual truth report to the shareholders. Mr. Arts, the CEO of P&G, had said the year before we were there he would be the first to eat the fish out of the river and drink the water. So we took him some. And of course he wouldn’t eat it and he didn’t drink it. But we embarrassed him quite a bit. I got to meet with P&G’s environmental folks. And shortly after that the company decided it would sell all of its pulp and paper mills in the United States. Unfortunately they couldn’t find a real buyer for the Perry plant. Eventually a group of investors of former P&G executives, probably getting the money from P&G, I suspect. And then the new owners switched the name back to Buckeye. In 1992, Greenpeace came and helped us block the chlorine train from going into the mill. We wouldn’t have nearly as bad a problem if we didn’t use chlorine. Which in the long run would save jobs. So the message was stop chlorine and save jobs.

124 Which in the long run is absolutely the way it’s going to be. The mills are going to change, we think, from using chlorine and chlorine dioxide and eventually go to a closed-loop system where the toxins won’t be created in the first place. And then there won’t be a problem getting rid of them. So we gave the company a message, well big deal, didn’t do a whole lot of good. But it was fun. We bought newspaper ads in Florida when they put the plant up for sale that said “Must see, fixer upper mill in Florida for a first time buyer, make your own chlorine poisoned products.” My friends at Greenpeace did this. We did some other little mean things. In Cincinnati I talked to Mrs. Arts and talked to her. And I told her my husband was contaminating my community. Your husband’s company is ruining the water and environment where I live, and it’s hurting people. And I want you to talk to him. She told me I needed to meet with him in the office. I told her I had been trying for three months. So I asked to talk with him and she said she would. So there’s more than one way to skin a cat. After company announced they would sell out, we took out another ad saying “Experienced pulp mill workers needed for a new mill.” I’ve found out P&G has to build a new mill in South America. That’s not a good idea either. Their environmental laws are like Taylor County’s. Sort of exempt from the law. So we thought we should try to ward that off if we could. When Greenpeace came down and we stopped the train from going into the mill for the day, we handed out fliers to the mill workers. Some were roundly applauded. Some were given the thumbs down. It’s amazing the coercion that goes in a community like ours. The workers, I think, are very much beat down. Here is the ad I put in the paper… I still get phone calls. I get 4 or 5 a week from people wanting to know our water situation. I’m pleased to try to help them any way I can. In 1991, I met David Letter he’s an attorney with Dept. of Environmental Regulation. And the state was about to set the Dioxin standard for Florida. So we went to the hearing down in Orlando and took some contaminated fish to serve to the ERC members. We were successful that day. The commission decided they had heard and seen too much conflicting information. They didn’t know what the dioxin standards should be because they didn’t want to eat any of the fish either. There was controversy about the amount of fish people ate. Fish consumption was still up in the air. Nobody knew how much fish people actually ate. Though HRS said we only ate 3 grams per day on average.

125 Again the next year the issue came up. And again the ERC said not, for which we were thankful. And these were some pretty hard fought hearings, I must say. From the time Julie’s articles started appearing in the paper to the end of 1992, the Fenhalloway wasn’t really the forgotten river anymore. To some of us it’s an experience we notice everyday. It was in the newspapers quite a bit since that time. CNN and 60 minutes. CNN’s done several stories, “The Smell of Money” which was the real expose of the mill. They did one “What Price White Paper?” which tells what the paper industry can do without being such bad polluters. “A Question of Accountability” why the government hasn’t acted to solve problems like ours. Past Sunday night on Network Earth on TBS, Dr. Arnold Schecter, went to fast food restaurants and bought hamburgers and fried chicken. Dr. Schecter is a dioxin expert. They found the dioxin levels to be 3 to 4 times what the EPA recommends as safe. It’s not really something to laugh about, but it does seem like its something people in the government would notice at some point in time. In the late 80’s DEP finally started doing some testing. Because so many people had been complaining. They finished one in ’91, commonly called the Dr. Watts study. And Dr. Livingstons’ pretty much proved that the mill is contaminated the ground water. Contaminating the aquifer. The aquifer in unconfined. That means the limestone formations to hold back the flow of underground water. Back in the 50s, the mill drained San Pedro Bay, its about 30 miles by 20 miles. They drained that area to plant more pine trees. That was a bad mistake. Those were the headwaters of the Fenhalloway and the Econfina and Steinhatchee Rivers in Taylor County. And when they drained that water recharge area, it changed the flow of the Fenhalloway River. As a matter of fact it stopped the flow of the Fenhalloway. So the only thing you in the river now is the mill’s effluent most of the year. Ours is not the only mill in North Florida that uses chlorine and has a problem. There are 6 mills in North Florida. This is a map to show you what’s going on. Over the east coast, there are couple more mills that use chlorine. So we’re not the only one’s who might have a problem with dioxins in our ground water. That 1947 law sort of let us out of all the environmental laws that you could imagine. We have a lot of springs along the Fenhalloway. And some are dried up, some are still there, because the mill pumps so much water out of the ground. They say they pump about 55 million gallons out of the ground a day. Their

126 permit from the water management district says they can pump up to 91mgd. Now, the Dr. Livingstons’ study says that there is a direct connection between the Fenhalloway and the Floridian Aquifer. And the connection is most immediately expressed through Campground Spring and Carlton Spring. The mill’s pumping of so much water has caused a cone of depression. So that the water underground is actually pulled back towards their own wells. It’s sort of changed the flow of water underground. Outside these study areas we don’t really know what’s going on. Because nobody has studied it yet. It’s kind of a mystery isn’t it? Here’s out Bill – the 1947 law. Now you would think that if you had an industrial river, in an industrial county, that was having so many problems, you’d think it’d be easy to change that law. I’ve written letters to just about everyone I can think of and it still hasn’t changed. We have managed to get the ERC to say that the Fenholloway won’t be an industrial river after 1997. But there’s a lot of leeway there. The company could have 2 or 3 or 10 more years after that to clean up their effluence enough to pass class 3 standards. An industrial river is a class 5 river. A class 3 river has a few more limitations. But there are always variances that state agencies can give these companies. So that they don’t really have to meet all the requirements that should have to meet. Dr. Livingstons’ study came down pretty hard. Based on hydrologic discharge the mill is responsible for contaminating wells, springs, and other bodies of water. The Fenhalloway appears to be responsible for the pollution found in the monitoring wells, privately owned wells and the springs. Contamination of their production wells is due to the leakage of the processed wastewater from the unlined sludge lagoon. That’s pretty catchy. It’s amazing that they would have an unlined sludge lagoon. Because when you think about it, the sludge has more toxins than anything. So how can it be that they have an unlined sludge lagoon. And still do to this day. About that time in ’91 all the newspapers came out and said “Whoa, the ground water’s contaminated in Taylor County?” Big surprise. Funny isn’t? It’s not funny at all. The local paper didn’t tell local people that there were contaminants in the water. They go all around it, but they never say the water is bad, don’t drink it. If you read other papers you might get the right idea about it, find out what’s really going on. But the fact is, the mill has a lot to do with what the local paper says. Because they buy a lot of advertising from the local paper.

