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LaNell Anderson Interview, Part 1 of 2

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Title:	LaNell Anderson Interview, Part 1 of 2
Identifier:	anderson_lanell_2036
Related:	anderson_lanell_2037
Location:	4Jc92
Description:	Anderson recalls her early influence, and discusses pollution, environmental justice, government and politics, and the media.
Country:	United States
State:	Texas
City:	Channelview
Date:	1999-10-05
Creators:	Anderson, LaNell (interviewee)
	Todd, David (interviewer)
Source:	Conservation History Association of Texas, Texas Legacy Project Records
Language:	en
Publisher:	Dolph Briscoe Center for American History
Rights:	Dolph Briscoe Center for American History
Original Format:	Mini-DV

The rich media version of this video was created by Michelle Bogart, April 2007. Her work was made possible by the School of Information, University of Texas at Austin and the Institute for Museum & Library Services.

Content

Interview start

Early influence

Pollution

Environmental justice

Government and politics

Media

Transcript

DT: My name is David Todd and I'm here for the Conservation History Association of Texas and its October 5, 1999. And, we have the pleasure of being with LaNell Anderson here on the banks of the San Jacinto River, in the Channelview community area.

And, a beautiful site, but also the site of a terrible chemical leak and also a river fire a number of years ago. And we thought it would be an appropriate place to interview, ah, LaNell, who's been an advocate for protecting her community for many years. And I want to take this chance to thank you for spending some time with us.

LA: Thank you, David, for having me.

DT: But, LaNell, could you tell us how you first came to, ah, this town of Channelview?

LA: Well, my father was in business, and decided that, at my age of 13, that we needed to move to Houston. We moved to the North Shore area, which is right here along I-10 East, and which is along Houston Ship Channel. And little did we know what we were in store for.

DT: What was the community like then?

LA: Well, Channelview actually was a fairly clean community in 1957. The history of Channelview is that it once was sort of a resort area. The river was beautiful, the San Jacinto River here. It wasn't contaminated at that point and people would come here for vacations.

DT: And then over the years I understand it got developed as an industrial site?

LA: Actually it did. Long about 1978, 79, some industry located on Sheldon Road, which started out very small, as a matter of fact. And, it is on the banks of the San Jacinto River as well.

And it has grown by leaps and bounds over the years, so that our community has been completely engulfed in industrial toxins, air emissions. We have three Superfund sites located within just two or three miles of the spot we're sitting right now. And, these sites were created by companies dumping their carcinogens into these places.

DT: What kind of companies and plants came to Channelview?

LA: Actually they're chemical companies. They're two of the major chemical companies in the U.S. Equistar now, once was called, Lyondell Chemicals, and, Lyondell, which once was called Arco Chemicals. They're both huge chemical companies.

DT: And, what sort of things do they make there?

LA: They actually make a lot of chemical building blocks, for other industries. But, ah, Ethylene Oxide is, and Propylene Oxide are their main, and 1-3-butadiene are their main products.

DT: And, what do you think drew them to this area?

LA: I think the - the fact that they could be close to a large city and use the facilities of that city without actually being located in the city limits, which helped their, ah, base line tax situation. Also, the ease with which they could ship their goods. We are crisscrossed, in this area, with pipelines.

In fact, 25 pipelines run under the river that were looking at right now. And, there is also a major freeway, Interstate 10, goes coast to coast. So they could ship by, ah, barge, they could ship by truck. And, also they could ship by rail. So it was a - a pretty unique site for them to help their bottom line profits.

DT: Were they offered any tax abatements?

LA: The tax abatements were developed, actually, by the corporations. And, they, we have a jurisdictional issue here, which we're located in the country here, not in the city. So we have a County Commissioners Court and, as well as a city council for Houston.

And, there, it's a multi-jurisdictional issue because schools give tax abatements, the county would give a tax abatement, and so, cities also give tax abatements, independently incorporated cities in the county can give tax abatements. Here in Channelview, they have approached the school board many times for tax abatements. And what that means, most people don't understand, but, about three years ago (misc.)

DT: Tell us more about tax abatement.

LA: Well, actually, the corporations have learned that they can, ah, go to schools districts, they can go to the junior colleges, they can go to the county, and apply for a tax abatement. And, what that means is, they can build multi-millions dollar additions to their plants, their chemical plants, without paying tax on those properties for 10 years, the terms average 10 years.

So, I spent a great deal of time, about 3 years ago, and I went to the Harris County Appraisal District and discovered that in Harris County alone, ah, from all the jurisdictions major industry had applied for and received tax abatements on eight billion dollars worth of their property. So, that means that they did not pay tax on eight billion dollars worth of property for 10 years, which is significant.

DT: So the - the taxpayers in these communities are, in a sense, subsidizing these plants?

LA: That's exactly right, because they use our roads, they use our railway systems, they use all the facilities in our community and in our city, yet they don't pay taxes on on, ah, the profits that they are making. So, in a, in a real sense, tax payers are being forced to subsidize their profits, which citizens now believe is - is really unfair.

