CLEAN WATER • ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE • STRONG COMMUNITIES WATERKEEPER WATERKEEPER® Volume 4, Number Volume 3 Winter 2008 Winter Winter 2008 $5.95 Coming Soon to Select IMAX® Theatres and IMAX 3D Theatres Worldwide Starting March 2008 EXHIBITORS IN THE U.S. Davenport, IA Putnam Museum Oklahoma City, OK Omniplex Theater St.Augustine, FL World Golf Village Austin,TX Texas State History Museum Des Moines, IA Science Center of Iowa Philadelphia, PA Franklin Institute Tampa, FL Tampa Museum of Science & Industry Atlanta, GA Fernbank Natural History Museum Detroit, MI Detroit Science Center Phoenix,AZ Arizona Science Center Tempe,AZ IMAX Theatre at Arizona Mills Birmingham,AL McWane Center Duluth, MN Duluth Entertainment Convention Center Portland, OR Oregon Museum of Science & Industry Boston, MA Museum of Science Ft. 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Science World Cincinnati, OH Cincinnati Museum Center Myrtle Beach, SC IMAX 3D Theatre Myrtle Beach Shreveport, LA Sci-Port Discovery Center Winnipeg, Manitoba IMAX Theatre IMAX IS A REGISTERED TRADEMARK OF IMAX CORPORATION. © 2007 Organic Valley Family of Farms BAI7DFA?A?EWhen it comes to family, Mom gets real protective. She knows our milk is produced without antibiotics, synthetic hormones or pesticides, and it comes from family-owned farms. Our cows are treated humanely and graze in organic pastures. And mom knows we consistently exceed USDA organic standards—not because we have to, but because we have families, too. www.organicvalley.coop WATERKEEPER Volume 4 Number 3, Winter 2008 12 7 Letter from the Chairman: Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. 10 Splashback 12 Ripples 20 San Francisco Bay Oil Spill 22 Steel Magnolia: Sally Bethea, 22 Upper Chattahoochee Riverkeeper 24 Beloved Community: Representative John Lewis 28 Environmental Justice 30 Environmental Justice at 20 32 Crossroads, Saving Turkey Creek 36 Tradition, Trust and Hopi Science 40 The Bridge, Ancient Wisdom and Environmental Protection 24 42 Fighting for Justice in Northeast Oklahoma 44 East is West 46 Talking Environmental Justice, with Dr. Robert D. Bullard 50 Hann Baykeeper, Africa’s First Waterkeeper 55 The Way Forward: Strong Communities 56 This Movement 58 Waterkeepers Around the World 32 61 EcoSalon 62 Ganymede 64 On the Water, with Giles Ashford 66 All Hands On Deck: The Surface Mining Act at 30 41 4 Waterkeeper Magazine Winter 2008 www.waterkeeper.org Corp-SU05-530 waterkeeperad18/30/055:27PMPage SAFETY BLEED TRIM “Above all else, pollution is a Letter from the Chairman human rights Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. violation.” Hazardous facilities are pushed into Pollution’s Chief Victims minority communities by industry be- cause they receive less scrutiny from gov- ernment regulators and environmental groups. Environmental injustice is moral- ifteen years ago labor leader Den- color communities are exposed to higher ly equivalent to any other form of racism nis Rivera and I jointly published an levels of pollution than the rest of the na- — it has immediate health impacts and in Fop-ed in The New York Times titled tion and that these same populations expe- the longer-term destroys the cultures and Pollution’s Chief Victims. We cited cases rience certain diseases in greater numbers vitality of our highest risk communities. around the nation where toxic waste, sew- than more affluent white communities. Above all else, pollution is a human rights age plants and other hazardous facilities • In 2000 The Dallas Morning News violation. We need to make sure that our were foisted on minority and low-income and University of Texas-Dallas reported that laws, our enforcement and all of our insti- communities. In 1994 President Clinton nearly half (870,000 of the 1.9 million) of the tutions recognize, understand and elimi- signed an Executive Order requiring the nation’s housing units for the poor, mostly nate environmental racism. federal government to take race into ac- minorities, sit within a mile of factories that The solution to environmental racism count in environmental decision-making. reported toxic emissions to U.S. EPA. remains the same: Better, stronger, envi- But in 2007 things have only gotten worse. • In 2001 the Center for Health, En- ronmental enforcement that protects every What we wrote in 1992 is just as true vironment and Justice reported that more community and every