127 So the Fenhalloway still flows through the regulatory cracks, even to this day. Even after all these studies have gone on, the state linking the dirty water to the mills. The same thing is still happening. There’s still the effluence coming out of the drainage pipe going into the groundwater. Their unlined lagoons are still contaminating the groundwater. Some folks are saying the site of the mill itself is contaminated. Which wouldn’t surprise me one bit. Now Dr. Livingstons’ study, like most of the studies, are very careful so not to give you the wrong idea. It’s as if somebody put up a wall 2 miles north and 2 miles south of the mill river to stop the contamination. You’d think that from talking to some of the experts, they say all you have to worry about is 2 miles north or 2 miles south of the river. But based on hydrogeologic formations under the ground, nobody has put up that wall 2 miles north or south. But all the state agencies know so far is what they’ve tested. So that brought us around to the lawsuits, because that’s about the only we could do was to file against the company because that’s the only way we could true justice, we didn’t get it from the EPA or the state. And I’m not so sure how true the justice is there either. That seemed to be the only other thing we could do. So a lot of us got together and we filed lawsuits against the company. And we tried to get a class-action suit so that just about everybody in the county could be involved. And could get some kind of justice from it. But we were thwarted in our efforts for a class action suit because the judge said that people in the suit didn’t have $50,000 of property damage. So people still have their individual suits and they will be moving forward soon. That was the past so let’s talk about the present. The present is: the mill is still contaminating the groundwater. Not a whole lot has changed in Perry, Fl. Now the company says they’ve sold out and there’s a new company that owns the mill. The New Buckeye. Which I pretty much suspect is controlled by the old company P&G, and the old Buckeye. The company still get the product that comes out of it. It still makes cellulose for disposable diapers, sanitary napkins, and celluloid film and all sorts of products like that. None of that’s changed. So what do we do now? Our groundwater is still being contaminated. I guess we just keep on doing the same thing we’ve been doing.

128 We try to educate people, we try to tell them about our problem. Sooner or later somebody will come along that can really help us I think. So there’s a lot going on though. National Geographic ran a big water story this fall. In here is one of our river signs. Down at the fish camp. Can you believe there was a fish camp down at the river? The National Geographic photo was there for a week to get this picture. We’ve been in the news a whole lot. Walked across both those and wrote about his experiences: the people he met and the things that he saw. For this book, what he did was get in his boat in S. FL and went along the west coast. And he came to Taylor County and he stopped at Steinhatchee and he stayed awhile and at Keaton Beach. One chapter in this book is called Blonde and curvaceous. Which is a pretty sexy title there. But he wasn’t talking about anyone in Taylor County, he was talking about the manatees. He’s talking about how the manatees come into the rivers and creeks along the Gulf coast. And get in the warmer waters there. And when he was staying there in the coast of Taylor County he was able to see quite a few manatees. He was very interested in them. And he says, “For thousands of annuals migrations, gray sea cows have come here to graze on the sea grass. The location of this bountiful unpolluted dining place is stored in their memories and is shared with the baby manatees, who pass the memory on and on.” ”They used to come closer to the coast to even shallower and probably safer waters.” “But closer to shore, much of the sea grass has been poisoned by the 55 million gallons per day pumped into the gulf down the now grotesque Fenhalloway river.” “Up this obscene river is a cellulose mill, a foul-smelling, smog belching plant that harvests the fast growing local pine trees and turned them into an essential ingredient for disposable diapers, plastics, cellophane, plastics and rayon fabric.” “The daily discharge from the mill oozes down the Fenhalloway to the gulf, killing the grass flats and oyster bed where the river becomes part of the sea.” “The high level of dioxin is also creating mutant fish. Scientists have found female fish that are becoming biologically male.” “Fortunately the manatees are smart enough to no longer graze there.” Boy that’s a sad epitaph isn’t it? I hope that they’re smart to not graze there. There’s nothing there for them to graze on. The sea grasses at the north of the Fenhalloway are dead.

129 But I’m gonna write this man and tell him that I really appreciate him. There’s a lot going on in the environmental movement about chlorine. If the mill didn’t use chlorine we wouldn’t have near the problems we have. In Europe, the mills are going to be a closed-loop system. Where they re-use their effluent over and over. And they really don’t have the problem we have at home. As far as I know there is not a mill, like the ones in Europe that produces this product that has gone to this system, a closed loop system. But I believe it can be done, if it can’t be done then surely there are other technological processes that are much safer than what we’re using now. And the reason I say that is because of dioxin. It’s a chemical reaction that happens when chlorine is missed with wood pulp or other organic materials. You don’t create dioxin unless you have chlorine. And it’s just not safe. And that’s all there is to it. You’ve heard of Agent Orange, well this type of dioxin we’re talking about is the same as Agent Orange, the same kind of chemical. Some of the toxic effects in humans is chlor-acne, cancer, we know now that it effect the embryo, we know there are a lot of things going on with dioxin that are not good for our health. The way it’s getting into our food is through fish, from the pulp and paper mills discharging chlorinated compounds into the Gulf of Mexico or other water bodies. It’s also created by incinerators; when chlorinated plastics are burned it goes up into the air and comes down on the grass and the cows eat it and then you get it in your milk and beef. All the meat that we eat. So then all we need to do is stop that, doesn’t that seem pretty simple? But this has been going on for a long time. Now this is interesting because we see PCB’s back in the 30s and we see lot of things happing during the 50s and 60s. And we found out in the 70s that PCB was bad, now dioxin was formed back in 1974. PCB production was stopped in 1977. In 1979 the EPA stopped use of 245T because it was contaminated with dioxin, or Agent Orange, in Vietnam. And the Vietnam vets started a class action suit the next year concerning dioxin. Things rocked on what’s interesting is that if you look at the history and you check the statistics, cancer rates really started rising in the 40s. And that was when the chlorinated organics first started being used. Pesticides, when the mills started using chlorine to bleach pulp and paper. So if you really look at these things you can see that we probably ought to pay attention to that kind of thing. In 1993, cancer was linked to the Sebáco herbicide exposure with cancers. And the National Academy of Sciences published a report on Agent Orange. Back in the late 80s the EPA did an assessment on dioxin. And the paper industry and chlorine industry thought they could refute the EPA’s

130 dioxin assessment. So they screamed loud enough so the EPA said okay we’ll just reassess it. So last year they came out with their reassessment of dioxin, it’s still in draft form. And people all over have said hey wait a minute what you’re saying now is that dioxin is more dangerous than you ever said it was before. And they said yes, that’s what we think. And I believe that to be true too. The EPA did all that, they wrote these great big huge books called the dioxin reassessment. Some of them are stacked over there. They did a national study of chemical residues in fish starting in ’86 where they went around and they tested fish all over the U.S. And they found high levels of dioxin in the fish downstream from P&P mills. Big surprise. So it’s still happening. Not a whole lot has changed on that except that we are still arguing about dioxin. So where do we go in the future? Well we need to stop using chlorine obviously. Greenpeace and other big environmental groups have come out with a lot of studies; they’re here on the table. And I’ll be glad to share them with you or I can get you copies of them, so that you can read more about this. One of the things we can do is a market based thing. We think that the way to get people to change is to get them to buy environmentally friendly products. That makes sense doesn’t it? So Greenpeace came up with their TIME campaign. We think that if we can get TIME Magazine to switch to paper that’s not made with chlorine, we think that other magazines with do the same thing. SCUBA Times, a national SCUBA magazine has already gone to non-chlorine paper, I think their first issue is out now. Chlorine free paper is available at Kinko’s, Crosspoint makes a very good quality chlorine free paper, there’s lots of them. There’s lots of other things we could use besides bleached white disposable diapers. We could use cotton diapers. Why do they have to be white, why do they have to be bleached? I don’t think most mothers, if they knew the water problems we have in Taylor County, would care if their disposable diapers were a light tan. So Greenpeace came up with their TIME campaign. And this is the discharge pipe and Foley Mill on the cover of TIME magazine. But this isn’t really TIME magazine it just looks like one. There’s an ad on the back that says “Absolute Death.” It tells in here how, if we can get TIME magazine, and this is printed on non- chlorine paper, if we can get them to switch to CF paper then the others papers

131 will follow suit. That will create enough demand in the marketplace that other magazines will do the same thing.

