This is a national, global problem when the total effects of a toxic waste site
are considered. They are seldom restricted to any one given area over time. At
all levels of government we need to strengthen environmental laws.
Toxins have little respect for boundaries. In Idaho we have two sites dealing
with mine tailings and storage of radioactive and toxic waste that are steadily
seeping into the state of Washington's watershed. Asarco mining has been working
to open a new mine on the Montana side of our border that will impact streams,
rivers, and lakes in Idaho. Berkely Pits in Montana has the potential to effect
the entire Columbia River Basin. We are just now learning the serious
implications of Harvester Ants and tumble weeds, how they spread radioactive and
toxic waste far from sites that have supposedly been resolved. In Hanford,
Washington there is an all out effort to exterminate ants who can burrow as far
as 20 feet from the surface, and tumble weeds that blow into Oregon.
States have responsibility to hold industry accountable, but at the federal level
we need to strengthen our environmental laws, not weaken them as our current
legislators -- as our republicans from the western US are trying to do. We work
it here, to oust these legislators but with little success over the years.... the
crazy local citizenry continues to elect the likes of Helen Chenoweth, Larry
Craig. It's every bit as important, if not more so, to educate citizens so that
instead of seeing 'new jobs' and prosperity, they see the reality of toxic and
radioactive waste as a bigger threat to their livelihood.
How can I find out more about the NYPIRG bill being written? Are bills like this
being presented in other states?
/donna
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
> Unfortunately many people aren't capable of taking care of problems like these
> on their own, and if these problems were left to the individuals who are being
> affected by these sites, little to nothing would ever change (considering the
> few people in this world who actually have the motivation to make a change).
> These toxic sites were, and are still being made by companies' harmful
> chemical wastes, and while many of these companies are long gone, new
> companies are still producing. And we shouldn't have to deal with their
> messes, or foot the bill for the cleanup of them. That's why NYPIRG is
> working on passing a bill to have the companies pay a front end fee on their
> toxic raw materials that would replenish the superfund with their money, not
> ours. And right, you shouldn't have to pay for our problems, and we shouldn't
> have to deal with yours, that is also why their are separate state PIRGs,
> specific ones to deal with specific local problems. So you out in Marion
> County do not have to deal with our problems here in NY.