citizen from pollu- today: Inexorably, society’s wastes flow than 1,200 schools — serving 600,000 tion. Waterkeepers — fighting to clean up toward communities debilitated by social low-income and minority students in toxic waste sites, fighting to stop coal min- unrest, high illiteracy, unemployment and Massachusetts, New York, New Jersey, ing, fighting to protect wetlands, fisheries low voter registration. Those communi- Michigan and California — are located and communities — are on the frontlines ties have become toxic dumping grounds within half a mile of federal Superfund or in this battle. But like others throughout while receiving few of the safeguards that state-identified contaminated sites. the environmental movement we need to prudence and decency demand but only • In 2003 the U.S. Commission on do more to diversify our staff and directors political power can obtain. Civil Rights concluded that “Minority and racially and culturally, and support the en- In 1992 EPA acknowledged that low- low-income communities are most often vironmental justice movement. income and minority populations shoul- exposed to multiple pollutants and from We must pressure Congress to ban the dered the greatest environmental risks multiple sources.” production of toxic materials that can- and that the application of environmental • In 2005 the U.S. Government Ac- not be reused or recycled. We must push controls and enforcement follows racial countability Office (GAO) criticized EPA Congress to reinstate the Superfund tax lines. In the past 15 years, researchers for its handling of environmental justice to ensure that polluters are held respon- have piled up evidence of unequal pro- issues when drafting new clean air rules. sible for cleaning up their toxic waste. We tection from the law, of shoddy cleanups • In 2004 and again in 2006 EPA’s In- must fight to restore federal environmen- of toxic sites and of minority and low-in- spector General chastised the agency for tal protections that have been systemati- come communities being stuck with our failing to consider environmental justice cally stripped from the public by the Bush worst polluting facilities. And these com- in important decisions. Administration, to rebuild sewage plants munities and all Americans are paying an • And finally, in 2007, the GAO criti- and water delivery systems, revitalize city unacceptable price. cized EPA’s handling of contamination parks and expand public transportation. Dr. Robert Bullard, an author of Toxic from the nation’s worst ever spill of oil, Finally, Congress must pass the Environ- Wastes and Race in the United States the industrial chemicals and other hazardous mental Justice Act of 2007 to give the seminal 1987 report on environmental materials in post-Katrina New Orleans weakly implemented 1994 Executive Or- justice, recently testified at the first ever and Gulf Coast communities. der the force of federal law. Senate hearing on Environment Justice Dr. Bullard was also a principal author Society must recognize that eco- (he’s interviewed on page 46). The evi- of the 2007 Toxic Wastes and Race at nomic and social injustice are a virulent dence of environmental racism that Dr. Twenty 1987-2007 report, which conclud- form of pollution. As we endeavor to Bullard cited reads like a trail of tears: ed that “environmental injustice in people heal the wounds that afflict our planet, • A 1999 Institute of Medicine study of color communities is as much or more we must also heal the inequities that di- concluded that low-income and people of prevalent today than 20 years ago.” vide our nation. W www.waterkeeper.org Winter 2008 Waterkeeper Magazine 7 ® ON THE COVER WATERKEEPER M A G A Z I N E KUCHINA AwAKEN Michael Kabotie (Lomawywesa) is a renowned Hopi painter, jeweler and poet. He incorporates traditional Hopi images, songs and stories into 50 S. Buckhout St., Ste. 302, Irvington, NY 10533 distinctive artworks. www.nativeart.net www.waterkeeper.org The official magazine of Waterkeeper Alliance MISSION: Waterkeeper Alliance connects and supports local Waterkeeper PROUD programs to provide a voice for waterways and communities worldwide. SPONSOR OF Eddie Scher Editor Bandana Malik Assistant Editor Switch Studio Art Direction Richard J. Dove Photo Editor Waterkeeper Amy Lamp Designer Giles Ashford Creative Consultant MAGAZINE William Abranowicz Photo Consultant John Wathen Photographer Anne Costner Advertising Board of