QUESTION: So what’s gonna happen in the future for Taylor County? ANSWER: Well that’s a good question. I’ve never wanted the mill to close. Because I have a lot of friends and family who work out there. But I do want to see the mill improve. I would like to see it change, like to see it cleaned up and I would like for Taylor County to have clean water. And I don’t think that’s too much to ask. The fact is though, that Perry’s not gonna grow a whole lot. Taylor County’s not gonna grow a lot, because nobody wants to go to a place with contaminated water. Would you want to raise your children there? Probably not. Kiplinger Business letter, May 24 issue. This is about counties that won’t grow much. It says the numbers are relatively small. Taylor County is at the bottom of the list for growing. The percent of gain by 2005 is only 4%. The factors that are considered in this are in migration, out migration, births, deaths, the fertility rate and the increase in longevity. Well I don’t think a lot of people will be moving there a lot will be dying probably. The fertility rate may be affected by dioxin. I don’t think our longevity gonna be increased by eating contaminated fish and drinking bad water. So I see the future for Taylor County. About the only thing we can do is to make the mill clean itself up. Perhaps we can attract some other kind of industry to come there. I don’t know if we can or not, maybe we can. But I think that it has to be cleaned up before the county can grow and change and improve. So that’s where we are with that. It kind of worries me because I read a lot and I see things happening. Lewis Thomas, who is one of my favorite authors has written this book called The Fragile Species. And he says, “I’m a member of a fragile species, still new to the Earth, the youngest creatures of any scale.” “Here only a few moments as evolutionary time is measured.” “A juvenile species, a child of a species.” “We are only tentatively set in place, error prone, at risk of fumbling, in real danger at the moment of leaving behind only a thin layer of our fossils.” “Radioactive at that.” So I hope that’s not what we have to look forward to. I hope we have something better to look forward to. And I think the way we have to that is, each of us have to make a commitment to

132 buy environmentally friendly products, we have to be involved, we have to think of things we can do to help out. And the way we can do this is right here. We can reach our friends and our family. We can show them the things we need to do. We can buy products that don’t hurt the environment. We can be careful about the products we choose, and be careful about the things that we do, how we dispose of things. I think this is what we all have to do. We can make the industries around us clean up, we have to do that, it’s personally responsibility. I don’t think there is any way around it. We could use less energy, we can do all these things right here and that’s how we each can help to make the environment safer and better. And we do need to start thinking seven generations ahead. Alright I’m done does anyone got any questions? Well up until about ’87 I really didn’t know how bad our water was at home. And we’re still drinking our water, our well water where I live until about ’87. And that’s when I started buying bottled water because the water started tasting so bad you really couldn’t stand it anymore. So since then we’ve been using bottled water. We spend about $150 a month on bottled water. The Crystal man just brings it to us in 5 gallon jugs. I use it to cook with and we drink it. However we still take a bath in our well water. Our animals have to drink well water. When there not pond water or creek water available. You know I wonder how safe it is to take a bath in. I’ve asked every state, federal agency I’ve come in contact with, is it safe? And they all said don’t worry about it, it’s fine. But then that’s what they said about the drinking water too. My friends who know and trust me also use bottled water to cook with and drink. Everybody still has to use their well water or if they’re switched to city water, to bathe in. I’ve really don’t have the answer to say whether it’s safe to bathe in, yet. I worry about our animals, the livestock, the wildlife that are drinking natural or well water. We don’t whether it’s safe or not. And it’s been tough, it really has. Because the regular, the everyday people in Taylor County would not have talked to. And that’s a pretty scary situation when you get right down to it. A lot of people have rashes. Really itchy rashes that won’t go away. About the only thing that controls the itch is cortisone cream. And if you ask a doctor they’ll tell you that you shouldn’t use cortisone cream for a very long time. There are a lot of shin problems there. I worry more about long term affects though.

133 About cancer, about developmental problems, learning disabilities, reproductive problems, than I do… That’s a good question. What you can do is boil it. But what boiling it does is it volatizes some of the chemicals, kills some of the bacteria, but it doesn’t actually change the chemical structure that’s in the water. They say that reverse osmosis removes some of it. What you gotta realize in Taylor County is that people are poor. They’re not very wealthy, and they’re not very educated either. Which is part of the whole problem. It seems that you should be able to start out with clean water. The city is adamant that it is clean, but I suspect they may be afraid of the liability if someone does actually find out how bad the city water might be. But to answer your question the prison is going to use city water. Piping it 12 to 13 miles out to the new prison. They found contaminants north of the river. They found contaminants east of the river. Because of the cone of depression that the mills wells have created, when you pump 55 million gallons a day out of the ground at one time, 3 of the mills own wells were closed down because the water was so contaminated. Coming from the mill going back underground into their wells that they couldn’t use it. You’d think that would be a pretty clear indication that they need to clean it up, right? And they’re gonna run the discharge from the current discharge point down the Gulf of Mexico. Well it’s already being shard with everybody, what’s the difference? The only difference is maybe it would keep some of the toxins out of the springs that flow down into the ground now instead of pumping the water into the river like they used to do. Now they swallow it down into the ground. Basically that’s the only advantage I could see to have a pipe go to the Gulf of Mexico. If they switch to chlorine dioxide, like they said they’re gonna do, it’s gonna result in chlorates which kill even more sea grasses. Chlorates are some of the worst herbicides there could be and that’s the end result you get if you use chlorine dioxides. So I don’t really see too much of an advantage. The settlement ponds will still be there, probably still developing sink holes. The mill site itself is still contaminating the groundwater. The aquifer is already contaminated. The pipe is not gonna clean up the aquifer. The only think that I could see that would clean up the aquifer eventually would be for the San Pedro Bay, the water recharge area, to be returned to normal, and that would require closing all those drainage canals that were built back in the 50s and 60s. And restore the San Pedro Bay to what it once was. Of course they can’t grow in trees there anymore, if they do that because it will be a great big swamp. That would get the water flow back in the way it should be again and get the

134 hydraulics going the way it should be. And after about a million years it would flush itself out. But I don’t see a whole lot of advantage in the pipe at this time. I think that what’s the answer is process changes at the mill, to make the effluent clean enough for Dan to drink. That would be the answer. I don’t think so, I don’t people know the difference yet. But there’s a difference. I brought something just to answer that question. Now if you a choice wouldn’t you buy environmentally products, I hope none of ya’ll guys get embarrassed, sanitary napkins are nothing to be embarrassed about these days. You can buy sanitary napkins that are not made with chlorine. You can buy facial tissue that’s not made with chlorine. You can by toilet paper that’s not made with chlorine. Now these products are becoming more accepted. These are number of kinds of sanitary napkins, panty liners, different brands, lots of them, made without chlorine. There’s also diapers made without chlorine. There are cellulose bags made without chlorine, cellophane, okay? We can buy these things. Now I have always wondered why coffee filters were bleached, now you can buy oxygen whitened coffee filters. That’s just as white as you might need for a coffee filter. I mean there’s some brown one’s around. It doesn’t matter to me what color they are, you know? It make me really happy if none of them were made with chlorine. But as far as I know, nobody’s done any studies on it. I would ask you, if you have a baby, not to buy these. This is PG’s brand names: Pampers, Luvs, Always, and I would ask you not to buy them. You could use some of these that are used without chlorine or you could even use cotton ones, reusable ones. And I think this is the real answer, I think most of us have washers and dryers nowadays. And it’s really nothing we should be embarrassed about, it just natural.

