Jan. 11—Time is of the essence.
That’s the message a group of environmental and community advocates sent Friday as they renewed calls for federal regulators to address what they say is a public health emergency near the Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. plant off 56th Street in Niagara Falls.
Echoing comments they made during a press conference in late December, representatives from the Clean Air Coalition of WNY, the Niagara Falls chapter of the NAACP and four other organizations encouraged the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to take immediate action at the site.
Advocates want the EPA to issue an emergency declaration that would require Goodyear to install new equipment that would reduce the amount of Ortho-Toluidine — a known carcinogen linked to incidences of bladder cancer among factory workers — being released into the air at the plant.
Their bid for EPA intervention is now being backed by a pair of new supporters, including the United Steelworkers union representing the plant’s 40 employees and Kelly Cloyd, a retired geologist who used to perform regulatory work for the state Department of Environmental Conservation.
“Our union has worked for decades to push Goodyear to enact common-sense health and safety protections against occupational exposure to Ortho-Toluidine, a known carcinogen,” United Steelworkers District 4 Director David Wasiura said in a statement. “Now, it’s past time for Goodyear to look beyond the walls of this facility and address the risks associated with possible Ortho-Toluidine exposure on the wider community. Up until this point, Goodyear has been willing to hide behind outdated federal regulations, but this is simply not good enough. Goodyear must reduce exposure to the lowest possible level — inside and outside the plant.”
Advocates went public last month with frustrations over what they described as the DEC’s failure to impose higher standards for the monitoring and release of O-T from Goodyear’s Falls facility. Their request for EPA intervention followed the public release of an aerial map produced by the DEC in September that showed roughly a half-mile area surrounding the plant being covered in what advocates described as a “cloud of toxic chemical emissions.”
On Nov. 27, the groups, led by the statewide environmental advocacy organization Don’t Waste New York, made a formal request to the EPA for the issuance of an emergency order under the Clean Air Act. Such orders are traditionally reserved for environmental concerns posing “imminent and substantial endangerment to public health.”
Ann Rabe, a spokesperson for Don’t Waste New York, said there’s no question the Goodyear plant poses an imminent threat to public health. She said it also meets another part of the criteria for an emergency order because the state’s lead regulatory agency, the DEC, has failed to address the problem for years.
In a statement issued Friday, a DEC spokesperson said the agency “takes seriously” its role in protecting the environment and public health and “will continue to work with our federal and New York state partners to ensure all facility emission requirements are backed by rigorously examined scientific methods.”
“New York State’s health-based emissions guidelines for ortho-toluidine are set at levels to protect the public from health effects and are more stringent than federal risk thresholds,” the DEC said in its statement. “Based on DEC’s review, and after consultation with the State Department of Health (DOH), the Goodyear facility permit’s emission limits are currently protective of the surrounding community’s air quality. Nevertheless, these emission limits will be further strengthened in the upcoming permit modification.”
Goodyear insists the Falls plant produces “low levels of ortho-toluidine emissions and that the company is in “full compliance” with its current permit for the facility.
“The DEC has updated its ambient air guidelines for ortho-toluidine going forward, and Goodyear is working closely with the agency to identify and implement any changes needed based on those new guidelines,” the company said in a statement. “Goodyear is committed to maintaining compliance with state regulatory and permitting requirements.”
Rabe said standards for O-T release changed in 2021 from 21 micrograms per cubic meter down to .02 micrograms per cubic meter, meaning the plant that was once allowed to release 5,000 pounds of the chemical per year can now legally release only 100 pounds per year under the new requirements.
Rabe said the DEC has failed — for four years and counting — to mandate that Goodyear change operations to ensure the plant operates under current emissions standards.
According to Rabe, an emergency order from the EPA would force the company to “immediately” install new equipment to temporarily reduce O-T emissions by as much as 90%. She suggested the first step in the process should be the installation of a condenser that costs less than $5,000 to reduce airflow.
Rabe said the DEC has failed to take advantage of another option at its disposal — a referral to the state attorney general’s Environmental Protection Bureau which could review plant operations to determine if Goodyear has committed any violations.
