WHO IS LOIS GIBBS?
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Who is Lois Gibbs? Lois Gibbs is an important environmental activist who gained her start when fighting for the rights of the people in Love Canal. In 1978 concerns of chemicals in the homes of townspeople were becoming more apparent, and Lois took action. She was so worried about the people getting sick from the chemicals that she rallied the people in her community to fight against the United States government and the EPA. Originally Gibbs went to the school board in hopes of them making a change, but she had no such luck. Due to the increasing sickness of the communities children she decided to fight for change on her own. That is when Gibbs discovered the field next to the towns elementary school which was filled with 20,000 tons of chemical waste. She then went door to door gathering signatures from her neighbors in hopes of making a change. In the documentary " A Fierce Green Fire" directed by Mark Kitchell, we learned about how Lois Gibbs locked people in her house as a response to the government not providing the residents of Love Canal with temporary to permanent relocation. After the holding was completed the government then met her request and provided the temporary relocation. After Love Canal, Lois Gibbs continued to fight for the environmental rights for the people in the United States. In the year 1980, Lois Gibbs formed an organization called the Citizens Clearinghouse for hazardous waste, which later got renamed the Center for Health, Environment and Justice, where she is currently the executive director of the organization.
Who was Richard Nixon? Richard Nixon was the 37th president of the United States of America. He served from the years 1969 to 1974. Nixon was in the beginning portion of the back and forth fight with the people of Love Canal and Lois Gibbs herself, they all wanted environmental freedoms from the superfund that they were living in. The reason that Richard Nixon is important when it comes to the environment is because the Environmental Protection Agency or EPA was established under his presidency. Love Canal being a huge factor along with other environmental concerns, Nixon said "By concious choice, [we] transform our land into what we want it to become". In 1970, during Nixons presidency, is when OSHA was then created. Congress had passes the Occupational and Safety Health Act, so workers were protected in their work place against health hazards which included toxic chemicals. The motivation for Richard Nixon to create these new laws stemmed from the fact that most towns and stated created ineffective policies that often confused residents. Nixon then enacted the EPA to monitor new national guidelines and monitor/enforce them. As years went on we saw a large change in the way people treated the environment, and started facing repercussions for environmental dumping. Thanks to Richard Nixon he set the foundation of environmental regulations throughout the United States of America. After researching I found another big thing that Richard Nixon that impacted the environment was the "Marine Mammal Protection Act or MMPA". In 1972, Nixon signed this act, and also put into action the Ocean Dumping Act which was the first time marine animals became protected under laws.
Before the Love Canal superfund was discovered, the worlds relation with the environment was so different than it is now. There were no set and stone environmental dumping laws, and companies rarely faced repercussions for their harmful actions. But What is Love Canal? Love Canal was a neighborhood just south of Niagara Falls filled with working class people, and children. The
Hooker Chemical Company was based there and workers used the canal as a dumping ground for thousands of tons of chemical waste. The town was built over this chemical waste land including the children's school playground right over the top. Mysterious sickness started spreading over town, things like epilepsy and other serious birth defects. It was then uncovered that the chemicals started
leeching into the residents yards, basements, and the school. Begging and bartering began from the townspeople because they wanted to make a change, they believed they should not have to live in these conditions. After years of this and
being quickly dismissed by president at the time, Jimmy Carter, and the state health authorities, changes were starting to be made.
In 1978 a state of emergency was finally declared and over 200 families got moved from this now superfund. The Love Canal story changed the way Americas environmental laws work for the better. Due to the severity of the contamination, it brought federal legislation to the United States in regards to managing all of the hazardous waste disposal. The
new legislation is called the Comprehensive Environment Response, Compensation and Liability Act or the Superfund Law. Lois Gibbs has a huge relationship with the people of Love Canal. She was one of the main reasons that laws were enacted in relation to chemical waste, and she helped to get all of the people of Love Canal permanently relocated.
An action of Lois Gibbs that may be considered controversial is when she held a representative from the EPA hostage in her home in order to make a change. Even though she was working hard, people were not taking her seriously. Before that an EPA administrator named Eckhardt C. Beck came to Love Canal and he had a lot of insight on the matter at hand. He said that there were
corroding waste disposal drums popping out of backyards. The towns trees and gardens were dying, and it was said a whole swimming pool came up from its foundation. He also said
"everywhere the air had a faint, choking smell. After this we learned that Lois Gibbs had invited two EPA representatives to her home. There was one doctor and a public health relation employee but once they arrived to Lois' home, they were told they couldn't leave.
The reason that Lois Gibbs and her peers did this is because they wanted these people to understand how the residents of Love Canal felt. This could come across as controversial to some of the townspeople, or people seeing the news coverage. Holding someone as "hostage" is not the best way to get your point across. Lois could also come across as complex because she did not go down without a fight. Due to her actions in 1980, Carter signed an emergency declaration which granted relocation for the families of Love Canal.
Over 300 families were then relocated to safer housing, and the process of making the area of Love Canal a superfund began.
Without the work that Lois Gibbs put into environmental impacts of chemical waste, our lives here in Keene would be so different. Due to her impacts, a law was created called
Comprehensive Environment Response, Compensation and Liability Act or the Superfund Law. If this law was not created, then environmental dumping would be so much worse, and companies would note face repercussions for their actions. After looking at the map I can see that in Keene and surrounding areas, there are plenty of chemical companies and large industrial factories. In Keene we also have two major dams, Surry Dam and Otter Brook dam. If the environmental laws were not in place then Keene could turn into a chemical waste dump because the local companies would not face repercussions for that action. If this happened, us as a community could get really sick like the people of Love Canal. There are homes right next to Surry Dam and Otter Brook dam so those people would be put at a much higher risk. Thank you to Lois Gibbs for protecting our environment with the Superfund Law.
That is absolutely WILD to read Lois Gibbs kept an EPA representative hostage in her home while trying to make a change. It's kind of crazy to think how fortunate some of us are to be living in communities that have never seen such drastic issues with pollution and chemical waste. I find it hard to picture just how hard it is to live somewhere that is engulfed in pollution, has poor drinking water, or bad air quality, it's baffling to see that people let this happen and it makes people go as far as keeping someone hostage for something to actually change within the community. I really enjoyed how well your post was laid out, it felt very cohesive and easy to read, with lots of interesting facts sprinkled in. I almost find it hard to believe that the Superfund law was not created our own town of Keene could suffer the same fate as Love Canal. Overall, really informative and eye-opening blog post, it's scary to think this could happen to any of our communities if certain laws didn't exist.
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