Dan Simmons Horning: Tell me what info did you first come aware of that concerned you about the possibility of water and air in Perry was becoming polluted. Or whatever the situation may have been. Simmons: I graduated from high school in '65 went off to college and was gone for a long time and finally moved back home permanently in ' 81. My grandmother was getting old and when I moved back I said something about the

135 water at her house. "Mom, the water tastes bad." She said, "Oh you know that mill has ruined the water here, it just tastes terrible." And I had been worried. Horning: In 1954 the Florida State Legislature, with the blessing of the governor signed into law making the Fenholloway an industrial river. Tell me in your words what impact that had on the river and the community; and the impact on you personal since you mentioned your grandmother? Simmions: I was not involved in that 1954 decision. I was just coming online as someone who is responsible but we grew up in the 70s, most of us that are here now. And I attended the first Earth day in junior college back in 1970 when people our age had a lot of enthusiasm back then. One day we were like the environment is really bad and we were doing this Earth day. And we were doing something really great. And if were ever in a position of any kind of leadership then boy you are gonna (sic) see us solve all of these problems. And now it turns out that we are in a position of leadership and so we gotta (sic) deliver on promises that we made to ourselves. And so how do you do that? Well it’s not quite as easy as we thought it would be. You got a community that needs the jobs. People that have invested their lives in the plant so it’s not as simple as we'll fix it or close it down tomorrow. What you actually do is you get the best resources that you can identify the best scientific people the best legal advice, you talk with the regulator, you talk with the stake holders and then you identify with a strategy to make improvements. You go as fast you can as far as you can that the resources will allow you to do that. So then when specific groups come in and say that we want you to eliminate the use of the element chlorine right now cause (sic) we are fixing to put a railroad blockade across your railroad track. You aren't going to get anymore in. Then you have to deal with that in the context of a larger theme. Try not to let it distract it away from your larger mission but at the same time be responsive to people who have legitimate, cause it may be some things that you can do. And we human beings continue to learn and you can never totally isolate a group and say we won't listen to that group cause (sic) they might have part of the answer. I mean they might not have a silver bullet but you do have an obligation, especially for any number of reasons to listen and to learn what you can from any group. Even at first glance you might say oh that's a French group. They could have some ideas that could help you. So we try to do that. In the case of, oh you might have heard a count of this, it was back in 1992, I think, the HOPE organization in conjunction with Green Peace handcuffed themselves to the railroad tracks at the plant here. Actually they weren't on plant property they were on railroad property. And our response to that was we got to work here at eight o'clock in this chair and I think I was talking on the phone or getting ready for the workday and uh, someone sticks their head in the door and they stopped traffic. And some of our folks had already gone down there and stopped the trains. So what I did was, the way I handled it cause (sic) I said this sounds to me. I got our cafeteria to make a pot of coffee and I got uh, I don't think we had donuts I think we had just coffee. I took it down there to meet with folks to diffuse the situation. And see if we could sit down and talk. So we did have some

136 conversation. Had the media there it was well organized. It turns out that I had found out that they were there about six thirty in the fog and the media was there with them. Sometime in the middle of the night they able to get all of the media there and surprise us. They did good, um, and of course there were a little bit of theatrics but you try to meet with people. You just don't call the police out and have them arrested. They weren't hurting anybody, really. Eventually the railroad authorities, that was about seven o'clock in the morning, eight o'clock in the morning they didn't want them out there, that was about eight o'clock at night they didn't want them on the tracks. The railroad authorities did have them arrested. It was a misdemeanor, I think. Our position was you go out and you bend over backwards. You don't take wood chips in or something. Chemicals in for a day that's fine. Try to build some trust. They anticipated us coming in with fire hoses or something. I don't know how those people would feel about us today. I mean you are always still an adversary. But we have been able to demonstrate to a lot of people that we do respect the environment. But it's not just taking coffee to protesters. It could be a gimmick if that's all we are doing. What we were also doing was investing tens of millions of dollars to making environment improvements. What they were specifically protesting that day was chlorine. What they did not understand, that was in 1992, was that in 1987 EPA did some dioxide tests, in the USA. Scientist had dropped the detection limit for dioxide like 1000 fold and it was done to the percent quadrillion. And they were finding dioxin in places they never thought they would find them because they didn't have the capability to.

. Jennifer Fitzwater, DEP Attorney: Cross Talk with Dan Simmons Dan Simmons: I think its important to know that our plant made changes in 1989 that were voluntary to the tune of $40 million, today dioxin is not detectable in treatable waste water today. Dan Simmons: It is not detectable in treated waste water today. Dan Simmons: That’s not the same thing as saying it’s not present. You drink tap water at the mill now? – Yep ((Simmons) You drink city water? The mill is on city water. So the mill’s on city water. The fact is, mill management started drinking bottled water back in 1956 and workers in… It’s true they did run city water to the mill. It’s true, but that’s not the whole truth. The whole truth is that the technologies that are available to detect dioxin are very poor. They cannot detect the level of dioxin that is considered safe. The detection limit is 10ppqd. The water quality standard is 0.014 parts per quadrillion. That’s a thousand times different. When they say they can’t detect it, all they’re saying is that it’s less than 10ppqd. They’re not saying it’s safe, which is 0.014. That’s a big difference. Something about standards being set below

137 detection standards. Jennifer Fitzwater, Do you know why the drinking water standard is what it is? Dan Simmons: Because it’s safe.

Jennifer Fitzwater, DEP Attorney: No because the statute that says how EPA is to create drinking water standards says they’re suppose to set the standards according to the method that allowed the measurement of the contaminant. That’s why EPA number is as high as it is. Not because it’s safe. EPA actually says the safe number is zero.The practical qualification number. It’s an additional factor that takes into account variation in the measurement in the lab. But it still has nothing to do with the safe level of dioxin. Nothing at all. That dioxin was more dangerous than we thought. But we’re all carrying enough dioxin in us right now without additional sources contributing to our bodies, that we are on the threshold of suffering adverse health effects.

Connie Tucker – Executive Director of the Southern Organizing Committee for Economic and Social Justice in Atlanta, Georgia.

We’re losing ground. The contract with America threatens to destroy legislative gains made across environmental concerns. But then that’s true of almost all social economic related laws and appropriations. And this has been happening for some time, for at least two decades the Republican party began stead fastly implementing a strategy to make the Republican party the majority in the United States. And to accomplish this, the partnered with the far right, and the religious right. And we saw this most exemplified, 12 years ago, when Ronald Reagan re- popularized racism. America was not outraged. By the mid-80’s racism had become so respectable that the Bush campaign manager Lee Atwater was afforded respect and the presidency in the blatant face of racism. With the use up the Willie Horton campaign and many of you remember that. And America was not outraged. And in the last congress a democratically controlled congress pushed back all pro-labor legislation, environmental legislation and other important legislative acts will giving us NAFTA and GAT.

And enough Americans were not outraged. What we have to do today is implement a strategy to impact public policy for the long hall. Just has the right has done. And just as the civil rights implicated a long time strategy. And it must be anchored in informed, grass roots action networks and it must be multi-issue. We must face the facts that many environmentalists and proponents of environmental justice voted for the contract on America by voting Republicans into office. While we are not happy with either party and maintain our non- partisan position we cannot ignore the fact that Republican party has made pack with the devil, the right wing full of hate groups and the dike for people of color, race has become our primary in our oppression as economic oppression. And we see this exemplified in the numerous middle class and mixed income, African

138 American communities across the south.

They are faced with life threatening environmental contamination so for U.S. institutionalized racism is just as life threatening as economic oppression or exploitation. And until we realize that rise in racial intolerance is inappreciably bond to increase, increase of corporate welfare. We will not get the full picture. When this critical leap between economic and racial oppression is fully understood, we would have evolved to a situation to which we can truly build a just and sustainable void. Yes we’re going to have to gear up for the upcoming federal legislative session so we can voice our concerns on the various environmental and environmental justice issues. And yes we need to increase our efforts at the state level to impact public policy.

But most of all we need to build an informed grassroots coalition to the level that swells our ranks. And we could only do this through principle alliances and coalitions. This has to be born out of a clear understanding of the historical impacts of economic and racial oppression of communities of color and low income whites. Organizing strategies must be implemented with this in mind.

