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Is someone planning a 50-megawatt power plant in your backyard?
If you
live in Meriden or certain parts of Southington or
Wallingford, there's a better chance you'll hear about it
now that a new law creating Environmental Justice
Communities has taken effect.
The regulation, which took effect Jan. 1, designates a
number of cities and portions of suburban towns as
Environmental Justice Communities. The entire city of
Meriden has been so designated, as have neighborhoods in
Wallingford and Southington.
Meriden already was considered a distressed municipality
by the federal Housing and Urban Development Department,
and the other two towns have a U.S. Census block in which
30 percent of residents have incomes below 200 percent of
the federal poverty line.
Under the new law, anyone proposing a major
pollution-generating facility in one of those communities
would have to provide extensive notice to the affected
neighborhoods. A developer, for instance, would have to
file a public participation plan, hold an informal public
meeting and print a quarter-page notice in the newspaper
announcing the meeting, before receiving approval from the
state Siting Council or Environmental Protection
Department, which regulate the location of such
facilities.
"It's a way of making sure the communities that are the
most vulnerable have knowledge and a say about what
happens when there is a proposed new or expanding major
polluting facility," said Mark Mitchell, president of the
Connecticut Coalition for Environmental Justice, which
lobbied for the law for the last five years.
The new law, which passed during the 2008 legislative
session and was signed by Gov. M. Jodi Rell, is the first
of its kind in the country, he said.
The concept behind environmental justice, Mitchell said,
is that low-income communities and communities of color
"bear a disproportionate burden" of environmental hazards.
Such communities, he said, do not have the same political
power and access to information as affluent communities.
Upper-income neighborhoods are also home to lawyers and
other professionals who are savvy at mounting a campaign
against a potential project.
The new law does not stop at public notice. It also
requires the project's developer to negotiate with the
town or city's chief elected official on the need to
provide an environmental benefit to offset pollution. A
company building a major power plant, for example, could
be asked to retrofit buses with energy efficiency
equipment to offset its own pollution.
When it was first considered, the law would have applied
to only a handful of cities, but state Rep. Mary M.
Mushinsky, D-Wallingford, said she pushed for the
inclusion of an area in Wallingford which is home to
several industrial uses, and other suburban neighborhoods.
"I had made that point to them that it's not always an old
urban minority community," she said. "Sometimes it's an
old urban neighborhood" in a suburban town.
The environmental justice neighborhood in Wallingford
extends near South Colony Street, near the sewage
treatment plant, two power generating stations,
Thermo-Spas and the regional waste-to-energy plant.
Mushinsky, who lives in the neighborhood, said the area
has carried more than its share of large industrial
facilities and will benefit from the new law, which would
give the public more power over any future project.
Meriden Council of Neighborhoods President David Swedock
said he likes the way the law will get residents involved
in their communities.
"I can see how it's going to be a hassle for someone who
wants to accomplish something commercially," he said,
"but, to tell you the truth, I kind of like the concept of
the community, especially people in the area, getting
involved."
State Rep. Mary Fritz, D-Wallingford, said the law will
provide more public notice in a world where many projects
slip by without public scrutiny.
"I think the more the public is informed the better off we
all are," she said. "Sometimes things happen in
communities and no one seems to know how they got there."
gmoore@record-journal.com
(203) 317-2275
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