DEAR EDITOR:

“We do not have to sacrifice people to have a prosperous and booming economy.”

This recent important statement from Michael Regan, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency administrator, should have come with the disclaimer “unless, of course, you live in East Palestine.”

It’s been over a year since the EPA willingly sat idly by when a murky decision was made to open-burn five rail cars of vinyl chloride. My guess is this was due to pressure from Norfolk Southern, as they wanted to get a busy rail corridor open again. But, we should not be left guessing. State and federal regulators need to come clean and explain why they allowed this risky open burn to happen.

Government officials should not be allowed to poison someone — let alone an entire region of people — on purpose. And yet, it happened at the oversight of elected leaders, speculative corporate representatives and poorly informed local officials.

My town is not the only town that has suffered from the toxic impacts of vinyl chloride, a known human carcinogen, that is used primarily to make PVC plastic. Nor will it be the last. A report published earlier this year found that, at any given moment, roughly three million Americans are at risk as trains carrying the dangerous plastic ingredient move around the country.

If you are interested in learning about what unfolded during the East Palestine train derailment and you haven’t read the June 2023 National Transportation Safety Board Docket, turn to “Group D, Exhibit 11 — Oxy Vinyls.” None of this information about the vent and burn being unnecessary is new; and as a generational community member in East Palestine, this is infuriating. The taxpayer-funded EPA should have stopped the open burn. Instead, the agency’s silence provided a blessing to proceed, deferring to corporate interests and leaving the region at risk.

That “prosperous and booming economy” Regan referenced comes at the expense of people who were in the path of the toxic plume that traveled through the region.

The EPA cannot continue to be silent in rooms where it has an obligation and responsibility to protect families from the dangers of vinyl chloride. It must act to ban vinyl chloride and prioritize people and the planet over industry profits.

JESS CONRAD

East Palestine