Letter to the editor:

The people have spoken. Will the EPA listen?

Now that the public comment period has closed on the proposal to roll back the Endangerment Finding—the scientific determination that greenhouse gases threaten public health—the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency faces a choice: side with the people of Michigan or side with polluters.

For years, our summers have been increasingly marred by a haze of wildfire smoke — a stark reminder of climate change that chokes our skies and our lungs. This finding has been the basis of key clean air protections for nearly 20 years, upheld by the Supreme Court. It is the essential tool that empowers the EPA to restrict the pollutants driving climate change. Weakening it would ignore decades of scientific consensus, putting polluters ahead of the health of our children, seniors, and communities.

The American Lung Association warns this would be a “dangerous setback for health.” For Michigan, repealing this finding means more lung-searing ozone pollution and more intense wildfires filling our air with smoke. It directly leads to more asthma attacks and premature deaths.

Beyond air quality, these climate impacts fuel more extreme weather across our state, causing unpredictable floods that overwhelm our sewers, longer droughts that threaten farm yields and stronger windstorms that cause widespread power outages. 

The EPA has a responsibility to protect all Americans from escalating climate threats. Thousands of Michiganders have spoken. I now urge Administrator Zeldin to listen to the public, heed the science and abandon this dangerous effort to weaken the Endangerment Finding. Our health and well-being must come first.

 Liz Busch
Mount Pleasant city commissioner