“Unfortunately, our state agency has broken the public trust,” Rabe said.
Cloyd, who worked as a geologist with Region 9 of the DEC, agreed.
While Goodyear’s air toxics permit expired in 2021 after 10 years of operation, Cloyd the DEC, under New York’s Administrative Procedures Act, has allowed the company to continue to operate the Falls facility under outdated emissions standards.
“It’s now been almost four years since that permit expired and the residents of that neighborhood are still, according to state DEC modeling, being exposed to excess concentrations,” Cloyd said.
Bridge Rauch from the Clean Air Coalition of WNY said what’s been happening at Goodyear in the Falls is a symptom of a larger problem statewide — plants operating for years with expired permits. Rauch said the DEC allows such facilities to continue operating amid a backlog of permit applications as long as they meet annual deadlines for submitting the necessary paperwork.
“These polluters are conducting these operations with these expired permits,” Rauch said.
Representatives from the advocacy groups are planning to discuss their concerns during a meeting scheduled for Tuesday with Lisa Garcia, regional administrator for the EPA’s Region 2 Office, which serves New York.
Renae Kimble, a former Niagara County legislator who serves as president of the Niagara Falls branch of the NAACP, credited staff from Congressman Kennedy’s office with helping to broker the meeting.
She said current conditions at Goodyear are not acceptable and should not be tolerated.
“We call on EPA to protect residents and workers of Niagara Falls immediately when nobody else will,” Kimble said.
Other elected officials representing the Falls, including Gov. Kathy Hochul whose office oversees the DEC, have remained mostly silent on the matter.
A spokesperson for Hochul referred questions about the Goodyear plant to the DEC, calling it an “enforcement matter” that falls under the agency’s responsibilities.
“We’re very, very disappointed that the governor’s DEC for four years has let this community in Niagara Falls live under a toxic cloud of a known carcinogen,” Rabe said.
Representatives from the advocacy groups said they briefed both Mayor Robert Restaino and Falls City Council Chairman Jim Perry on the matter. As of Friday afternoon, neither had taken formal steps to request intervention by the EPA.
A spokesperson for U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer, D-New York, issued a statement in response to questions from the newspaper. He did not indicate whether Schumer intends to encourage EPA officials to get involved.
“We are in contact with local environmental groups and workers to hear their concerns and will make sure their clean air concerns are heard by the EPA. Senator Schumer will always fight to protect the health and safety of Western New York’s residents,” spokesperson Ryan Martin said in the statement from Schumer’s office.
The office of U.S. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-New York, did not respond to multiple requests for comment from the newspaper.
Both the DEC and Goodyear have said that they are working on a plan to address community concerns about plant emissions. The DEC said it is taking steps to require Goodyear to implement “state-of-the-art” pollution control technology to meet current air toxics standards and Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act (CLCPA) disadvantaged community mandates. The DEC has not provided a firm timeline for when any such changes may be implemented.
“DEC’s ongoing oversight, including potential enforcement action, will ensure that the facility complies with all applicable environmental laws and protects public health,” the agency said in a statement. “If determined necessary, this will include requiring the expeditious installation of any additional emission control technologies.”
For Matteo Anello, brother of former Mayor Vince Anello, who has lived with his family in their home on 56th Street just east of the plant for decades, the changes can’t come soon enough.
While he does not want to see any of the plant’s 40 workers lose their jobs or for the plant to be shut down, Anello described the realization that he and his neighbors have been living under a plume of a cancer-causing chemical for years now as “wholly alarming.”
“The time has long passed to mitigate this problem,” he said.
Niagara Falls residents are invited to attend a community meeting about the Goodyear plant emissions that has been scheduled for 7 p.m. Jan. 30 at New Hope Baptist Church, 1122 Buffalo Ave., Niagara Falls.
The meeting is being hosted by New Hope Baptist Church, the Rev. Harvey L. Kelley, and a coalition of community organizations, including the NAACP Niagara Falls Branch, Clean Air Coalition of WNY, Don’t Waste NY, Sierra Club Niagara Group and the Interfaith Community Climate Center of WNY.