I have done a lot of work at Commissioners Court when I went down and targeted a particular tax abatement for Elf Atochem, for example, and they were actually under indictment by the county attorney for breaking environmental laws. And, they went and applied for a tax abatement anyway.

So, we effectively stopped that one abatement, because how can you reward, with one hand taking away, and then give with the other. And, that's just, that is a good indicator of the hold that corporate America has on our county and our city here in Houston.

DT: We've talked a little bit about some of the financial burdens that these plants have put on the community. Can you talk about some of the environmental burdens, I mean, I think there have been a number of incidences over the years, from spills to leaks to explosions? Can you describe some of those?

LA: Well, yes there have, David. Industry would have you believe that they're innocuous, that they're just trying to make, you know, a profit here and there. But when they live in your community and they proliferate the way these industries have proliferated in our communities, and in many communities all along the ship channel, all inclusive, they pose a serious environmental risk. Right now, the Houston Ship Channels greatest contaminant is Dioxin.

The Texas Department of Health has done the most recent fish tissue samples showing the highest levels of Dioxin ever measured. And, we've been under a fish advisory, which means we cannot consume these fish since 1984, yet there's never been a sign posted anywhere. And there are very, there are people fishing every day putting fish on their table.

The, ah, the chemicals, the amount of chemicals that are put into the air in Harris County total 750 million pounds a year. There are 5.1 million pounds of carcinogens, known cancer causing chemicals, that are put into our air. Our system of permitting is so lax in the state of Texas, that it does no good, you might say.

Anybody who wants a permit is going to get a permit. While everybody in Houston, more than 4 million citizens, are breathing these carcinogens. So, it doesn't matter what part of Houston you're in, you're going to be breathing carcinogens.

DT: And, I guess, a lot of this is, sort of, insidious, back ground, sort of, emissions. But, are there also, sort of, dramatic instance that you've seen, I mean, that have, (?) sort of, hit the headlines?

LA: Well, the example I would give, is that, just by virtue of where were sitting today, were located five miles from two facilities where there were two explosions in the past seven to eight years, where forty men died. They got up to go to work that day, they kissed their wives and children goodbye, they went to work, and there were explosions, and they died.

They did not find a lot of those men. There is an area designated at our, one of our local chemical companies, where seventeen or eighteen men died. And, it's designated that they can't build on it, they don't do anything there, because they know that, that's where their bodies are. It's really a sad thing, when you get down to the gory details of these families now living without fathers and husbands and that's not the only incident.

We have explosions almost monthly. Across this nation, there are twenty explosions in the chemical and petrochemical industry every day, every day. Some take lives and some don't. But, I can tell you, just in the 1980s, two incidents that come to mind, the Hibernia oil rig capsized; eighty-four men died. There was another oil off shore oil rig that blew up, and 128 men died.

So, I challenge anybody whose doing this work to study and see the cost of oil and the pursuit of the profit from that oil for our entire nation.

DT: The site that were at right now, on the banks of the San Jacinto, I understand that four or five years ago it was in flames. Is that correct?

LA: That's correct. In October 20, actually, 1994; if we could back up, October 16, the rains came. And they were in torrents, which is not unusual in Houston. We have had rains and floods for years. And it rained and rained, it rained all over Texas as a matter of fact. And the water is never stopped by damns up in the north Texas area, it continues to flow down stream.

And, so, when it got to the Houston area, decisions were made to open damns in Montgomery County and Lake Houston and all of the people along the banks of this river, most of them that were at a fairly low level, were completely flooded. And there was a pipeline, Colonial Pipeline, its still in existence, actually.

It's owned by 20 companies that are all the major oil companies, that carries gasoline to the northeast. It's the major delivery pipeline from this Gulf Coast area up to the northeast. It had been leaking for some time. In fact, we found out, through investigation, that they had been told the year prior to re, ah, re-position their pipeline because it had been found to be loose during an inspection by the Railroad Commission.

And they had not done that. With the floods, of course, it became even in worse condition, and so they actually had a man there working on the pipeline. It leaked for what we believe to be two to three days. And then, upon some ignition source, which no one knows, the entire two mile stretch of the river that were looking at right now, was on fire.

Of course, we had many, many people come from all over the U.S. to attend to this huge environmental assault on our community. It brought into focus many issues that still are unresolved. For example the Shelter in Place issue. Shelter in Place, and I've done some investigating about this as well, that order is typically given by a corporation.

The corporation calls the local law enforcement agencies and they say, we're issuing a Shelter in Place, because they're the ones who know what's in the air, what's been released. Law enforcement has told me they have to take their orders from industry because they won't allow them in the gates and they're the only ones who do know. So, therefore, Law enforcement calls the school districts and to tell the schools to shelter the children in place.

Well, on October 20, when this fire erupted on the river, there was a shelter in place order issued to the Channelview schools and then shortly thereafter there was an evacuation order issued on all the major television and radio stations. We were under assault. Our whole community was just about to blow up and we felt, we felt the very real threat.

