Starting in Alaska’s Tongass National Forest, the Trump administration is proposing to eliminate long-standing rules protecting 50 million acres of ancient forests across the country from logging and roadbuilding, raising new alarms about the president’s disregard for the climate and wildlife.
Taxpayers, already spending billions to keep Alaska’s timber industry afloat, could end up paying even more. If Trump strips roadless protection from the Tongass, no National Forest is safe. FULL STORY
November 20, 2018 Part 1 in a series
Images of the Tongass Rainforest
SUPPORT CASCADIA TIMES
HELP US INVESTIGATE THREATS
TO CASCADIA’S FRAGILE ENVIRONMENT
By PAUL KOBERSTEIN and JESSICA APPLEGATE
Photographs by SARAH CLARK
May 6, 2018 Part 1
People in The Dalles, Ore., say their air is being poisoned by a company that uses creosote to make railroad ties. Some say they are crazy, but a bevy of court documents and medical studies back them up.
Last week, a federal health agency issued a skeptical report casting official doubt on their claims, saying “no apparent public health hazard existed.” But some say its report was marred by outdated and missing data. Plus the agency failed to talk to any of the victims.
Over the last decade, the courts have ordered the creosote industry to pay billions of dollars for personal injuries and environmental damage, including the biggest bankruptcy settlement in EPA history. But in a simple twist of fate, The Dalles got nothing out of these deals.
Why was The Dalles left out? And why are its residents still being poisoned?
May 14, 2018 Part 2
Meet the polluter in The Dalles, Ore., who thinks its toxic air emissions data are none of your business.
May 30, 2018 Part 3
Protecting the environment is a game of numbers.
The state’s new Cleaner Air Oregon program will soon decide such things as how much toxic air pollution each industry should be allowed to emit. It will also decide how much toxic pollution people can inhale harming their health.
Unfortunately, Cleaner Air Oregon is about to dial-in a number that protects industry more than people. This number has been skewed to provide more protection for white people than African-Americans.
July 27, 2018 Part 4
Four Indian nations in the Columbia Basin -- each with treaty rights to Columbia River fish -- are calling on the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality to launch a “comprehensive investigation” into dioxin contamination at a Union Pacific-owned Superfund site in The Dalles.
In 1991, DEQ scientists found dioxin, industry’s most dangerous pollutant, in the soil at the heavily contaminated site, where railroad ties were treated with creosote and other chemicals. The waste also included high levels of pentachlorophenol, a pesticide laced with dioxin, as well as arsenic and naphthalene.
For 34 years, the plant pumped these untreated toxic wastes directly into the nearby Columbia River, contaminating more than an acre of river sediments as far as 300 feet from shore.
Studies show several species of Columbia River fish caught downstream from The Dalles are contaminated with dioxin. Did dioxin in the fish come from the Union Pacific Superfund site? No one knows.
But we do know that after finding dioxin contamination long ago in just one location near the plant, DEQ never bothered to look for it any further.
FROM THE CASCADIA TIMES ARCHIVES
Cascadia times magazine
Twenty years ago, Cascadia Times sued the Oregon DEQ for the release of public records showing massive air pollution from oil terminals in Northwest Portland. Seven oil companies joined the DEQ in the fight against our suit.
In a ruling by the Oregon Attorney General in April 1998, they lost. The public's right to know what's in the air won.
It was a landmark decision that affirmed that industry could no longer claim that pollution records are confidential business secrets. And the fight for clean air in Oregon was born.