Cherokee Concerned Citizens
Cherokee Concerned Citizens
Our Story
Our neighborhood is located in Pascagoula, Mississippi near Bayou Casotte and the Gulf of Mexico. To the east of us, are several large polluting facilities. There is some debate about who came first, industry or residents, but regardless of which is true both have expanded together over the last fifty years with one side of the street zoned as heavy industrial and the other residential.
The following timeline is our account of the last eight years. It is by no means meant to be comprehensive and may not be complete. We decided to publish the site before we finished the timeline. We have done our best to document issues and our efforts to address them. A lot of our efforts have been met with resistance, deflection, stall tactics, and outright dismissal by the polluting facilities, elected leaders and regulatory agencies. It should be noted that even though our organization officially formed in 2013, people have been aware of and complaining about the threats these polluting industries pose to residents and the environment for many, many years. If you live on the Mississippi Gulf Coast, you may not be aware of all the dangers of industrial pollution, but you certainly know about that "Pascagoula smell."
The timeline starts with the most recent and works backwards to our first official meeting. It includes all of the significant incidents and activities and provides some context especially for folks that are not familiar with environmental justice campaigns. While we did include times where we reported odors, noise, and/or dust to the Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality (MDEQ) or other agencies and public officials, we did not list them all nor do we always report them to MDEQ. It has been quite a challenge fighting against these powerful corporations and the elected officials and agencies that put corporate profits over the interests of public health. The burden of proof is on us. We are a community that in addition to full-time jobs and care taking responsibilities experiences chronic health issues and stress related to industrial pollution. We are expected to make the case that industry is in fact responsible for our health and nuisance issues to agencies and elected leaders who consistently placate, minimize and/or ignore our lived experiences and community science.
Pictured in the upper left is our neighborhood and to the right is just a snapshot of the nearby facilities. The space these facilities occupy is significantly larger than the nearby residential communities.
Check back for the latest stories
February 8, 2020: Cherokee Concerned Citizens joins coalition petitioning EPA about phosphogypsum stacks and process wastewater
The pictures are google images of the phosphosypsum piles located near us. They are byproducts of Mississippi Phosphates operation. Each of the radioactive, hazardous waste piles are larger than our neighborhood. The green coloring indicates the waste water that is currently contained within site.
Story coming soon.
July 8, 2020 - February 9, 2021: VT Halter Permit & Permit Board Hearing
We received an email that MDEQ has completed the draft Title V permit for VT Halter Marine. MDEQ has delegated regulatory authority over the permitting process required as part of the Clean Air and Water Acts among others. The EPA is also involved approving each permit. In reality, however, given the sheer number of permits they are responsible for, we learned that the EPA only actually reads a small percentage of draft (don't quote me but it is something like less that 5%), and that the best way to get their attention is to submit a public comment. In fact, we were told the best way to address the issues we were facing was to engage in the permitting process. Though we have and continue to do so, we don't agree that this process actually protects residents, the environment, or public health.
Like all Title V permitted agencies, VT Halter submitted an application for renewal at least six months before the permit expired. All permits are officially authorized for five years. After the five years, MDEQ is required to reissue a draft permit in which the public is able to submit comments. VT Halter's permit has been expired for seven years. We have been expecting MDEQ to release the draft permit for six years. So we finally get the email with the public notice in the summer of 2020.
We submitted our comments and received a response from MDEQ. No significant changes to the permit were made as a result of our comments.
The challenge we have found with submitting public comments is the technical expertise that is needed to understand and make recommendations. There is a great resource, The Proof Is In The Permit, that we were given during a training held by MDEQ that has been helpful, but it doesn't help with all the technical language. In fact, our conversations with permit writers have revealed that they don't even always understand all the laws and technical jargon (more on that later).
So communities are at a huge disadvantage when making comments, especially since comments regarding health concerns don't translate into specific regulatory changes. We have learned a lot about the disconnect between protecting public health and regulating polluting industries that threaten public health. If you read through the timeline or jump down to our meeting with MDEQ to ask that they do air testing in our neighborhood, you will get a better idea of what we are talking about here.
On February 9, 2021, MDEQ permit board voted to approve VT Halter permit.