We've been able to raise some consciousness levels in our community, so we know how dangerous the chemicals are. When the citizens began to go to the schools to get their children, they would not release the children, because they were still under a shelter in place order. And, it created chaos.

Many citizens felt as though the offending companies, the offending corporations, had not only been guilty of running us out of our community, now they had complete control of their children. And, so help me, I know of no constitutional right that gives a corporation control over our children. But, that's how evasive corporate America has become. They control our world, in our view.

DT: LaNell, you told us a little bit about the pipeline leak and related fire here. Can you tell us about other incidents with pipelines, or shipping or transport or storage that you don't often associate with the plants that they serve.

LA: Well, there is such a public relations clamp on information that gets out in Houston, that often times we are not made aware of many of the leaks that come from pipelines, for example, from the barges that transport these chemicals up and down the river, ah, to the channel, up and down the ship channel.

And, there are leaks. I mean, for example, about four years ago, I was asleep in my brick home, air conditioned and heated, nice windows, so it wasn't just, ah, you know, a house where air would flow through easily. And I was awakened about 3 o'clock in the morning with a horrific chemical odor, I could not get my breathe.

I was awakened from a dead sleep with this chemical odor that was in my house. And, and that's just something that is - is really frightening and should not be. It should, that assault should not come to our community. Also, I've been awakened in the middle of the night with seismic rumblings, when one of these facilities would start up on of their major units, you know, in the middle of the night.

And not know, my windows rattling when I lived in a nice brick home. You know, and I, and I thought well, maybe its the train, you know, maybe that's what I hear. Because often times you think of the rumblings, seismic rumblings of the weight of the train coming along. But, this was ten times worse. I thought we were going to be blown up.

And I'm not alone. Many people in this community, in fact, all people in this community experience the same things and have the same concerns. We don't know. Is tonight the night that our community is going to be blown off the face of the map? And then, the more I learn about the chemicals that are stored on site, which should be covered under the latest legislation of RMP, risk management programs, I understand that two-hundred forty thousand gallons of Ethylene Oxide is stored at one of these facilities.

And knowing that a twenty-five, knowing that a twenty-five gallon tank car can explode, twenty-five thousand gallon, I'm sorry, tank car, can explode with Ethylene Oxide and create a hole six-stories deep in the earth, does it tell you, does it tell you what risk were at in this community? It, it's just insidious. We live in what I call a kill-zone. Many communities up along the ship channel, up and down the ship channel, citizens are living in kill zones.

Citizens are absolutely living in kill zones. There's no way to escape. If lightning hits one of those units that's holding all these on site chemicals, were gone. In our view, it is an unreasonable risk.

DT: Can you tell about this Ethylene Oxide tank car explosion? What happened?

LA: I don't have the details on that explosion. I have been told there was a twenty-five thousand gallon tank car, railroad tank car, which is relatively small. (misc.)

I understand there was a twenty-five thousand gallon tank car, which is relatively small, by comparison to other tank cars, that was sitting on site, in Texas city, or one of the cities down south, and it got too warm and it exploded. Ethylene Oxide is a chemical that boils at 51 degrees. It explodes, it's an auto ignition chemical, it explodes upon contact with the atmosphere. It is a very dangerous chemical and if it's not managed properly, or correctly, it's not off-loaded correctly, then we're all at risk.

During the river that was on fire, what they failed to tell anyone, was that the biggest risk was the Ethylene Oxide. Because that pipeline ran right along beside that chemical facility, very close, less than a quarter of a mile, just probably a hundred yards away, from this two-hundred forty gallons of Ethylene Oxide. Therefore, if that fire had traveled up that pipeline, none of us would be here today. None of us would be here.

DT: Speaking of explosions that sometimes hit this community, do you recall any stories about one of the first major explosions, the one that was at the Texas City docks, of I think it was a transport ship?

LA: It was a transport ship and it held fertilizer. It held the same fertilizer that the criminal used to blow up the building in Oklahoma City. And, I don't know a lot about it, David, I know there was a lot of loss of life.

DT: Do you think there's been any sort of legacy from that of people being wary of chemicals or shipping safety?

LA: Well, I think we've all been led, the citizens have all been led to believe that improvements have been made. Improvements in the laws concerning how to handle those products. But, it still does not remove the risk, does it? I was asked to be involved in a Coast Guard workshop for two days, a couple of years ago, concerning (misc.)

DT: Can you continue to tell us about the Coast Guard?

LA: I was asked to participate in a two day workshop which the Coast Guard conducted concerning chemical spills into the navigable water ways, around Houston, specifically the ship channel. And, of course, all the chemical handlers were on board, they were at the table, there were more than forty of those men there. I heard frightening stories from some of those men.

Basically, that we had every response in the world associated with dealing with these chemicals, beginning with just lighting a match, throwing it over your shoulder and running like hell, all the way to calling the appropriate authorities to deal with the spill. Of course, once its in water, you know, it's almost impossible to contain.

And, depending on what chemical you're talking about. And, then when you realize that a lot of these ships, that are off-loading these chemicals, have foreign workers who can't read English, they can't speak English. They come up to an American doc, we have separate environmental laws and rules than they do in their own countries of origin.

