Dear Allies,
Here in New York, we are proud of our historic 2019 Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act (CLCPA), which requires state agencies to reduce greenhouse gasses (GHGs) and avoid disproportionate burdens from these and other pollutants on disadvantaged communities.
This law applies to development projects like the STAMP mega industrial site. But the NYS Department of Environmental Conservation (NYSDEC) and Empire State Development Corporation (ESD) are NOT following the law - even though NYSDEC last year confirmed that "the entire STAMP site is within a... Disadvantaged Community [DAC]” for purposes of the CLCPA.
How bad is it? The CLCPA prohibits state agencies from issuing permits that would disproportionately burden disadvantaged communities. But in March, DEC approved an air facility permit for Edwards Vacuum that allows the facility, which is currently under construction adjacent to the Tonawanda Seneca Nation, to release air pollutants including the GHGs NO2, CO2, CO, and SO2, as well as Hazardous Air Pollutants (HAPs) including triethylamine, cobalt 2-ethylhexanoate, formaldehyde, and naphthalene.
NYSDEC greenlighted these emissions without even following the CLCPA’s requirement to analyze existing and proposed burdens on the Nation. For its part, ESD has funneled over $100 million to STAMP for projects that would disproportionately burden the Nation, including infrastructure to service the Edwards Vacuum facility. This is just the kind of environmental injustice the CLCPA was designed to prevent.
In the words of Chief Roger Hill of the Tonawanda Seneca Nation, “The very idea of siting a new greenhouse-gas emitting industrial facility - with massive new truck and automobile volumes - adjacent to a disadvantaged rural Indigenous community on undeveloped farmland surrounded by ecologically sensitive protected areas runs counter to the letter and spirit of the CLCPA.”
Take action now! Use our simple automated tool below to email key decisionmakers. Demand that state agencies, elected officials, and corporate execs abide by our climate laws and respect the Tonawanda Seneca Nation. Together, we can stop this dangerous project.
In solidarity,
Allies of the Tonawanda Seneca Nation
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Allies of the Tonawanda Seneca Nation (ATSN) strives to uphold the inherent sovereignty of the Tonawanda Seneca Nation. We recognize and act in service to the leadership of their traditional government. Allies of the Tonawanda Seneca Nation acknowledges the historical and ongoing theft of the Nation’s unceded ancestral homelands, and works alongside the Nation and its citizens in support of the full rematriation of these lands.