For instance we maintain that African-Americans should organize our communities we also maintain that persons who do not live in the communities should work through a task force that is made up of persons who are seasoned organizers in the state. Or the region. Working also with representatives from the impacted communities. This way a check and balance system is in place that will prevent communities from being exploited by outside persons. We also understand that mass public environmental and public education is absolutely necessary for us to impact public policy. We also understand historical, political, cultural education is essential. Strategies to achieve environmental justice: a definition of environmentalism is: Environmentalism is where we live, where we work, where we play as well as the natural world. E.J. has put forth this whole paradigm in terms of equal protection, equal enforcement, pollution prevention, right to know what exists in the workplace, in the home as well as on the playground. E.J. also includes protection of workers and finally E.J. includes community empowerment and meaningful participation. Over the past years change has not come from government organizations, it's come from the bottom up Grassroots activism. 1983- Warren County, North Carolina, PCB landfill, 500 people arrested demonstrating the location. This demonstration also led to 1983 GAO study- the correlation of landfills and the racial socioeconomic status of surrounding communities. That study showed that 3 out of 4 hazardous waste sites in the south were located in or near African- American communities. Even though African-American' only made up 20% of the region's population. The commission for Racial Justice Toxic Waste and Race's (1987) first international study that correlated hazardous waste sites and demographics.

139 Again race was the most potent variable in predicting where these facilities were located. More powerful than poverty- land values- home ownership, etc. Dumping in Dixie to dispel the myth that African Americans and people of color aren't concerned with the environment and hazardous waste, lead poisoning of our children- we're also doing something about it. Five regions of the South have used various strategies to confront this issue of environmental injustice. In 1991- The first people of color leadership summit held in Washington D.C.- to address this whole question of toxic racism, environmental injustice, environmental inequities and the whole problem of disproportionate impact. "Race and the incident of Environmental hazard"- Bunyon Bryant and Paul Moorehigh. It wasn't only these activities books, conferences that led government to respond, but these were the important ones. Government's response? In 1990, ATSDR held a historic National minority health conference focused on contamination. In 1992, EPA established office of Environmental Equity- after meeting with community leaders, academics, and some civil rights leaders and basically admitted there was a problem and something had to be done about it. In 1992, EPA produced first comp. Document to examine the whole question of risk of environmental hazards in the equity report. The equity report led the way for other agencies to examine the problem. In February 1994, seven federal agencies sponsored a natural health symposium, "Health and Research needs to ensure environmental justice." It's difficult to work with one federal agency- imagine 7. The planning organization was unique in that it included grassroots organizations impacted communities and federal representatives to plan a national conference. President Clinton, on 2nd day of conference, we were invited to the White House to witness the signing of the environmental justice executive order. To point out some of recommendations of the symposium: Conduct meaningful health research in support of people of color and low-income communities. Promote disease prevention and pollution prevention strategies. Promote interagency coordination to ensure environmental justice. Provide effective outreach, education, and communication. And design legislative and legal remedies. These were key recommendations that cut across agencies and departments- state, local, and federal. The National Environmental Justice Advisory Council has defined environmental justice in 4 basic subunits. Health and research- and I chair the subcommittee. Waste and Facility Siting. Enforcement and public participation. The central theme is that we have to take on our interdisciplinary approach. We have to take a multi-media approach and we have to involve the public and particularly impacted communities in decision-making. Whether it's talking about community driven research, the question of examining what health risks are

140 present around a superfund site. And developing a method of involving those affected residents in the process, equal enforcement of the laws in terms of compliance. Environmental Justice Executive Order: is it a new law? No. Is it anything new? No. The Environmental Justice Executive Order basically says: We should ensure that all communities are protected equally: We should use our existing laws to make sure we have healthy and sustainable communities. The executive order examines two pieces of legislation, one over 30 years old- The Civil Rights Act of 1964, which says no federal monies can be used to promote discrimination based on race or color, education, employment, housing, or any other area including the environment. The Civil Rights has not been used to the extent it should have been used when we talk about enforcing the law equally in a non-discriminatory. Environmental Policy Act of 1969: it says that in terms of federal actions that have potential for impact need to be assessed mitigated. Including environmental health and socio-economic impact assessments have not been done to the extent to protect all populations and particularly such as children. Children's bodies metabolize toxins in very different ways than adults. We use these two laws to pinpoint the fact that not all communities are created equal. There are some communities on the other side of the tracks that don't get adequate treatment, don't get adequate attention and we all know this to be true. The executive order means that we'll finally be connecting new data on ethnic and racial minorities and also to assess disproportion and adverse impact. Not everybody has access to information. There is a process that we're advocating to level the playing field when it comes to getting information in a timely manner and used friendly manner. The last part of the executive order deals with the whole question of subsistence fishers and wildlife consumers. Everybody does not get their fish out of the super- market, there are many people who are subsistence fishers and many people who are not anglers who fish for protein who basically subsidize their diets and their budgets by fishing from rivers, lakes and streams, etc. We need to factor those elements in when we talk about calculating risk, etc. Whether it's water quality standards in dioxins or other types of toxins that may be added to our food and water supply. People who hunt and fish based on geography, based on culture, based on location, often times can be under protected when we calculate and make our assumptions. If we look at the Civil Rights Act- Title 6 Equal Enforcement of the laws, equal protection, compliance analysis, we have data on distributive impact and regressive impacts. Resource allocation- some cases, the money is placed one side of town to enforce of the law, on the other side of town, we look the other way.

That has to end. That is immoral, that is illegal it is uncertain and we say that should end. We should look at investments and impact where we put our money and what kinds of results we're getting. Looking at the possibility of targeting

141 enforcement, targeting resources where there are the greatest risks. This is not a Republican issue, this is not a Democrat issue, this is an issue of justice. Justice that involves impacted populations in the process whether its around a superfund site or whether it's in the process of abating lead in public housing. We have to involve people in the process, particularly those people that have the greatest to gain from that involvement. We have to bring in the whole idea that all impacts do not have the same effect across the board. We have to focus our assessment to determine what is significant and this is a significant problem only because it affects large numbers of people or the fact that a smaller number of people are being affected at a level that would be intolerable if those people happened to be white, affluent and happened to live on the right side of town. Those are issues that are not addressed in policy and by not being addressed in policy, the whole cycle of inequities, whether it's groups that are medically underserved or it's populations that are at great risk when it comes to health, and whether it's geographic areas that are under ecological strain. There needs to be a mechanism to provide feedback to impacted populations. Not getting that information back to people has to change. There have been that have literally studied to death and they don't understand why action has not been forthcoming. There are some communities that are at the end of the line when it comes to getting their points on the table. There are many cases right now where we don't have the data to assess multiple cumulative effects and possible synergistic impacts in terms of chemicals and other toxins. We don't get any action. We continue to look at the flavor of the month- one chemical at a time. Where as in the real world, in many communities, whether it's on the south side of Chicago… where there are multiple chemicals that are in the waste stream that are in the communities that need to be, risks need to be assessed and prevention methods need to be put in place. I don't think this is anything that's unusual that people are asking for. It's the common sense approach. In addition, there is a requirement in the executive order calls for research data collection and analysis. Here we're talking about examining qualitative and quantitative data, there are many qualitative data that will not show up in the census tapes. We have to do in many cases ethnographic studies, we have to do on-site visits, we have to do in-depth interviews and we have to do health surveys. We have to add to the data, and again we have to use qualitative and quantitative data. We have to use demographic information, community rights to know, SIRI data to plot emissions and track emissions.

Develop pollution intervention programs, emission reduction programs, and waste minimization programs. We also have to consider that when we change units of analysis, we may change may change what we find. When we go from a census track to block groups to zip codes to counties, etc. And understanding that in many cases communities or neighborhoods existed long before there were geographic configurations called census stripes. In some cases, maybe all

142 cases, pollution does not necessarily stop at a political boundary or it does not stop at a fence or state line. We have to assess what the unit of analysis and the zone of impact is. We have our policy makers, our analysts, working with communities working to identify what the socio-historical nature of that neighborhood and community is. Community is more than a spatial definition, it is both spatial and social. We have to have our databases go across jurisdictions and planning districts.