You know, you can see the the the chance for a catastrophic error. And, that leads me to another issue, in these facilities, they all use contractors and its a way of off, off-setting their costs and off-setting their liabilities.

DT: Contractors as opposed to full-time employees?

LA: That's correct. They maintain the safety record that they're all so proud of, the ISO 9000, or ISO 6000, or whatever their numbering system is, which is just a game created for their own PR. Often times they'll take the most dangerous jobs and give those jobs to a contractor, so that if there is injury or death, they don't have to claim it. So, they don't get sanctioned by our environmental agencies. Many, many times (misc.)

Many, many times these contractors will hire, workers that don't speak English, they can't read directions that are printed in English. (misc.)

Many times the contractors will hire people that cannot speak English, therefore when they go into these facilities to operate equipment and the instructions are there printed in English, they can't read the instructions. And, I would say, about 50 % of the time, that I am very suspect when explosions occur from maintenance type operations, like cleaning tanks etc., that is was because of a worker who cannot read English.

DT: You mentioned you did this work with the Coast Guard. I imagine the Coast Guard isn't alone in being an agency that's responsible for regulating these industries. There's the EPA, Texas Natural Resources Conservation Commission, the Railroad Commission. What do you think of their response to some of these risks in the industries here?

LA: Well, David, I've done a lot of work with the EPA. They have asked me to come, as a public participant, to many round-tables in Washington D.C. and here in Houston. In trying to get a grasp on how our regulatory agencies work, I discovered the EPA delegates their enforcement authority to the state agency, the TNRCC [Texas Natural Resources Conservation Commission].

And, in watching the TNRCC and their responses to particular issues, I can tell you that they are very ineffectual, in fact, I would term them as a failure. I think that they should give all the money they've made for the last fifteen years back to the citizens, because they have acted in no more than a way of extension to the corporations, they help the corporations fight the citizens. And, that's not why they were established.

They fail, in my view, many times, when it comes to looking at federal law and state law. They will opt to give the most lenient, decisions when it comes to industry. We fought, I guess, the beginning of our fight here in Channelview came when a corporation named American Envirotech came to Channelview and decided they were going to put in a commercial toxic waste incinerator, on fourteen acres located over right by the ship channel. (misc.)

The citizens really became, melded. We stood together to fight this issue. We discovered the person that was making application for this permit, for this toxic waste incinerator was a former employee of the Texas Water Commission. So, not only had we paid her salary as tax payers, for many years, but she took what she learned from the Texas Water Commission to make a big profit. And it was wrong. There was no demonstrated need for this incinerator in Channelview.

We had the old Rollins incinerator just across the ship channel from where the proposed location of this, this incinerator was to be. But yet, the TNRCC, with John Hall as its Executive Administrator, issued the permit. I made a very strong case, during this contested case hearing, that there was no financial assurance proven on the part of the applicant, and it is a RCRA [Resource Conservation and Recovery Act], Part B permit, and that's one of the requirements.

And so, John Hall worked very closely with the applicant to bring in a money-man. And, that was from Ogden Resources, and, of course, you know, Ogden is one of the largest waste corporations in the U.S. And, on the very last day, when they issued the permit, John Hall forced them to merge, so then they could prove financial assurance, but technically they had no financial assurance.

And so, they issued the permit, everybody went home. There were 600 people in the audience that day. I personally delivered 18,000 signed petitions to John Hall in an apple basket, and it did not matter to him.

Everybody went home and decided we'd lost and that they were going to build the permit, I mean the permitted facility, and I decided that wasn't going to happen. So, I continued to fight. I looked at the way federal law and state law interacted. And John Hall was illegal, he illegally issued that permit. The minute, an interesting fact is, the minute the political regime changed, and John Hall was no longer a part of the TNRCC.

He came strait to Houston and went strait to work immediately for the attorney that was representing the citizens in this fight. We still fail to understand how an attorney can have that type of conflict and legally represent citizens. But, it happened. It happened here in Channelview. We're really angry about it still. But, the most surprising and angry fact we discovered was that John Hall was immediately put on the payroll for Waste Management and as a lobbyist for the city of Houston.

So, not only had he take the money that tax payers provided him, he feathered his nest for anything in the future. And, he is now pushing, in the city of Houston and in Harris County, for widening the port of Houston, for a new container port, when we have a container port that's not even being utilized as it is, in Bayport. But why, you have to ask yourself why? And, my dad told me, all my life, Nell, if you want to solve the problem, you follow the money. I followed the money.

And, they're now trying to float a bond issue for 300 billion dollars, or some insidious amount of money, that the tax payers will pay, all to increase the traffic on the Port of Houston, okay, into the ship channel which will cause an increase of 7000 trucks a day, which will cause more death and destruction, and there is no end to it. And, it's all about corporate profit. It has nothing to do with benefiting citizens.

And when you track the jobs that are provided, it never pans out, it never pans out. I did a tracking at the county commissioners, ah - court, of their tax abatement issues, and they all go for a tax abatement based on jobs provided. Well, I caused, and unknowingly, but I caused an internal investigation of their policies, and then someone inside gave me a copy of the report. Over 95% of the tax abatements never provided a single job, never provided a single job.

