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Environmental Justice at the MA State House
Photo: Maria Belen Power - Chelsea GreenRoots (center), Andrea Nyamekye - Neighbor to Neighbor (left), Madeleine Scammell - BUSPH (right) testify at environmental justice hearing
Just last week at the Massachusetts State House, the Committee on Environment, Natural Resources, and Agriculture held a hearing for a new environmental justice bill. This bill aims to increase support for environmental justice communities as defined in former Governor Deval Patrick’s 2014 executive order and the EJ policy that was originally issued way back in 2002 and updated in 2017. The Executive Order lays out a
Everyone's doing it, and so should Massachusetts!
What is IT, you ask? It’s bettering our products, homes, and lives by going flame retardant free! These chemicals have been linked to increased rates of cancer and problems with fertility, development and the nervous system and can be found in many common household items such as furniture, electronics, and toys.
Awful, right? Luckily, we’re not the only ones who think so. 14 states have already banned toxic flame retardants, pushing their leaders to recognize the hazards these chemicals pose.
This summer, Maine took it to a whole new level by passing a strong piece of legislation which bans
Engaging the Marketplace & Winning
Our members are familiar with many of the aspects of Clean Water Action advocacy: promoting legislation, endorsing candidates, field and phone canvassing, educational outreach.
Several of our state offices also do direct engagement with the business community to promote best practices on issues like chemical policy and waste management. Our New England offices (Rhode Island, Connecticut and Massachusetts) have been working for over a year with management at CVS Health on developing a safer chemical policy.
The Mind the Store program had been talking with CVS on this subject for a few years
3 Things I Learned Just by Showing Up
On March 31st this year, Clean Water Action and the Coalition for a Safe and Healthy CT, an advocacy group that aims to protect our children from toxic chemicals, held a press event to voice concerns over the use of recycled tire rubber as a ground cover in playgrounds and urge passing of the bill to ban its use. I saw firsthand the world in which the Coalition works and learned a few things about the legislative process, the science, and the impact of simply showing up to relay my concern. Here are three things I realized:
Showing up is actually not that hard to do. Driving into the CT stateIn Memoriam: Senator Ken Donnelly
On April 2 nd, Massachusetts lost a great leader and champion of justice and environmental health, Senator Ken Donnelly. Senator Donnelly was a firefighter of 37 years, former Secretary/Treasurer of the Professional Fire Fighters of Massachusetts and the Senator from Massachusetts’ Fourth Middlesex District since 2009. He died of brain cancer.
As a Senator, he was best known for his advocacy on behalf of the mentally ill, union workers, and homeless families. However, he also worked hard over the years to reduce children’s and workers’ exposure to toxic chemicals. This is the capacity in