Justice for all

By KRISTA WILSON

TUESDAY, SEPT. 16 – Nearly 150 people from across the state recently attended a summit in the name of justice – environmental justice.

“Unfinished Business: Environmental Justice in Michigan” was held last Friday to raise awareness about low-income and often minority communities that are being exposed to greater amounts of pollution than other areas. It was hosted at Union Missionary Baptist Church.

Consider the environmental justice movement as a fusion of the ‘go green’ concept and the civil rights movement.

Organizer Kyle Whyte said, “It feels good to hear a lot of the people’s testimony and we can all work together to make a change.”

Pollution is everywhere, Whyte said.

But, “Communities that are most impacted, though, are urban neighborhoods and indigenous people because citizens with lower income don’t always have access to the political processes and decision-making,” he continued. “Indigenous people are not active in the political process because they live by the land and nature.”

The result is a continued cycle of poverty, poor health and blight.

Poor air quality and water quality and pollution “makes it impossible for the community to grow,” said Whyte, “It is less likely people will want to say there and the youth early on will not have respect for their own community.”  

Whyte said the way to address the problem is through the government so that existing policies will be changed. The communities that are being impacted most have to speak up.

“Citizens can make a difference through democratic action because that is where the influence comes from,” he said.

Whyte, 35, of Lansing, is a professor of philosophy of environmental science and policy at Michigan State University

He said he became passionate about the issue because of his Native American heritage. He said his family has lineage in the Potawatomi tribe, which originated in the Great Lakes region but was forced West in the 19th Century. Many of the uprooted indigenous tribe died enroute to what is now Oklahoma. Dislodged from the region and lifestyle they were accustomed to, the tribe was negatively impacted physically and culturally by the change of their environment.

Michael Depa, a toxicologist with the state Department of Environmental Quality, said, “Possible environmental problems in the Lansing community could be due to the coal-fired power plant.”

In a later interview via email, Depa explained: “Air emissions of carbon dioxide (greenhouse gas) and mercury which is a neurotoxin causes birth defects when women eat contaminated fish (fish get mercury from air deposition from coal-fired power emissions).”  

Alisha Winters, 33, of River Rouge, was a speaker at the event.

The Sierra Club member is a mother of seven, two of whom have asthma.

Winters said, “The people of the area I reside in, 48217, have high levels of cancer, birth defects, asthma, and neurological problems because of the pollution in my community.”

She said her community has significant air pollution from local industrial operations.

Pamela Smith, 43, owner of Regeneration LLC in Saginaw says her background in chemical engineering and environmental engineering sparked her interest in helping the environment.

Smith said it’s important to “be the voice for those who don’t always have influence.”