So, I was right, they're wrong, I was right. It is, the fix is in, it's all about money, and it's all about our money and controlling our money.

DT: Why do you think these agencies aren't more responsive to the citizens who pay their taxes, who pay their salaries? I mean, there's some money there, is it not enough?

LA: They're not responsive to us because they don't have to be responsive to us. We are just like a mosquito biting them. They run our entire state through their lobbyists, they run our entire country through their lobbyists. Texas has been in a long swing of coming from Democrat to Republican. And, the major push occurred when Phil Gramm and, I can hardly say her name, Kay Bailey Hutchison, were elected as Senators in our state. We were done for then.

DT: How did that change things?

LA: Well, because that caused more influenced to get more Republicans elected to the state legislature. And, when the Republicans are in office, corporations win. A lot of people complain about Democrats and their give-away programs. And, and I'm not sure whether I'm Republican or Democrat any more. That's how confused citizens are now days.

What, what does, a centrist mean? What, what does it mean to be a conservative any more? We think were conservative, but the parties that we grew up voting for aren't conservative any more. You know, we're living in a time of slash and burn the politicians, you know, for any reason at all. In fact, they go a little further than slash and burn, they set them up. And, so we're all involved in their game of getting control. Why do they want control? Power. Why do they want power? Money. So, the money interests of our country are running this world.

DT: Can you talk a little about these companies that are controlling the government, in your view? How is it that they operate, and influence government for us?

LA: Their lobbyist write legislation, which benefits their bottom line. Tom DeLay was quoted in our local news paper saying he was proud to have two lobbyist in his office in Washington D.C., that he was not ashamed to admit that they influenced the legislation that he wrote. In fact, he was not ashamed to admit that they wrote the legislation.

So I, in turn, sent him a letter via fax asking him if he could not agree with me that he espoused nothing more than the benefits of a prostitute. And, I asked him why, in his estimation, we should not fire him and just keep the lobbyist on, thereby saving a lot of tax payer money. After all, a whore is a whore. (you're going to have to cut that, but that's what I said to him in the letter, that's what I said to him. Oh he's a son of a bitch, I'm sorry, you're going to have to cut that too. Okay).

DT: Did you get a response?

LA: I never got a response from Mr. Delay.

DT: Can you talk about some of your other interactions with lobbyist and companies? I remember you told me once about an EPA meeting where there were a lot of people in suits, and, ah, can you maybe elaborate a little bit?

LA: Well, I attended an EPA hearing concerning the value of establishing a chemical accident safety board, and I believe it was in 94, as a matter of fact, in Pasadena. And, ah, it was myself, another environmentalist, and a lady from Austin who's an attorney, but an environmentalist as well. We were in a room filled with 400 men wearing gray suits, who had perfectly combed hair, perfectly pressed pants, and who were very well prepared with the remarks that they were ready to deliver to EPA.

When the second man stood up, being the Vice President of Monsanto, he stated from the podium that he thought that OSHA was wonderful, and that EPA was wonderful, and he wanted to remind everyone in attendance that more regulation only cost the tax payers more money, and that there was no reason for change. And, when the EPA asked if anyone from the audience had anything to say, of course, I raised my hand.

So, I went to center microphone and I asked this Vice President, in his perfectly pressed pants and his recently cut hair, how he could make that remark in light of the fact that we were sitting within five miles of two facilities who had killed 40 men. And, he said, well, of course, he couldn't justify his remarks that nothing could replace those lives. And, I asked him why he didn't see that change was necessary and he couldn't answer, he could not answer that.

And, lo and behold, all these years later, I see in the news that this chemical accident safety board was authorized, and it was coming up, they did not authorize the funding. And, so once again, this authorization for funding was coming to the forefront in Congress. And, I heard in the news that President Clinton was going to veto this bill, there was something he didn't like about the bill. So, I sat down and wrote him a letter. It's titled was "Life in a Ship Channel Community".

Because I know so many of the politicians have no idea what it is like to live in these kill zones, around these corporations, where we could be killed at any moment. And, within two weeks I got two letters of response, one from the Policy Director of OSHA, and one from the chemical division of EPA. And, in the first paragraph of each letter it states, we're writing to you at the request of the President to let you know he has changed his mind about the funding of this board.

Now, I'm sure I was not the only one that wrote to the President, or who wrote about this issue, but we now have a Chemical Accident Board in Washington D.C. that functions much like the National Transportation Safety Board.

DT: LaNell, you had a big impact and made a lot of efforts to try to work with the government and different industries. I'd like to know what drives you. Are there problems in your community, or in your own family or friends; health effects perhaps, that you'd like to tell about? What triggered your going from non-involvement to being this involved?

LA: Well, in 1987, my mother died from bone cancer. She was barely 67 years old, and she lived very close to one of these facilities. And, that's what, what triggered my involvement. And, then the next step was the incinerator. And, then my father died of emphysema. And, then, my older sister, whose two years older than me, was diagnosed with an autoimmune disease. And, I started wondering why. I started asking questions and digging for information.

