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There Is a Better Way to Protect Ohio's Families and Communities
Ohio is rich and abundant with farmland, waters, and wildlife. Regardless of the season or region, we Ohioans enjoy a special relationship with our natural inheritance. We know that protecting our state's natural resources and beauty makes Ohio's economy stronger and our families healthier. From the hills in the southeast to the plains in the northwest, from Lake Erie to the Ohio River, the outdoors have always been important to our residents and civic leaders. Today, however, our state's treasured environment has been put at risk. Bush administration policies that weaken and ignore federal environmental safeguards are already harming our communities' health and our natural heritage. The Bush administration is allowing electric companies, chemical companies, coal companies, and other industries to weaken the laws and regulations that protect the health and safety of Ohio's families, allowing irresponsible corporations to benefit at our expense. The administration has allowed electric companies to build more outdated, polluting coal-fired power plants instead of requiring them to use modern technology to cut pollution, encouraging them to build cleaner facilities, or promoting their use of renewable energy sources like wind and solar power. The administration has reduced funding for programs that would encourage smart growth and decrease sprawl, shrunk federal funding for Ohio's water infrastructure, decreased the public's right to know when sewage fills their local waterways, and increased the risk of mercury poisoning for Ohio's women and children. The administration's undermining of our nation's most basic environmental protections leaves the people of Ohio exposed and vulnerable to increased amounts of asthma-triggering smog, development-retarding mercury, disease-ridden sewage, and other contaminants. In each case, the Bush administration's policies put Ohioans' communities at risk. This report documents the consequences of Bush administration actions—and lack of action—on the health and safety of families in Central Ohio communities. It also serves to remind us what we have learned over the last thirty years—that there is a better way; that we have the know-how and a successful track record cleaning up the pollution in our air and water and the poisons in our soil. But know-now, effective laws, and proven technological solutions are clearly not enough when the Bush administration is determined to let irresponsible corporations off the hook, weaken the standards that reduce pollution, and strip funding from the agencies responsible for enforcing environmental laws and the programs that encourage environmentally sound improvement. Only public pressure on decision-makers will ensure that the last three decades of progress is not lost, and that we continue to make our communities safe, protecting our children's legacy of clean air, water, and still-wild lands. Up to Top HOME | Email Signup | About Us | Contact Us | Terms of Use | © 2008 Sierra Club |
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