This was the first time we have been invited to participate in a permit board meeting. We drove to Jackson to attend. We were able to coordinate a in-person review of public records for the same day. We were not quite sure what to expect except but we suspected the board would approve the permit. This point was made clear to us in 2014 when MDEQ staff laughed at the idea that a permit could be denied to a facility no matter how egregious their violations. YES - THEY LAUGHED!
We asked the permit board to consider the following before approving the permit:
We asked the permit board to postpone approval of the permit because we had reason to believe that VT Halter's Title V permit should also include Halter Marine. There is confusion about whether Halter Marine and VT Halter should be considered as one operation and thus, share one Title V air permit. VT Halter and Halter Marine are located in very close proximity to each other -operating side by side. Both companies fall under the umbrella of the same parent corporation, ST Engineering. VT Halter is classified as a shipbuilding and repair operation and has been operating as such for many years. ST Engineering purchased the property next door in 2016. The site formally owned by Signal International , World Marine, and most recently Vision Technology is classified as an operation that manufactures equipment for oil, gas, and offshore drilling. The site has been operating as such for many years even as ownership has changed. However, we have reason to believe when ST Engineering took it over, the company expanded its operations to also include shipbuilding.
On October 9th 2020, we reported to MDEQ fugitive emissions coming off the Halter Dry Dock from ship sandblasting. We were told that this dry dock was owned by Halter Marine and not VT Halter. This was news to us because the area had always belonged to VT Halter. We pointed out that if the site actually belonged to Halter Marine that these two companies should be considered one because of EPA memo that explained that two companies should be operating under one permit if they 1) have the same parent company; 2) are located in close proximity; 3) and carry out the same operations. MDEQ responded that Halter Marine is not doing any shipbuilding. This is the kind of run around we get all the time when engaging with industry and MDEQ.
What is the reason for the confusion? We believe that first pointing fingers at the other guy polluting is a common practice. "It is not us; it is [insert name of another industry] doing it." Sometimes it is true. It is in fact difficult to know who is responsible for what when there are so many industries releasing pollution into the air and water. Secondly, if Halter Marine operates as a separate company, it will not have to comply with additional legal requirements associated with a PSD major source that VT Halter is classified as because of the amount of pollution it releases annually.
We also asked the permit board to modify the permit to require VT Halter to monitor releases (PM & VOCs) by putting air monitors in the neighborhood and/or at the property fenceline. All companies are legally allowed to regulate themselves. They are required to report violations. The other mechanisms in place to enforce the law are periodic inspections by MDEQ and citizen reports. These inspections happen usually once a year. MDEQ reports that they do surprise visits, but we have been told by workers that they are not generally surprise visits. The problem with citizen reports is that by the time MDEQ comes to verify the report, the activity has stopped. Industries are often taken for their word, but residents, on the other hand, are required to be scientific investigators and document evidence that shows clear and substantial violations. Even then, our science can and has been discredited because they say we are not scientists. See section below about our citizen science projects.
Additionally, in our experience it has taken years before MDEQ takes a complaint seriously. In the case of VT Halter, for example, residents were complaining for years before MDEQ took a dust sample from the vehicle of one our residents that confirmed the content as Black Beauty, a toxic material used by VT Halter. It then took nearly one year before MDEQ took corrective action (evidence will provided below as we continue to build out this timeline).
We believe that specific air monitors that measure particulate matter and VOCs, take measurements often or continuously, and are strategically placed in the neighborhood will alleviate the burden on residents to continuously and timely report violations to MDEQ.
MDEQ argued that they didn't think they could require air monitoring and that VT Halter is currently in compliance. While there are legal limits to the kinds of actions MDEQ can enforce, we believe if they can force VT Halter to build and use an enclosure, it was within their ability to impose air monitoring. Also, the Chevron in Pascagoula is required to do fence line monitoring for benzene as a result of a lawsuit brought against the company in California. This requirement is part of their permit.
MDEQ claimed VT Halter was in compliance and that no one in the neighborhood has complained since the use of the new enclosure in late 2018 despite the fact that the community has complained and 30 people in the neighborhood testified to having "dust" (the same stuff they have had on their property for years) on their property in the last six months. Their signatures were submitted for the public record as part of the public comment period and before the permit board hearing.
