A coalition of community organizations teamed up in Oregon to force a chronic polluter out of business, and bring environmental justice to a nearby neighborhood.

The groups, known as the West Eugene Community Coalition, used community engagement, education and pressure from regulatory agencies to force the J.H. Baxter Company to close.

Residents of the West Eugene neighborhood say for years, the wood-processing mill dumped cancer-causing chemicals into their air and the soil.

Lin Woodrich is co-chair of the Active Bethel Community. Woodrich helped organize neighbors to pressure the company to do soil tests, but many residents were afraid to participate.

She said company officials didn't treat them as people.

"They talked about us as data, and I kept explaining that these are people," said Woodrich. "These aren't data. These are people with homes and families and the poisoning that's going on. We need to find out, really, what is going on."

Baxter & Co. was a lumber-treatment facility that operated in West Eugene for more than 70 years. It finally closed its doors in January after pressure from state officials and numerous complaints of unbearable smells related to pesticides, creosote and petroleum products.

Woodrich said company officials tried to intimidate the homeowners in the low-income neighborhood with letters written by lawyers announcing soil tests, and the official-sounding text frightened many away from participating.

She said the groups sprung into action, going door-to-door to organize neighbors to pressure state officials to deal with Baxter.

"There's no question about it that my group going out," said Woodrich, "we had our vests on, our official volunteer vests. I had a flyer, and we made sure that they understood how important it was. I definitely think that we made a difference."

Several other groups and organizations helped the coalition through the hearings. Rebeka Dawit is an attorney with the Crag Law Center.

She said she and others provided legal guidance to the groups to help them though the bureaucratic maze and reach their goals. She said that can be a daunting process.

"The clean-up process or the accountability process doesn't just kind of go through bureaucratic administrative processes that doesn't include the public or doesn't involve information that empowers community members that are directly affected," said Dawit.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission approved a plan extending a natural-gas pipeline in Virginia. The Virginia Reliability Plan and Transcot's CEC project calls for compressor stations and a natural-gas pipeline extension in communities already harmed by these impacts such as Petersburg.

The city ranked as the least healthy according to the University of Wisconsin's County Health Rankings and Roadmaps.

Tim Cywinski, communications director with the Sierra Club's Virginia Chapter, said projects like this undermine the state's climate progress.

"Whether it's a natural-gas pipeline that's doubling the size and diameter or a proposal to build a 'peaker plant' in Chesterfield, Virginia," he said. "All of these go against Virginia's goals, specifically since we're the last stronghold in the South that has any kind of climate commitment."

He said the state can't reach its climate goals and uphold environmental justice if projects like the VRP continue to be approved.

The project's Environmental Impact Statement is explicit on the determinants this project poses, but, Cywinski said Petersburg is a "sacrifice zone." This is an area where fossil-fuel companies already have an approved project and go there for a new project since the area's already facing environmental impacts.

Feedback to the project has been particularly negative. Numerous community and environmental groups voiced their opposition, and Cywinski said policymakers need to understand the importance in plans like this not being implemented.

"It's not unreasonable for us to expect our decision makers to implement a policy where protecting people from pollution is the floor -- not some negotiation up to the ceiling, the floor," he continued. "And, I think people, as the climate issue becomes more apparent, as people see more of the impacts of pollution, that this type of opposition is becoming more and more regular."

While some could get the misconception Virginia is pulling away from its climate goals, Cywinski said the opposite is true. He feels Gov. Glenn Youngkin and some legislators are working to blunt the state's climate goals.

In a new report, a coalition of New York environmental groups said dredging the Hudson River of toxic chemicals has failed.

The report by Friends of a Clean Hudson River showed PCB chemical levels are higher than anticipated. The Environmental Protection Agency dredged the river between 2009 and 2015 for 30 years worth of chemicals General Electric dumped into it.

Ned Sullivan, president of Scenic Hudson, said while dredging is typically an effective way to clean pollutants out of a river, the EPA's effort was ineffective.

"The problem is that EPA struck a deal with GE that was too much in favor of the polluter," Sullivan contended. "They didn't require GE to clean up enough contamination."

Other federal agencies noted this. A 2015 report found GE did not do enough dredging, and the EPA did not force the company to do more.

Sullivan argued the first step to true remediation is having the EPA admit the finding was correct, and prepare for more extensive dredging.

Some 200 miles of the Hudson River are considered a Superfund site due to the high amount of contamination, and 40 miles of the Upper Hudson are GE's responsibility. Friends of a Clean Hudson River's assessment contended current sediment recovery rates are unlikely to allow fish to recover naturally.

Sullivan noted the effects it would have.

"PCBs are a forever chemical, they don't naturally break down in the environment," Sullivan stressed. "And as you move up the food chain to other wildlife that consumes fish, as well as humans, the PCBs become more and more concentrated at every level in the food chain."

The EPA has warned against eating fish caught in the river between Troy and Hudson Falls, but people still do.

Sullivan emphasized PCBs are here to stay unless more is done. He said other parts of the river also need to be monitored, since they are just as toxic as the dredged area.

"We've called on EPA to require a formal investigation of the Lower Hudson, 160 miles below the Troy Dam, where no remediation has been done," Sullivan pointed out. "We know there is additional contamination because the fish in that Lower Hudson remain unsafe to eat."

GE implemented two of three sediment collection programs this year. A third program, which includes deeper sediment sample collection, starts in 2024.


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Washington state's Climate Commitment Act promised funds for communities on the front lines of climate change. One group is tracking those dollars to make sure the state follows through.

Passed in 2021, the CCA is the state's carbon cap-and-trade program - with at least 35% of the revenue it generates committed to "Vulnerable Populations within Overburdened Communities."

However, an analysis by the nonprofit Front and Centered found less than 7% of revenue in the current budget met this requirement.

Guillermo Rogel, legislative and government relations advocate with Front and Centered, said the group is looking at the state's investment in areas like transportation.

"Some communities are able to afford increased access to public transit, some are not," said Rogel, "and that's what CCA investments could be used for. So, it's just an example of what we want to see."

Rogel noted that it's still early in the process of distributing funds from the CCA. Revenue generated by the program has reached nearly $1.5 billion so far, in its first year of carbon auctions.

Rogel said the 2024 legislative session should give lawmakers an opportunity to ensure frontline communities are prioritized.

"We'll be asking the Legislature take a look at their budget, see what in their budget is explicitly dedicated to overburdened communities," said Rogel, "where we can be a little bit more clear, and where we could really make sure that the intent and the spirit of bills, like the HEAL Act and the environmental justice provisions of the CCA, are met."

Also passed in 2021, the HEAL or Healthy Environment for All Act aims to ensure communities affected the most by climate change are prioritized as well.

It requires seven state agencies to direct 40% of their grants and expenditures to these communities.




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