Questions For Senator Booker and EJ Advocates At NJ Spotlight’s Roundtable On NJ’s “Landmark” EJ Law

Huge Flaws Render Scientifically Credible And Protective DEP Regulations Impossible

NJ Spotlight is holding a virtual roundtable on Friday afternoon, on what they call NJ’s “Landmark Environmental Justice Law”, to register, see:

• New Jersey’s landmark Environmental Justice Law: How Will It Work?

NJ’s US Senator Cory Booker is scheduled to make opening remarks, so I decided to register and see what he has to say.

I suspect that Booker’s political interests in EJ are similar to his interests and role in talking the lead sponsorship of “reforms” to the federal Toxic Substances Control Act enacted in 2016.

That role would be to co-opt and marginalize the activists, derail and weaken aggressive regulatory requirements, and put a fake veneer of progressive and black EJ cover on what will amount to protections for corporate polluters (something Booker has done before with his colleague NJ Senator Sweeney).

Upon registering for the event, I noted an opportunity to submit questions for the panelists, so I submitted the following: (which I guarantee will not be engaged, so I urge readers to submit similar questions):

The NJ EJ law does not apply to greenhouse gas emissions & climate adaptation

It also does not apply to “extraordinarily hazardous substances” (i.e. to facilities subject to NJ’s Toxic Catastrophe Prevention Act and federal Clean Air Act Sect. 112 Risk Management Planning requirements).

It also exempted contaminated sites & air pollution sources that emit less than 100 tons/per year (including industrial emissions of hazardous air pollutant (HAP)s, many of which are carcinogens and create unacceptable risks in far lesser quantities).

NJ DEP’s own prior “cumulative risk” research in Paterson NJ (funded by US EPA) found, among other things, that small air pollution sources, particularly HAP sources close to sensitive receptors (scientific jargon for vulnerable kids in daycares and schools), create unacceptable health risks and pollution “hot spots” (see:

• DEP Suppressing Study That Shows Breathing Air in Paterson is Hazardous to Your Health

In light of these flaws, how can DEP conduct scientifically credible cumulative impact, climate justice, and EJ reviews?

Maybe NJ US Senator Booker, who is making opening remarks, can answer them.

After all, Booker did such a great job in sponsoring “reforms” of the federal Toxic Substances Control Act, reforms that are working so well in Paulsboro, NJ, see:

• Once Again, DEP Gets A Pass, We Get Poisoned, And Polluters Continue To Evade Regulation And Dodge Huge Liability

I left out a whole bunch of other stuff.

For those interested in going into the weeds, see:

• An Open Letter To NJ’s Black, Poor, and Environmental Justice Communities – You Were Just Sold Out