And, then I myself came down with an autoimmune disease and I was exactly the same age as she was when I came down with this disease. And, so that began the journey for me. The levels of frustration and ah, indignation, you know, they rise and then they wane, you know, they go away. But, basically, its wrong. What's happening is wrong. When a chemical corporation or a petrochemical, or any corporation has more civil rights than American citizens, it's just wrong.

What has happened to our country, you know? Even a foreign interest can come and locate in our country and those products have more civil rights than American citizens do any more. Then, my younger sister was also diagnosed with an autoimmune disease. So, that means all of us in our family have been effected by environmental issues health wise. So, human health is the reason I pursue this.

There are numbers of people in Channelview that die daily from the effects of pollution. There is an NRDC report, National Resources Defense Council report, using information from 1996 which proves that a thousand people a year die, in Harris County, from the effects air pollution. That's a horrible cost. If you look at conservation issues and you ask yourself, what would happen if I went and poured poison on a thousand birds out in the Katy Prairie, there would be outrage in our country.

But, why isn't there an outrage over a thousand people a year dying in our county. That's a thousand families who pay for a thousand funerals who look down at a thousand caskets being covered with dirt every year in our county. It's, it's a crime. It's all I can say, it is a crime. In this community alone, in this zip code I have tracked the cancer rates through the Texas Department of Heath, for many years.

And, the male lung cancer rates are 100% higher than the expected incidents, based on standardized mortality ratios. That cost is too high, I'm sorry. There are many costs when you approach and try to understand the risks of major corporations, chemical and petrochemical being located in your neighborhoods.

But, it's not only the risk from the kill zones, or being explosions and killing you, but the long term debilitating diseases as well. There are so many people that are suffering. An example I would offer is that, at the end of December, actually Christmas day, last year, all the way through June of this year, one of the corporations in our, in our community, Equistar, has been in an upset and a flare condition almost every week.

On two of these occasions, they flared or burned over 800 thousand pounds of carcinogenic product. So that's, that's an additional load to our air shed in what we have to breathe over and above what they report. It's unconscionable. There are many friends that I have in this community that suffered from nose bleeds, from upper respiratory infections, they were at the doctors office.

You know, many, I still hear of the problems that occurred in those six months. And, when you stop and you consider flaring and what is an upset, the definition of an upset, okay, and I have considered this because I worked in a source reduction project directly with these corporations, where I interfaced with the plant managers, with the managers of the particular units in each facility, okay, an upset is defined as off-spec product.

So, they they make some off-spec product, for whatever reason, and they can't sell it at the price they want to sell it, so they route it to the flare and they burn it. It's just unconscionable. When you consider the definition of a flare, and we've talked about incinerators now, a typical incinerator is a dual train, rotary kiln, mechanical device that burns waste and it also has interior scrubbers to remove a lot of the poisons.

A flare is worse than an incinerator, there are no scrubbers, there is no testing required, you know, no stack test, etc., okay, they can go for permit amendment, they still don't have to go through stack testing. So, they just burn their stuff, they dump it into our lungs, is what they do.

So, and then when you think about our state legislative, regulations, you look at the state implementation plan, that's state implementation plan, and you realize that's how the TNRCC gains their authority from EPA, and you realize that the flaring and the upset rules are very weak and they need to be amended in the state of Texas. And, by god, the citizens are going to force that, so that they can stop dumping their unwanted product into our lungs every day.

DT: You mentioned citizens and their efforts to try to work on the SIP(?). Can you tell a little bit about some of the citizens groups and networks and some of the individuals that you've worked with?

LA: Well, there are many environmental groups in the city of Houston and in Harris County, as you can well imagine. There are some very good groups. We never really meant to set up a network, but inadvertently its become a network. And, there are several key people in Houston who follow the issues very closely. Unfortunately, there are some groups, who set themselves up as environmental groups who allow themselves to be infiltrated by industry as well.

So, they, they become ineffectual. Galveston Bay Foundation is one that I would offer as an example. And, they get in there and really cost the true environmentalist their issues, sometimes. But, we are working, there is network.

DT: This is, I guess, what you mean by Astroturf?

LA: Yes, yes, if you'll remember when the new Clean Air Standards, the EPA was required by law to review the Clean Air Standards, and the industry really started a big fight on Capitol Hill about new air standards. They fight everything that's going to impair their profits. And, in the state of Texas alone, I received information, in print, of 110, "grass roots environmental groups" that had been set up in all the communities across Texas to address this issue of new clean air standards.

When we investigated who was running these groups, we found that industry was behind every one of them. So, we call them Astroturf groups rather than grass roots groups. And, and so if they can't sway the votes or the politicians in the normal way, they'll go to any length to do that. And, if they can't set up the Astroturf groups, then what they do is infiltrate other groups, environmental groups to sort of sway or wear out the people so that they can, they become ineffectual.

