1998 ANNUAL REPORT

The Clean Air for Childrens’ Health Campaign

After defeating an attempt by industry to eliminate North Carolina’s regulations for toxic air pollution control in 1997, BREDL continued to organize communities with actual or proposed toxic air pollution industries and to oppose the deregulation of air pollution. In 1998 we also mobilized a new campaign to tighten air pollution regulation of large industries for the protection of pristine areas. Major accomplishments in 1998 were:

The path to clean air is paved with program and policy changes at the state and national levels. But without an actual reduction of pollution in communities where industrial plants are located, we cannot claim success. BREDL community organizers spent 90% of their time in 1998 working with groups of citizens, most of them new to the environmental movement. This year we organized four new groups in Polk, Rutherford, Macon, and Ashe counties in western North Carolina. These rural groups which have become BREDL chapters include Foothills Action Committee for the Environment (FACE), Rutherford Environmentalists Against Pollution (REAP), Neighbors Against the Cullasaja Asphalt Plant (NACAP), and Ashe Citizens Against Pollution (ACAP). BREDL staff services included campaign strategy sessions, technical assistance with permits, media training, assistance with fiscal management under our 501c3, and limitation of liability through joint incorporation. All four groups now have active local campaigns. ACAP has already won a one year moratorium on new asphalt plants in Ashe County by a majority vote of the county commission.

In 1997 our successful campaign against an asphalt plant in a residential area in Boone, NC resulted in a de facto statewide moratorium on new asphalt plant permits. But the asphalt and highway industries used their considerable clout in Raleigh and in March 1998 the moratorium was lifted. Soon after, the asphalt company re-applied for an identical permit on the same site. Citizens Against Pollution (CAP), which led the ‘97 campaign, again rallied people and other resources. Monthly events kept the issue in the public eye and meetings with state officials pressed them to justify the lifting of the moratorium. For example, CAP held a Clean Air Walk in downtown Boone on May 23rd. In June, public hearings in Boone were packed with citizens demanding extra-territorial zoning of the proposed plant site which lies outside the city limits. In July BREDL challenged the state with a request for a ruling on toxic emissions from asphalt plants. On August 8 Dr. Ravindra Nadkarni, author of two parts of the national Clean Air Act, testified against the air permit at a public hearing in Boone. In September BREDL staffer Lou Zeller presented new information about asphalt plant emissions to the state Environmental Management Commission. Finally, the state issued a permit which required a year of meteorological studies before the plant could open and which allowed local zoning to prevail. On December 14th CAP held a victory party at the firehouse in Deep Gap. However, BREDL and CAP remain vigilant.

In neighboring Avery County, Christmas Tree Capital of NC, citizens of Pineola tolerated asphalt plant pollution for years. After joining BREDL, Pineola Concerned Citizens waged a campaign to stop the poisoning of their village. Our joint efforts were rewarded on July 6 when the Avery County Commission voted unanimously for the asphalt plant’s immediate closure. The issue is now before the state Division of Air Quality.

In August the National Parks Conservation Association contacted BREDL about the pending expiration of Tennessee’s air quality agreement with the federal government. The memorandum of understanding (MOU) formalized procedures for new air pollution permits which negatively affect wilderness areas and public health with pollutants such as ozone. The Tennessee MOU required one more Appalachian state to sign by December 31st. We researched state files in Raleigh, found new information, developed factsheets, sent out action alerts via e-mail and snail-mail, organized letter-writing campaigns, contacted the media, and shared material with citizens groups in North Carolina and Tennessee. Industry lobby groups wanted no agreement, but we rallied hundreds of citizens in support of clean air at the October public hearings in Asheville and Raleigh. On December 22nd, NC Governor Jim Hunt signed the MOU, an important step towards better air pollution control.

The 1998 High Level Nuclear Waste Watch

The High Level Nuclear Waste Watch organizes transport route communities and raises awareness of community organizations, emergency personnel, civic leaders, and others about the dangers of nuclear waste transportation. We celebrated a major victory in 1998 when national legislation to ship waste to Nevada died with the adjournment of the 105th Congress.

However, the project took on new importance when we learned of the federal government’s plan to reprocess nuclear warhead plutonium into commercial nuclear power reactor fuel. The preferred site for fuel fabrication is Savannah River in South Carolina and southeastern utilities are vying for Department of Energy contracts. Weapons-grade plutonium now scattered across the nation would be transported to the southeast, made into fuel, and shipped back out to reactors.

BREDL attended hearings in South Carolina in August and learned more about the plan. In September we hosted a three-state tour with the Institute for Energy and Environmental Research. The tour included community meetings, editorial board meetings in Atlanta, Columbia, Augusta, and Asheville, and a speaking tour highlighted by the testimony of Martin Forwood and Janine Allis-Smith, anti-reprocessing activists who live near the Sellafield plant in Great Britain. On December 6th we hosted a regional grassroots strategy session in Greenville, SC which drew activists from three states and Washington, DC. At this meeting, plans for 1999 were combined into a coherent strategy to stop plutonium fuel.

The Family Farms Preservation Project

Farmers have always been an important part of our membership. The principle of land stewardship and the safeguarding of our rural way of life are an integral part of all our work. The onslaught of large corporate hog farms, intensive livestock operations (ILO’s), or concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFO’s) requires a formal alliance between rural environmentalists and small farmers. In 1998 North Carolina began a study of health effects from hog lagoon odor.

In January BREDL’s Swine Waste Action Team (SWAT) carried out its first full-scale direct action event. Displaying aerial photos of overflowing hog waste lagoons to prove that this failed method must be completely phased out, we held a press conference at the Charlotte hotel where the American Farm Bureau Federation was having its annual meeting. BREDL staff member Denise Lee took the photos, did the research, and called out the media. People whose homes are near hog factory lagoons attended the press conference and spoke about the intolerable conditions: the feces and urine in the creeks and the unhealthy organic compounds in the air. To punctuate the news, we flung a sixty foot long banner from the eighth floor of the hotel which said, “Don’t Hog Our Air and Water.”

In November we held a planning meeting in western NC where a new hog factory caused local farmers to form Citizens for Yadkin County’s Environment. We mapped out a plan for a hog lagoon odor study which will be presented to the NC Environmental Management Commission. The study will record the frequency, duration, and severity of hog lagoon odors based on CYCE’s observations.

The North Carolina Chip Mill Campaign

The history of resource extraction has left physical and economic scars across the Appalachian region from coal mines, gas wells, and forest clear-cuts. Chip mills are rapidly becoming a major threat to southeastern communities.

The two year North Carolina chip mill study began in 1998. BREDL’s goals are to force re-examination of the policies which subsidize chip mills in NC and to halt or slow the expansion of large-scale, satellite mills. Our principal allies in this campaign are small-scale logging operations, rural residents, and our Stokes county chapter, the Hickory Alliance. Together we organized a press conference and turnout for the state’s public meetings in Raleigh and Morganton in February. In July Janet Marsh Zeller led a long-range strategic campaign workshop and planning session for the Hickory Alliance whose members are now participating in the state study. Also, we are mobilizing groups in other western NC counties and investigating the impact of wood chip mills on rural communities.

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