Our research analysis also must look for health effects and vulnerable populations. Low income populations that might not have balanced diets, we're talking about proposals to cut school lunch programs for poor children, at the same time we're talking about proposals that would get the Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, and Endangered Species Act. I say to those people who speak out against cutting these acts, they must also speak out against cutting school lunch programs for children, or housing programs, and programs in terms of lead abatement. Those are environmental justice issues whether they be about the built-in environment or the social environment.

Land use and economic development are environmental justice issues. In many grass root struggles in communities have not been addressed at the federal level because they say it's a local land-use issue. That's a local zoning issue and the federal government, the EPA say we don't want to get involved in local issues if there is inequity built in to a system where people of color have been locked out of zoning boards and all this nasty stuff, locally unwanted land uses, LULUS, are placed on the other side of the tracks. And if it's a local issue then I think the issue of justice, fairness, equity must be addresses at all levels. If it's wrong to put all the landfills, all the hazardous waste facilities, all the nasty stuff, just where poor people here, and people of color are than in those local land use issue, a local zoning issue, I think there's an issue for the federal government.

When it comes to equal protection, Title 6, of the Civil Rights Act, when it comes to the fact that no community should be burdened with a disproportionate of our industrial society. Disproportionate impact going to our original issue, what is it? Environmental justice does not mean taking all the nasty stuff out of black communities. That is not justice, that is madness. What the environmental justice paradigm says is that there should be a sharing of the burden, since all of us produce waste and there is a direct relationship between per capita income and waste generation, and there is an inverse relationship between where the waste is disposed and per capita income. We're talking about those communities that have borne a greater shape a greater burden- should not have to bear any greater burden whether it's this generation or the next generation. What it means is leveling the playing fields. Those communities are at the greatest risk when it comes to health comes to impact on entire generations and future generations. Those questions of whether or not we should place another facility in that

143 community to add to that risk burden the environment justice paradigm should kick in. And there should be a moratorium on any future siting of facilities in communities that have borne their fair share. That is not asking affirmative action that is not asking for special treatment that is asking for justice. Assumptions in calculating impacts and risk, we have to make sure we're not building in a situation that perpetuates inequities. Equity assessment and distributive impact, we have to adjust our methodologies to deal with some of these issues.

As I said before, because in many cases when we're talking about who gets who, what, where, when, and why, may not necessarily be based in science it may be based on is political science. Oftentimes it may not be epidemiology, toxicology, hydrology, but maybe sociology. We have to understand that all communities, all neighborhoods, all regions do not bear the burdens when it comes to toxic waste, to pollution, when it comes to the whole topic of equity.

We also have to look at adverse and disproportionate impact, in term of social, economic, air quality, energy, environmental, we have to look at community impact. What is community health? Health is more than, as the environmental justice paradigm justice states health is more than health of the physical body, health is more then cleaning up a super-fund site. Health also includes the whole issue of sustainability. The fact that drugs are an environmental problem, is a toxic problem, crack cocaine is one of the most hazardous substance known. There aren't that many poppy fields, coca bushes, and marijuana bushes growing in the ghetto.

This stuff is imported, just as other kinds of chemicals that these companies operate in many of our communities. The question of how we define community health includes housing, employment, education, infrastructure, and transportation all these things are interrelated. So this is whole concept Brownfield's and cleanup standards and trying to reinvest, reinvigorate inner-city urban areas, we have to talk about it's more than just cleaning up a superfund site, in order for us to re-invigorate in order to create a sustainable and healthy community. We have to work at the whole community and community is just that. Where we live, work, and play as well as the natural environment.

Finally, the executive order and the environmental justice community calls for public participation and access to information. It's not enough to say that the info has been collected, but people, the public, the disenfranchised public have not been able to get info in a timely manner, have not been able to get access to the public library, and again when I wrote "Dumping in Dixie," it was not by accident that I focused in on the Southern United States, it was not by accident that Jim Crow gave us the Civil Rights Movement in the South, and it was not by accident that the environmental justice movement was born in the South. This is not to

144 say environmental inequities do not exist in other parts of the U.S. This is not to say environmental inequity is a domestic U.S. issue. Environmental justice cuts across the globe as we resolve many of our environmental health problems in our country many of the same problems are now being exported.

Trans- boundary waste trade dealing with the whole question of border disputes that are growing around the question of waste that is coming into Mexico form the U.S. The mequiladores program, NARTA, GATT, the whole question fairness and equity. We have to identify high impact populations and at risk populations, children, older people, pregnant women, people with anemia, people with susceptibility to certain kinds of chemicals in terms of the way they metabolize them. These are issues we have to work together on in terms of science, scientists, and in terms of public policy makers and in terms of environmental organizations and grassroots impacted communities.

We have to design our communication strategies and outreach strategies that are sensitive to cultural groups, language groups, groups that may be geographically isolated from the main stream, whether it's in Appalachia or on reservations or inner city neighborhoods. We have to be able to communicate and communication is a two way street. We have to create mechanisms to broaden our stakeholder participation in the decision making process it is not enough just to bring people to the table.

And as Malcolm X said, "Just because you sit at the table doesn't make you a diner. You have to be eating from the table." The environmental justice movement attempts to bring to the table real diners in the process about what's happening in their communities. Whether it's about a lead smelter in West Dallas, a hazardous waste superfund Cadillac of landfills in the South… The whole question of making sure the laws, regulations, and policies do not make some communities more vulnerable and allow those populations to be under protected.

This is what the whole environmental justice paradigm is all about. We have much success since 1983, we've come a long ways, but the environmental justice leaders and activists that I work with are not sprinters, they are long distance runners much of the action and changes that were begun actually started under the Bush Administration and Clinton Administration picked up on some of the changes that had been put in place. So environmental justice leaders and activists and people in the grassroots are not dismayed by the 104th Congress and their somehow disdain for equal protection be it the environment or employment we're saying that we don't retreat. A line has been drawn in the sand and environmental justice is about justice not about a political ideology, it's about justice. That's where we will take our position and that's where we are headed- Thank you.

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Today, we have identified such sites and cleaned them up or at the very least fenced off and contained these wastes and now we have laws in place to insure that handling and disposing such waste is done in a proper fashion. New environmental paradigms such as right- to- know, which empowers communities to understand about the wastes that are generated in their own neighborhoods. Paradigms such as pollution prevention that allow us to prevent the generation of waste in the first place. Reduce, reuse, recycle these are the paradigms of the 1990's. We have also learned there are better approaches to waste clean- up. Some of the new approaches to reform superfund law.

There is still much to be accomplished. Across the country, there's still too many clean- ups that have not been done and too many communities who still have questions about their health. All of you are integral to answering these questions and getting the job done. Though we've done much to protect the environment, we have failed to protect children and low-income, minority community to the fullest extent we should. I know from my experience in public health that children are the focus of concern for adverse effects by exposure to toxic chemicals for all communities. When it comes to environmental protection, the needs of children should paramount.

Children need safe places to live, wholesome food, and safe drinking water and clean air to breath. Since our children cannot protect themselves they need out help to protect them from the harmful effects of pollutants and toxic chemicals. Children also deserve to grow up in a sustainable environment and in a world where there is opportunity for economic growth. Not only for this generation, but for generations to come. We must not.

Protection of wetlands and endangered species helps to protect the lives of our children and future generation. Surely, the lessons of Eastern Europe should not be lost on us. Narrowly focused economic planning with little or no understanding or no understanding of long term dangers to the environment has left a legacy of seriously devastated land forms, a threatened environment that can no longer sustain economic productivity. Fortunately in the U.S. strong environmental protections in the last 25 years have helped prevent some of these consequences. This helps ensure our national security and our future security or for our children, but even in the U.S. the future of public health protection may be on a new course.