DT: Continuing on with that theme, and you're looking for grass roots things, it seems like you had quite a few problems of getting the media to put out your side or view, no matter how willing the individuals might be themselves, there seems to be an overriding quashing of these things?

LA: Yes, its well known, in Houston and in Harris County that, even the national media, ABC and NBC, ah, affiliates here. Their jobs have been threatened by industry, actually. And, its akin to the 60-Minutes episode on the tobacco issue. You know, they threaten to pull all their advertising if, when they print a story, or, ah, air a story, about environmentalists and their point of view.

If they do not air equal time, from a positive point of view for industry, then they loose their jobs. And they, industry tells them that. They're not even shy about telling them that. So, and then what industry has done is they've tapped each national affiliate and they've have them come out and do work for them for their safety films and for other, you know, and and, its a coop-ting, in our view.

And although there are many dedicated people in the media that are very good souls, who want to do the right thing, the rules are laid out before them. They, they sometimes cannot. They're precluded from covering the issue completely and entirely from a citizen point of view.

DT: Have there been local instances that you've had experience with where you tried to get coverage of something that you think is important, but people just can't seem to find the time to do it?

LA: Well, actually an NBC affiliate ah, had an anchor person named John McPherson, and he was particularly interested in our issues and gave us a lot of coverage. Ah, he started getting a lot of flack from industry. Hence the term "black jackets". He actually told me that he wished he could cover more, but that he's been threat - his job had been threatened.

So, the last issue he covered, he came out and interviewed a lot of people right here in Channelview. And, within two weeks, he was gone. He's now in West Virginia somewhere. He actually lost his job, because he would not follow industry's orders.

DT: I guess industry presses its case because of their concerns about their revenues and their property. I understand that you're a realtor that deals with a lot of individuals, real estate holdings. Can you tell us a little bit about the impacts on your business and on the properties your clients have from the industries?

LA: Well, I am a realtor. I, I don't work in this area. I was told by a doctor three years ago that I, because of my health problems that I had to move away from the extreme pollution. So, I have moved, umm. I will say that property values over all the United States have improved, over all, no matter what city or town you look in. Property values in Channelview have not improved the same as other areas.

In fact, the residential property values have gone down. But, interestingly enough, I just listed, a business property for a friend of mine here in Channelview and their values have skyrocketed. So, it is, what were witnessing is an industrialization of this community. Industry has come in and they have completely industrialized this community. And, they're buying residential properties that used to be water front, water view properties and their locating barge cleaning facilities there.

And, sometimes they'll buy, buy and house and the second person won't sell, so they'll buy the next house. And, there is an incidence of this happening over on Lake Side Drive, here. And they've parked or moored barges in a solid row so that the people can no longer put their boat in the water and get out. They are landlocked by this barge company. And, because the rules are so lax in the Coast Guard, there is nothing that can be done about it.

DT: You say that there's nothing that can be done, but you seem to strive onward. I'm curious how you think that your town or community can regain some control over its fate?

LA: I don't think this town can regain any control over its fate.

DT: Why is that?

LA: There are approximately 55,000 residents here. Most of them are ill. Most of them are ill. We started out once with 600 citizens that were interested in fighting this issue, and we all fought and fought, and we struggled and we have spent a lot of money. Harris County and the city of Houston spent more than a million dollars helping us fight this toxic waste incinerator and the TNRCC issued the permit anyway.

And, there is not way that any town, I don't care whether its Channelview, I don't whether its Lake Charles, Freeport, Orange, Beaumont, Port Arthur, any of those towns that you want to name along the Gulf Coast, they have not won, David. You can look at the historical, from a historical perspective and see that within 10 to 15 years after industry located in their city, it became a dead city. It is a cycle of industry creating dead cities along the Gulf Coast.

You drive into the city of Port Arthur and there's nothing left except empty buildings and abandoned houses right in the down town area. It's becoming that way here. People are moving away.

DT: They become ghost towns in a way? (misc.)

DT: You were talking about citizens before, and how its difficult to keep people interested and enthusiastic about this. Can you talk about, I guess what you'd call burn out, in individuals you've known?

LA: Well, what's happened naturally with citizen opposition, the corporations have jumped out ahead of the issue to get control. And, so they've used their very expert PR tactics to, actually threaten their employees with loss of jobs if they participate in any of our endeavors. And, they had encouraged them, and I - we've talked many employees who have verified this - to talk to their neighbors to say that if they help the environmentalists, then the jobs will be lost. It's really not an issue of jobs.

It's not an issue of competing in a world market. It's an issue of greed and bottom line profit. And, the latest reports show that, out of the top 175 energy corporations, that they pay their CEOs an average of five millions dollars a year. The highest paid one, which I believe is Exxon, which is hovering somewhere in the neighborhood of one hundred fifty million dollars a year.

While, at the same time, these citizens that are being threatened with their jobs, are still averaging fifteen to eighteen dollars an hour to risk their lives by going in chemical plants every day. So, over the past ten, fifteen years their salaries, the workers salaries, their salaries have not appreciated, but yet, the CEOs have grown some 7000 percent.

