A New Jersey chapter of the international ironworkers union faces allegations of discrimination and fostering a racist work environment after a Black female ironworker filed a complaint alleging that Blacks and other minority workers were regularly given less-desirable, short-term assignments, while major construction projects including jobs at Newark Airport and the American Dream mall went to white workers.
Ironworkers Local 11 was hit on Tuesday with the first step in a civil rights complaint from the state Division on Civil Rights, which found probable cause after investigating the worker’s complaint.
“Today is truly a win for the communities along the Lower Hackensack — and we deserve to take a moment to celebrate!” said the Environmental Protection Agency’s Walter Mugdan, Wednesday. Environmental officials triumphantly added the Lower Hackensack River — 19 miles of waterway — as Jersey’s newest federal Superfund site, number 115.
Making it onto the EPA’s Superfund National Priorities List unlocks the federal toolbox and funding required to clean up the thick gumbo of toxic sediment that’s befouled the river bottom. “I was convinced that the only way this river was ever gonna get cleaned up was to unleash the almighty power of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. They know how to do this work,” noted Riverkeeper Captain Billy Sheehan.
But rehabbing the Hackensack won’t be easy. It could cost $2 billion to $3 billion and take 20 years. For decades no fewer than six Superfund sites along the waterway dumped or leached arsenic, lead, mercury, and cancer-causing chemicals like PCBs into the river, and landfills dotted the landscape. Particles get eaten by wildlife — like crabs and fish. Signs warn folks not to eat their catch — but many ignore the advisory. “We counsel them not to do it — because it is dangerous. But we know that they do it anyhow. So that makes it even more urgent that we clean up these rivers,” Mugdan said.
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The cost of heating a house with natural gas is rising sharply this winter, ranging from $21 a month to as much as $31 per month, depending on which of the state’s four gas utilities supply the fuel.
In unanimously approving the provisional increases that are effective next month, New Jersey Board of Public Utilities commissioners blamed global geopolitical events for the spike without mentioning the obvious — the Russian invasion of the Ukraine and its cutoff of most gas supplies to western Europe.
Higher commodity prices also factored into why customers will pay more, as did increases in transmission costs on interstate pipelines. The four utilities do not make a profit on purchasing gas, only on delivering it to customers through their local distribution systems.
Timing is everything
Nevertheless, the higher bills come at a time when consumers are paying more for food, gasoline, and other energy bills
“These steep increases are really going to hurt,’’ said Eveyn Liebman, an associate director of AARP in New Jersey, citing higher inflation and higher cost of living in the state. “This is only going to make life worse for people already facing hard times.’’
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A woman buys ice cream ahead of a heat wave in downtown Chicago, the United States, on June 14, 2022. Credit: Vincent D. Johnson/Xinhua via Getty Images
By Keely Brewer, The Daily Memphian, and Eva Tesfaye, Harvest Public Media
Within the next 30 years, 107 million people—mostly in the central U.S.—are expected to experience temperatures exceeding 125 degrees, a threshold that the National Weather Service categorizes as “Extreme Danger.” That’s 13 times more than the current population experiencing extreme heat.
The hottest cities, according to the study, will be Kansas City, Missouri.; St. Louis; Memphis, Tennessee; Tulsa, Oklahoma; and Chicago.
“This is… really off the charts of the scales that we’ve developed to measure these kinds of things,” said Bradley Wilson, the director of research and development at First Street Foundation, the New York-based climate research nonprofit that developed the model.
Temperatures are expected to increase by 2.5 degrees over the next three decades. Warmer air retains water, creating more humid conditions and compounding heat indexes.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has found that human activity, in particular fossil fuel emissions, has warmed the climate at an unprecedented rate in at least the last 2,000 years.
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White flight beginning in the 1970s drove onetime Jackson residents into neighboring areas. The city’s decline since then has prompted better-off Black residents to escape Jackson’s failing infrastructure, not just water but also roads and schools. The more recent departures further eroded the city’s tax base, lessening its ability to afford repairs or apply for federal money as its infrastructure crumbled.
JACKSON, Miss. — Alecia McCarty awakens every morning wondering whether water will flow from her tap, and if it will be drinkable.
Earlier last week, her water was tea-colored before it sputtered and shut off. On Saturday it flowed fast and clear, but McCarty still couldn’t drink it from the tap under city orders.
She and her children, age 10 and 11, have had to brush their teeth with bottled water, then spend time refilling the family supply at two water distributions at nearby churches. They have used a garden hose daily to fill four buckets of water to run the toilet.
McCarty, 35, works as a caregiver to a bedridden elderly woman in the nearby town of Madison, which like most areas surrounding Jackson was unscathed, thanks to its newer water system.
“They don’t have water problems,” she said. “They don’t have any of these problems.”
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PHILADELPHIA (September 1, 2022) — Keystone Automotive, a vehicle parts distributor with headquarters in Exeter, Pennsylvania, will pay a $2.5 million penalty for allegedly selling aftermarket devices that were designed to defeat the emissions control systems on cars and trucks, the U.S Environmental Protection Agency announced today.
The company’s actions allegedly violated the Clean Air Act’s prohibition on the sale of so-called “defeat devices,” which are designed to “bypass, defeat or render inoperative” a motor vehicle engine’s air pollution control equipment or systems.
This enforcement action is part of EPA’s National Compliance Initiative for Stopping Aftermarket Defeat Devices for Vehicles and Engines. The Keystone settlement, at $2.5 million, is the third largest civil penalty settlement nationwide for aftermarket defeat device cases.
Today’s vehicles emit far less pollution than vehicles of the past. This is made possible by careful engine calibrations, and the use of filters and catalysts in the exhaust system. Aftermarket defeat devices undo this progress and pollute the air we breathe. EPA testing has shown that a vehicle’s emissions can increase drastically (tens or hundreds of times, depending on the pollutant) when its emissions controls are removed.
“The EPA will not tolerate violations like this,” said EPA Mid-Atlantic Regional Administrator Adam Ortiz. “This settlement will also send a message that we will crack down on companies selling illegal products that make our air quality and health worse.”
According to the company’s website, Keystone is “the leading distributor and marketer of aftermarket automotive equipment and accessories in North America” and has “grown from a single auto parts store to become the largest warehouse distributor” in the industry. Overall, the company was cited for 15,621 violations.
When installed on motor vehicles, the 44 types of aftermarket automotive parts sold by Keystone created potential harm to human health by defeating controls on emissions of particulate matter and ozone which are linked to a number of health effects as well as premature death.
The practice of tampering with vehicles by installing defeat devices can enable large emissions of nitrogen oxides (NOx) and particulate matter, both of which contribute to serious health problems in the United States. These include premature mortality, aggravation of respiratory and cardiovascular disease, aggravation of existing asthma, acute respiratory symptoms, chronic bronchitis, and decreased lung function
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