January 23rd, 2021: Cherokee Subdivision Health Surveys
In 2019, we worked with Dr. Wilma Subra and USM student volunteers to collect health surveys. Over the course of six months, we collected 80 surveys accounting for over one third of all residents of Cherokee subdivision. Dr. Subra analyzed the health surveys for us free of charge. We received the report in January 2021. Dr. Subra concluded the report stating,
"The acute (short term exposure) and chronic (long term exposure) health impacts associated with the 70 chemicals released by the industrial facilities into the air, match the health impacts reported by community members in the survey as a result of exposure to odor events and in addition to the odor events. The cumulative impacts to community members inhaling the chemicals released into the air in the area, add to the negative health impacts experienced by community members."
47.5% of people surveyed considered themselves sick.
***Nine people who identified as healthy also report getting sick at least one time a week, and only seven reported being healthy and rarely get sick.
97% of people surveyed reported industrial odors at a frequency of 2 - 30 days a month with an average of 22.8
***Sixty-nine (86.25%) people report getting sick as a result of the odors. Symptoms include headaches, nausea, sinus, burning eyes, burning nose, trouble breathing, reflux, itchy eyes, skin, throat, burning throat, cough, dizziness, sleeplessness, weakness, stuffy nose, and ringing in the ears.
Nine reported having cancer.
***Over the course of our organizing, we have learned of at least 35 people that have lived in the neighborhood that have, had, or died from cancer. There is one row of houses that never rebuilt after Katrina where at least one person in each house was diagnosed with cancer. This street is also the closet street to the nearest facility.
October 3rd, 2020: Southwings Aerial Flight of Bayou Casotte
Southwings reached out to us and offered their services for aerial flights over Bayou Casotte Industrial Parkway. On October 3rd, a volunteer pilot flew over VT Halter, Halter Marine, and Chevron Refinery and took the following pictures (not all photos are included below). We are in the process of having someone with more expertise than ourselves review the photos, but for our perspective, it looks as if we may have captured Clean Water Act violations. The bodies of water in the photograph is Bayou Casotte and the Gulf of Mexico (just a few miles east is the Pascagoula beach used by local residents, and the Bayou is a fishing hole many local use as well).
For additional context, nearly every body of water along the Gulf Coast is listed as impaired. This doesn't necessarily imply industrial pollution because MDEQ does not usually test for the toxins these industries release. Ammonia has been one exception (released in large quantities by Chevron, First Chemical/Chemours, and Mississippi Phosphates that is no longer operating but was at the time of the investigation). What looks like oil is reported (usually self-reported) to the US Coast Guard. Sky Truth tracks these reports and posts them to public. The sum of these reports that have been analyzed reveal chronic leaking of oil from ships and pipelines in which no companies are ever really held accountable for (see graphic below). The chronic leaks over course of decades have exceeded the amount of oil spilled during the BP Drilling Disaster (which was also significantly underreported). There were NO SkyTruth reports on the day (or anytime near) the photos below were taken.
July 6, 2020: Soil Sampling in Cherokee Subdivision
In the summer of 2020, we partnered with Public Lab to conduct our first soil sample using Hanby Environmental Soil Sampling Kit. We have since taken one more sample and are working with Public Lab staff to design a soil sampling study for our neighborhood. The second sample we took in October 2020 did not indicate industrial contaminants, but the first did and thus further sampling is warranted.
One of our residents had her soil tested by the Mississippi Department of Agriculture in 2013. The agency does not test for oil and other hazardous pollutants that you shouldn't have in the top soil. They are able to test for heavy metals.
Mississippi Dept. of Agriculture found the soil to be unsafe and contaminated and recommended that the resident not plant a garden in the soil.
Many residents have reported feeling sick after mowing the grass and/or breaking out in rashes when doing yard work and touching the grass and soil.
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In July, we followed the instruction videos provided by Hanby Environmental, took two samples as instructed, and consulted them to analyze our results. One sample found 500 ppm of waste oil, and the other 500 ppm mobil crude oil
The experts at Hanby said anything higher than 100 ppm in residential area warrants further investigation.
May 30, 2020: ATSDR Petition
In May 2020, we submitted a petition to the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ASTDR) to investigate Chevron Refinery. We learned about the petition process as part of their investigation of Mississippi Phosphates Superfund site (more on the superfund listed below). We were told this process could take at minimum six months. We have not yet heard back but continue to send any new data as we collect it.