You tell me, David, what would you do, what - what would you do if someone came and killed your family? Would you be angry? My husband and I have children, together five children, he has three and I have two. His oldest daughter had a child several years ago. Her name was Alisa. She was wonderful. She was a much waited for and wanted baby girl, in their family. She began to get ill. They didn't know what was wrong.

When she was about three months old, they discovered she had Biliary Atresia. She was born without any actual bile ducts from her liver. She had no bile ducts from her liver. I did some investigation and discovered from the American Medical Association that the dis - disease is caused by a virus called Reo 3. Her father works for Exxon. She was immediately put on a waiting list for a liver transplant. And, she died at six months old.

And, it - it was something that really changed our lives. It was the beginning of our enlightenment of the devastation that chemicals can cause. And, in further investigating I discovered that it's not just the explosions like I've said, but the effects of these hormone mimicking chemicals that can cause so, such major life altering changes in such small quantities. You know, when you're a fetus in the womb, it can change your whole life. There were no livers to match hers and so she died.

And, the most recent effect on my family is my son's, married, and he just had his second child three years ago. And, his name is Mason. And, when he was seven months old, his mother took him for his second in a series DPT vaccinations. And, in two weeks he had polio. So, he's paralyzed from his waist down, and can't stand or walk. My belief is that the child had a compromised immune system, whereby he reacted in this way to the vaccine, where other children would not react.

And, so there are all sorts of associated costs with this dedicated pursuit in our country of profit, greedy profit, from oil and from fossil fuels and from chemicals. There are some 70,000 chemicals out in the atmosphere right now, in our environment. 70,000 chemicals. They've never had a screening and testing program with which they can put these chemicals through to see what health effects they have. They create 2,000 new chemicals every year that have very serious effects on our endocrine systems.

They permeate our water, such as the MTBE issue right now, that's hot in the news out in California, its just been banned. You know, they test us, they use us for the testing. They're not required, they're not responsible. And, our regulations fail. They have failed. There's no other way to look at it, is that our regulations have failed. Why have they failed? Because of the corporate influence on our government. We are the government, we're the government and yet we have no control. The corporations control our government.

DT: Can you talk about the ways that you see the corporations control the government?

LA: Lobbyists creating legislation that benefits their bottom line and absolutely is against the benefit of the individual citizen.

DT: You mentioned that there's a ritzy section of Houston somewhere and that there's "x" amount of chemicals in the air. Now you'd think the executives who get the money, who work or run the corporations, they're not all living off shore, I imagine, or on the Bahamas or the Cayman Islands with their tax free accounts.

What does it take, or don't they realize that their children, if the grow up, even in the ritzy section of Houston, are exposed to the same things? You'd think they'd be greedy enough, in their own personal way, unless they all live in enclosed houses with air filters. Why isn't it possible to get through to them when they have to breathe the same air? What are they hearing?

LA: It's a very logical question. And, I thank you for asking the question. Being in the real estate business I have the ability to check out tax records on individuals and their properties. And, I have done my own study about most of the upper level mangers, and the plant managers, and some of the lobbyists for these major corporations. And, guess what I found? Most of them live north of Houston and commute an hour and a half to work.

Isn't that amazing. So, therefore, when my doctor told me that I must move out of the heavy pollution, I moved to a community where many of them live. So, I decided if they live there, they have their families exposed there, it's got to be the least exposure in Houston. There is an area in Houston called River Oaks, however, that has been there for many, many years.

It's, it's not unusual for a residence in River Oaks to costs five million dollars. Those people believe, inside their homes, that they're breathing clean air. There's no way they can be breathing clean air. Houston now leads the nation in adult asthma, Houston leads the nation in childhood asthma, and Houston leads the nation in childhood cancer. We have the highest readings on ozone that are recorded.

Much higher than Los Angeles. Our ozone problems, which is, it comes from particulate matter in the air and certain chemicals, and they get in the sunlight and the effects of the sunlight cook them and then they become ozone, ground level ozone pollution. Our ozone pollution comes from industrial facilities, whereas in Los Angeles it comes from a natural geographical setting where there are so many vehicles in Southern California, and the the off-shore winds come and they trap this pollution at the base of the mountains and you can't escape it.

And, it's beginning to go up the mountains as well. In Houston, our state implementation plan has spent millions of dollars doing studies and they have discovered that more than 50% of the pollution comes from stationary point source, which means, industry. Automobile makers are required to put controls on their vehicles. And, about $3000 of each vehicle we purchase we're paying for environmental controls, for $3000.

These big facilities along the Houston Ship Channel, for example Exxon, Shell, these two in Channelview that are just close to the ship channel here. They are like a half a million automobiles, tail pipes sticking the air pumping twenty-four hours a day, with no catalytic converter and no, envi - no environmental regulation on their emissions.

To a degree, you can think of it that way. And with 16% of our ozone pollution coming from automobiles, wouldn't you say that 16% of the effort needs to come from citizens and more the 50% needs to come from industry. The balance is made up of off road emissions and small business. But, more that 50% is from industry point source.

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LaNell Anderson Interview, Part 1 of 2

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