A coalition of environmental groups, including Downwinders at Risk, and Beyond Coal/Texas are planning a demonstration outside the Environmental Protection Agency’s Dallas headquarters at noon on Friday to call on federal officials to force Texas to enforce federal environmental air and water regulations. The plan calls for demonstrators to form a giant human SOS at Fountain Place that will be visible on Google satellite pictures.
They’re doing it because Texas is one of several states which have consistently ignored EPA regulations. According to Downwinder’s Jim Schermbeck, “DFW hasn’t complied with the Clean Air Act in over two decades, and if it’s up to Greg Abbott, we never will. He doesn’t even think smog is a problem in Texas.”
Note to Governor Abbott: Smog is a problem in Texas. Lots of people sick because of it.
In a press release about the event, organizers noted that “The Chief toxicologist for the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality – the state agency charged with cleaning-up the air — has argued with the EPA that smog in DFW isn’t harmful, even though there’s a vast scientific consensus on the dangers of bad air even at very low levels of exposure.”
“They’re not just climate change deniers in Austin,” said Schermbeck, “they’re smog-deniers.”
The event will run from noon-1 PM at 144 Ross, Fountain Place in Dallas, in front of the EPA’s Region 6 headquarters. Everyone welcome.
Smog deniers will be smog deniers, Repugs will be Repugs, half-wits will be half-wits, what’s new here? Dallas- Fort Worth has continued to violate our life-saving health laws for over 20 years but a mentally-retarded kid, who lives three houses up from me, has been laying in the Fort Worth jail-house for more than 3 1/2 weeks for not paying up on an ordinary anti-noise ordinance violation quickly enough to suit our powers that be. See anything wrong here? Does anyone figure maybe a few conventional, black-hearted, Repug Baggers could maybe be involved some way or another? You expect in some way, if they are called upon to answer for it, that we will hear from the Boss Hog, Tea-Bagging lady from Tanglewood with vodka on her breath? Do you figure things will ever change? Do you believe praying about it helps much? Think the rich get richer and the poor get poorer and it’s all in the great master-plan? Think maybe we should take some of the most stinking, greed-head, black-hearted rats, like those in Cleburne, fishing… far out at sea, or just have another beer? On the square, let’s figure this out. Surely, it’s past time?