There is pressure to move congressional mandates and regulatory policies from protection to measuring cost against the benefits of safeguarding public health. Another push is towards consideration of the different aspects of distribution of risk. Which increases risk potential. Children as opposed to adults. Talks about child not a little adults. How that mind set is now driving EPA guidelines. Draft

146 EPA statement on risk assessments for pesticide use and pediatric specific. Exposure limits for children and adults, lead poisoning and pesticides in specific. This anti-government fervor we see in many areas, people are taking advantage of that climate and using that as a way to advance very narrow agendas for special interest groups. It's important for people with a broader understanding to go out and educate.

Jerome Ringo (Environmental Activist) and Lois Gibbs Jerome Ringo was one person and I believe can make a difference… "Not how big the dog is in a fight, but how much fight is in the dog." We don't have many voices that stand up for color…one of me can bring in one of you, two of us can make a difference. (Ringo)

Question: Do you see any changes or awareness of this issue? Answer (Lois Gibbs):

…Yes I do see- not change but awareness…More in a mode of saving what we have… trying to create stronger regulations or better…There is no way to really guarantee, that an industry will come through, proper regulations.

Question: Can you give us some example of how the land usage has affected class racial structure?

Answer: Gibbs Land value will drop… rates of health problems value of land depreciate.

Question: What can the citizens do to? themselves against? issues?

Answer: Ringo That's a very good question… Education to realize what's best to deal with impact… Demand meaningful dialogue… Have good dialogue with companies, but do not compromise health, educate communities on how to deal with impact.

Question: How did you get involved in this?

Answer: Ringo I worked for Pepsi Chemical experienced many things that were unfavorable…watched friends lose lives at the industry… watched many people suffer the impact of chemical industry… High cancer rates… People standing by and not being a voice… I just chose to be a leader.

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Question: Tell us about some of the places you have gone to discuss this issue?

Answer: Ringo In the past I've visited Cancer Alley, Texas… witnessed what Hispanics go through… been to Maryland, Tennessee, Florida, Alabama… I've had an opportunity to experience first hand… Unfortunately people of color… we must all stand together to make sure that our quality of life is maintained… There have been a group of people that is unheard it is time that they became a voice…

Question: Places like Cancer Alley are really bad, but attracting more industries. Answer: Ringo The Cancer Alley story is unique… Industry is located there for a number of reasons. Strategic Location, Mississippi Corridor-Shipping… plantation land- been there for years, people that are there descended from slaves. Blacks that never left. Minorities might move in around industry- who would want to? But the American Dream is to own property that can be afford.

Question: St. Gabriel is a ghost town? People left behind. Answer: Ringo Not uncommon. The workers do not live in the communities that are impacted. As a worker in the industry you realize the impact… Industries do not relocate in rich white communities. Too much opposition… They want to go where they are less likely to be opposed and cheaper property.

Question: What do you say to the person that won't believe they can make a difference? Answer: Ringo Jerome Ringo. People of color? "Myth trying to erase…" People care about environment, are about people…do care about clean living, but there are priorities and that's living… quality of life in poor communities.

Question: What does environmental life mean? Answer: Ringo Basically what it means is unfortunately people of color live around the boundaries of landfills… because most of the contamination is located around people of color?

148 Question: Because industries come into a community. They promise jobs. What kind of effect does this have? Answer (Ringo) First we have to find out why they are located in the black community… The land is cheaper. Cheaper land is found around minority communities.

M. WILLIAMS: Founder CATE - Mt. Dioxin, Pensacola, Florida

Good morning and first giving honor to God, who is the head of my life. I bring you greetings from the Southern Organizing Committee for Economic and Social Justice in Atlanta, Georgia. Where Connie Tucker is the executive director. If Connie were with us this morning, she expand elaborately on the public policy gain which have impacted the implementation of EPA programs like the Environmental Justice Executive Order. But more importantly Connie would tell you that we’re losing ground. I’m Margaret Williams, President of “Citizens Against Toxic Expose”. That’s a group that was organized in 1992 trying to combat come of the things that EPA was doing in the Rosewood Terrace, Oak Park, at a Golden Community. We met with hope that we could talk to our government and receive fair treatment, and that was it. We soon found out that we had to fight for what we wanted and that’s what we proceeded to do. I’m Margeret Williams, President of “Citizens Against Toxic Expose”. That’s a group that was organized in 1992 trying to combat come of the things that EPA was doing in the Rosewood Terrace, Oak Park, at a Golden Community. We met with hope that we could talk to our government and receive fair treatment, and that was it. We soon found out that we had to fight for what we wanted and that’s what we proceeded to do.

I would like to give thanks to the almighty for the opportunity to come before you today and share some of our experiences. I’m Margaret Williams, President of “Citizens Against Toxic Expose”. That’s a group that was organized in 1992 trying to combat come of the things that EPA was doing in the Rosewood Terrace, Oak Park, at a Golden Community. We met with hope that we could talk to our government and receive fair treatment, and that was it. We soon found out that we had to fight for what we wanted and that’s what we proceeded to do. We worked for a whole year trying to get them to stop the digging that they had started at the Escambia treating cite, because the people who lived in the communities were being affected.

Skin rashes, eye irritations, respiratory problems. Since they started the digging in 1991 we’ve had over 42 people to die from cancer deaths, and some from lung deaths. We were very concerned so we went to the region thinking we could …

149 some support, and that failed. Then went to headquarters. And we found that headquarters was sympathetic with our issue and they sent someone down from headquarters to find out what was going on.

And when the representative, Mr. Robert Maxtin came down he was applaud at what he saw. Because what he saw was what we have been telling the region all of the time. He went back and we started a movement to see if we could get the region to do something. At first they said we need a health study, and we thought that a health study would certainly prove what we had been thinking all of the time. But after we read the trace records of Agency for Toxic Disease Control, we decided that they were not going to do a health study that would be conclusive. So we asked them for a protocol so we would know exactly what they were going to do. And when they provided us with that, we had it evaluated by several people; proctologist, eperdemidologist, scientist like persons etc. And each one said the protocol was not worth the paper it was written on. We tried to share.

Evaluations with AFTDCR to see if they could include them in a reuse protocol, but this they could not do. So they came up with another type of health study that’s called a retrospective health study and informed us that we would have to have 9540 participation before it would be a good health study. Of course we told them that it was impossible so we have them on hold right now we told them don’t call us we’ll call you. Our next step was to seek some off site soil samples. And of course we had to go through headquarters … to seek at least 60 samples. We went to headquarters and again asked them to oversee the sampling process, because we did not trust ATCR. We asked our technical advisor to be present as these samples were being taken, here again we did not want them to have any part in it because we felt that they would use figures to their advantage and we would be able to receive help. That sampling was done in 1995. In December 1995 we met with EPA and they were going to discuss the results of these samples.

But we found out the toxins were much higher than we anticipated and they themselves showed us that entire area was contaminated and people needed to be removed. And they had three options at that time. One was permanent relocation for residents. One was temporary relocation with on site clean-up and the other was temporary relocation, with off site clean-up. And of course the department of relocation was the most cost effective and we surely that it would be the one that they would select of course none of them worked.

When they got ready to go to Washington to brief headquarters about their plans, to our amazement they had selected another option and that was trying to deal with this. And this was one that was thought of at the last minute. When the meeting was over in Washington, Region Four told our Congressman that they

150 planned to move 60 families in Rosewood Terrace and that others would probably be moved at a later date. When I called Washington to see their version of the meeting the assistant administrator told me that a decision had not been made. But they promised me that they would have a proposed plan to us by the end of April. So that’s what we are waiting for now.

A proposed plan April 30. After we receive that plan, we have a public meeting and then a comment period. Right now we don’t know what that plant entails, but we have been informed by other people that it entails permanent relocation for 66 residents only. And the other in the plan would be temporary relocation where they would move the people temporarily, clean the site and move them back. And then wait until they got ready to clean the un-site contamination and they would have to relocate the people again. Of course we felt that it was sort of crazy to have people move at least four times. So we are waiting now to see what they are going to propose to us. And we have the option to reject it. It might be a bitter battle.

