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Submission from Ohio Valley Environmental Resistance (OVER) received on 03.15.21

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On Sunday March 14^th in the Squirrel Hill neighborhood of Pittsburgh, the Ohio Valley Environmental Resistance with the help of several affinity groups held a noise demo outside the home of Allegheny County Executive Richard “Fitz” Fitzgerald to protest his support of the petrochemical industry in Southwestern PA.  The activists chose March 14^th to coincide with Pi day (3.14) which is celebrated by science enthusiasts around the world. In honor of Pi day, OVER created a paper mache Pi filled with plastic made to symbolize plastic in the world’s food supply.

Fitzgerald recently made national headlines by responding to Texas Senator Ted Cruz’s’ comments about Pittsburgh and the Paris Climate Agreement by stating “we believe in science around here” and “climate change is real.”  Mainstream news networks grabbed on to these comments and Fitzgerald’s similarity to the actor Jeff Daniels without delving any further into Fitzgerald’s actual record on environmental issues.

Fitzgerald was one of the largest recipients of fossil fuel interest money in the state of Pennsylvania in 2017-2018. In 2014 his administration pushed for fracking underneath a county owned park by Range Resources despite widespread community opposition and a campaign that lasted for eight months.  Fitzgerald also ignored environmental advocates by encouraging fracking near Pittsburgh International Airport and has been a strong supporter along with Donald Trump of the Shell Ethane Cracker Plant in Beaver County Pennsylvania.

The plant is currently under construction and will emit over 2 million tons of carbon dioxide equivalents every year along with produce 1. 6 million tons of ethylene plastic “nurdles” that are used to make plastic products.  The plant also will receive 1.6 billion dollars in tax breaks from the state of Pennsylvania in exchange for reversing all of the progress the Southwestern Pa has made to combat climate change and for producing more plastic to poison the world’s water and food supply.

Protesters used pots, pans, drums, speeches, chants, and songs to create noise. They also placed door hangers on neighbors’ doors to explain why they were creating such a ruckus.  Neighbors were mostly supportive although one person did attempt to drive through the crowd  Fortunately the bikes blocking the permiter marshalled the driver through the crowd as people called the driver a “jagoff” (Pittsburghese) for not taking another residential side street.

Two members of OVER attempted to confront Fitz by knocking on his door and leading the crowd in a chant to “come out now!”  As expected the lights were on, but Fitz did not show.    

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OVER has three demands they are making of Fitzgerald:

1. Fitzgerald must publicly declare that he was wrong about the economic and environmental consequences of fracking.
2. He must never again court fracking and petrochemical companies to come to Southwest PA.
3. Ban fracking on county owned land. 

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  To Contact Fitzgerald at his office, call 412-350-6500.

Ohio Valley Environmental Resistance (OVER) is a coalition of climate justice organizations and independent activists who are demanding the cessation of the petrochemical buildout in the Ohio Valley. OVER intends to engage in sustained resistance until its demand is met.

KDKA News Story –  https://pittsburgh.cbslocal.com/2021/03/15/anti-fracking-allegheny-county-rich-fitzgerald-protest/

Campaign Donations – http://marcellusmoney.org/pac/FRIENDS-OF-RICH-FITZGERALD

Shale Cracker Plant – https://stateimpact.npr.org/pennsylvania/tag/ethane-cracker/

Deer Lakes Park – https://www.pghcitypaper.com/pittsburgh/proposal-to-drill-beneath-deer-lakes-park-raises-questions-of-safety-government-procedure/Content?oid=1708989

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[anonymous submission received on 01.28.21]

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On Thursday morning, a collection of autonomous activists blockaded the sole access road to the Shell Polymer’s office in Beaver, PA to protest the transformation of the Ohio Valley into a manufacturing hub for the petrochemical industry. Shell Polymers is a subsidiary of Royal Dutch Shell, and they are constructing an ethane cracking facility in Beaver that will be used to turn fracked gas into plastic.   

Marketed to the region as a job creator, the cracking facility will release 2 million tons of C02 every year along with 522 tons of volatile organic compounds that are linked to respiratory disease.  The plastic the plant creates will add to the existing waste in oceans and landfills that are poisoning habitats for earthlings everywhere. 

In an effort to avoid the dangers of climate change, the industry has set its sights on the Ohio Valley as its next sacrifice zone.  Other cracking facilities and related infrastructure have been proposed in parts of Ohio and West Virginia despite the glut of plastics on the world market.  If constructed, these facilities will help create a new Cancer Alley like what already exists in Louisiana.

While people in the affected regions surrounding the plant participated public hearings to voice opposition to the plant, they were ignored by both Shell and local government, so now those people are trying something else.   Stay tuned for more action from these people standing up to the corporations at the root of the Sixth Mass Extinction.   

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Action report from the Fight Toxic Prisons convergence.

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania — On the heels of the 3rd Annual Fight Toxic Prisons Convergence, dozens of organizers, community members, and friends and family of currently- and formerly-incarcerated peoples marched through downtown Pittsburgh, making stops at the headquarters of EQT and ending at a power plant belonging to coal utility NRG Energy on the North Side. The demonstration concludes a weekend of lectures, workshops, and discussion about mass incarceration and its links to environmental health.

EQT Corporation, a major oil and gas company notorious for poisoning drinking water supplies across rural Appalachia, is one of the largest companies involved in fracking, with 793 active wells in Pennsylvania alone. They’re also one of the top ten worst polluters in the industry, according to a 2015 report published by the Natural Resources Defense Council. In 2012, EQT received several charges for water pollution and disturbance of waterways, and a $1.1 million fine for poisoning drinking water supply sources through a shale pit leak at Rock Run in Tioga County, PA, and has received several other fines, violations, and complaints as well.

The march culminated in a rally at the NRG Energy Center calling attention to the health and human rights atrocities occurring at SCI Fayette, a state-run prison that currently houses 2,176 inmates. SCI Fayette was built in 2003, directly on top of a toxic coal ash dump that has been in operation for decades, receiving millions of tons of waste from coal processing companies, including NRG.

The inmate population of SCI Fayette, and the surrounding community of Labelle, PA, have reported alarmingly high rates of health issues linked to the ash that blows off the dumping site and into the surrounding air.

Richard Mosley, a member of Fayette Health Justice and Put People First PA and a former prisoner at Fayette, spoke to the crowd via telephone about his experiences there, including respiratory ailments and medical neglect. “I was admitted into the infirmary well over 10 times and at medical at least 40 times during my four years at SCI Fayette. My weight dropped down from 225lbs to 170lbs. I got so sick at one point that I kept a letter with me to send to my family in case I died.”

Other speakers at the rally highlighted campaigns and organizations working alongside and on behalf of prisoners everywhere, including Shandre Delaney of Human Rights Coalition (HRC), a prisoner-led human rights organization based in Pittsburgh and Philadelphia, PA. HRC was a local host of the Fight Toxic Prisons Convergence.

Speaking to the crowd, Ms. Delaney said “HRC believes that it is critically important that prisoners are treated with humanity in every aspect of their incarceration. A prison sentence should not become a death sentence because of the lack of healthcare or the access to legal remedy or complaint of their treatment.”

HRC is involved in drafting legislation to end solitary confinement in Pennsylvania, as well as highlighting ongoing cases of abuse behind prison walls. They were also involved in co-producing a report on the toxic conditions at SCI Fayette with the Abolitionist Law Center, a legal advocacy nonprofit based in Pittsburgh.

More information about the Fight Toxic Prisons Convergence can be found at: FightToxicPrisons.org