We do have representative working with that have been to the Whitehouse even, to discuss our situation. We are waiting now to see what will happen after this plan is issued. We are hoping that some interference by headquarters will stop them from submitting to us a plan that says anything other than permanent relocation for all the residents in the area. If you are familiar with the area you now that the area near the Escambia Treating site is called Mt. Dioxin, and we have about 90 families in a 200 unit housing project in that area. And the contaminates in that soil are dioxin, arsenic, binsol-piren, and all of these are at much higher levels than the safe concern level of the Environmental Protection Agency. Just ¾ mile away you have the Agrico-Chemical Site. Agrico Fertilizer Plant. The contaminants there are dioxin, arsenic, lead, fluoride. We have about 60 families in that area.

What we are seeking now is permanent relocation for all families. We are asking that each of you become the conscious of your local organization, local government, your state government, your regional government and your federal government. And let them know the thing that’s happening to the people in the communities around you. Even though the contaminants have been found in our area who is to say that they are not in your area too. Because we understand that … the pollution from both cities have made and is headed south. And who knows where else from there. We are getting information daily about how other properties have been effected by these contaminants. So we feel that we are our brother’s keeper, if we work hard to protect each other, then surely we will have a safe place to live. This is what we should have, we are entitled to a place to live free from contamination. If you have any questions about these cites I’ll try to entertain them for you … and if not I want to thank you for the opportunity to speak with you.

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History of Pensacola “Mt. Dioxin” – M. Williams

Mt. Dioxin is the soil from an old wood trading cite, Escambia Wood Trading Company. Which sat in the ground for 40 years until EPA took it upon themselves to dig it up. And they did that without establishing either the levels or the volume. So they didn’t realize the extent of the contamination that they had. They just began to dig anyway. And as the pile grew there was dust flying around there was a lot of contamination attached to the dust and also vaporizing into the air.

We have huge amounts of dioxins here, that were originally in the Penta, and it always contains dioxins, but in this case it contains even more dioxin then usual because there was a fire on the cite. Before Penta was used at this cite they used creosode and after the Penta they also used copper-chromium and arsenic. So all those contaminates and managed together with the dioxins and also with the solvents in the soil. When that was dug up people were badly endangered, they had chronic health effects, and on top of that they had very urgent, acute affects, we assume and are told by medical professionals that the symptoms that we saw during that period were evidence of long standing and permanent health damage. So we are simply looking about temporarily breathing problems or temporary rashes or temporary eye problems, we’re looking about long term damage that may impact these communities for generations.

The community is largely people who moved into this area in the 50s and 60s when they were young couples. It is as far as I have ever seen during my involvement with the community entirely African-American. I believe that at some point there were whites living here but I’ve never met any of them. And they aren’t there now. In general they are people with good jobs, high ambitions for their families and for themselves. And they bought in this community because it was a good new development with new houses and that the American dream. In that sense they were seriously victimized because it was their very ambition that lead them to buy into this community. Which was one of only two that African Americans were allowed to buy new homes in Pensacola during that time. African American just weren’t welcomed in most communities in Pensacola in the 50s and 60s so they moved where they could move.

And these were nice houses tree lined streets, well kept yards. They were friendly communities, the people have a history together. They are very strong, well educated optimistic people. And that has been destroyed. There still are the strong connections, the children grew up together and have major loyalty, but they are not only dying off now they are terrified and indignant and rightfully so.

152 In many cases people are now retired and they were young couples the, and by now they are in their 60s, retired. But, a lot of them are raising grandchildren. So we have very small children playing on the soil in this cite everyday. Breathing these contaminants and these health effects that they may be suffering may in fact effect even the grandchildren of those children. That is the kind of damage we are doing by leaving people to live in this contaminated area.

QUESTION: CATE Hope to accomplish

First we want relocation for the people. Nobody expects to make a killing in the real-estate market where they end up with some fancy new home, bigger and better. But they are owed by the people who have failed them homes just like their homes but in an uncontaminated area where they can be clean and free. Whatever financial situation they have right now, if their houses are paid off, they deserve a house free and clear. If they have say 10 years to pay, four hundred dollars a month then they should still have that. We want them to be victimized in any way, the way some communities have by taking a bad relocation plan. But that’s our first and foremost aim is to get people where they are not continually endangered.

Second up, all we want to be very sure that the best possible method is used to clean up this contamination and that we don’t minimize the danger it anyone in Pensacola who is exposed to it.

This is right to the middle of town. Run-off from here is carried all the way into town. The ground water is contaminated with this all. We have to become serious about toxic clean up and also about the reduction of the use of toxics in industrial process… across the country and especially in communities like this in the south east.

QUESTION: First step…

Well we knock on a lot of doors, we went to a lot of offices we wrote things. We distributed fax sheets. We tried to overcome the kind of apathy and complacency that we found to often is the face of this. And also the kind of discrediting influence that government officials have sometimes been. By saying don’t worry about a thing, we are taking care of it, we are here to protect you, blah-blah. Everyone was much too ready to believe that. I mean the Wyger community was hit first.

As far as these neighborhoods they knew they were sick, they hadn’t connect it with the cities but they knew that they were suffering. And it was, unfortunately, our responsibility to prove that the suffering was not brought upon by themselves, but actually caused by industry that had been there. And it had received great

153 profit by improper disposal. Because enforcement of environmental laws on these cities would have been politically costly and economically costly. It would have cut into profit and we are horrified that industrial profit can override human health. It’s certainly an aim but we are not willing to take it instead of human health protection.

It started in 1992, EPA dug in 1991 clean up process… People were exposed to the containments. They decided that we better get organized to see if we do something about what’s going on.

Question: What would you tell people about what to do if this was happening in their backyard… Answer: First I tell them talked to city official, governor and no one wants to pay attention…

Organize and keep on fighting until someone listens…

Question: How did you get the attention? Answer: Took it to Washington and told the story about Mt. Dioxin. Two hundred and six thousand cubic feet of dirt with dioxin and people living within 15 ft of it..

Question: How many deaths do you know of from it? Answer: I can’t specifically say it was from that but the rates was very high in this area, due to cancer… I used to live in the golden area… There were about 5 deaths in my family, died from cancer, a still born… People had respiratory problems and rented a house to a man, found him dead and another woman who lived there had cancer… They expect people to prove what is going on is harmful to their health. You have to prove that they are hurting you… We do not have a toxicologist to treat people in this area… The doctors won’t say that you are sick because you are exposed… The projects supposed to have a high rate of thyroid cancer… I think the people are afraid to come forward…

Question: How did you organize all of this - ??? Answer: I go to a lot of meetings, making contacts when I invite them, they showed up… They hear me creaming Pensacola… You thank Margret Williams… They do see that our struggles are legitimate.

Question: Been a long road? Yes it has… We take death for granted… Can’t do something about it. My daddy was only 60 years old when he passed… Destroyed an entire community…emphazema…sad situation.

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165 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH

Gloria G. Horning, Received her Ph.D. from Florida State University in 2004 from the College of Information, her MS is from San Jose State University and her BA is from California State University, Hayward. . Dr. Horning has been working on AIDS and Environmental Communication Issues for more than 13 years. She has produced/written and directed three AIDS documentaries and is in the process of producing her first full-length documentary on environment issues facing minorities in the deep South. Professor Horning is presently teaching in the Electronic Media program at Northern Arizona University. She brings to the NAU/EM curriculum 13 years higher-education experience and nearly 12 years experience as a news producer and director for NBC and CBS affiliates. She won the CINE award for her work on “The Faces of AIDS.” Horning has also taught, with high teaching honors, at Florida State University (2000-2002) and Florida A&M University (1993-2000).

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