Demonstrators take to streets again in protest of petrochemical plants

28th May 2019   ·   0 Comments

By Meghan Holmes
Contributing Writer

A march against the petrochemical industry, initially planned for April, will begin with a rally on May 29, and proceed from Reserve to Baton Rouge over the course of five days.

Along the way, protestors will highlight some of the state’s heaviest polluters on both the east and west banks of the Mississippi River. That route has caused some issues with the permitting process, and state police recently told marchers they cannot cross the river in two places, due to safety concerns. Protestors hope to get approval before the march begins next week, but plan to continue their route to the governor’s mansion regardless of whether or not they can physically walk over either the Sunshine or Mississippi River bridges.

“We see the act of crossing these bridges as symbolic,” said Reverend Gregory Manning, one of the march’s organizers. “We want to bring attention to how this is an issue that impacts both sides of the river, and we also want to bring attention to specific plants like Denka Dupont, and the recently approved Formosa plant in St. James.”

Marchers will carry photographs of loved ones lost to cancer and other illnesses they connect to emissions at nearby plants. “We are standing up for the right to life,” Manning said. “What we are seeing illustrated now is intentional genocide, and the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality and the governor are very conscious of what is happening with the uncontrolled amounts of poison and toxins filling the air in this sacrificial zone, where the ancestors of those enslaved became sharecroppers and worked hard to purchase property, now worth pennies on the dollar. The government is complicit, and this behavior will not be tolerated any longer.”

Groups of local residents in river parishes, including RISE St. James and Concerned Citizens of St. John the Baptist Parish, will also take part in the march. St. James residents want to stop the construction of a new Formosa plant, touted by the governor as a win for the state because of the 1,200 jobs it will create. Some residents close to the proposed site worry about the cumulative impact of a new plant alongside many others. “So many people here are already sick, and have cancer and respiratory problems. I don’t know what will happen if they add more emissions to what we already get,” Sharon Lavigne said, director of RISE St. James.

St. John residents march in part to raise awareness of pollution from the Denka Dupont plant. For the past 50 years, the plant has been emitting a chemical called chloroprene as part of the neoprene production process. In 2010, the EPA tightened regulations on chloroprene after finding that certain exposure levels could cause liver and lung cancers. A retrofitting plan reduced releases by 85 percent, but the amount remains above levels that the EPA deems safe.

“There is an elementary school with 400 children about 1,500 feet from that plant. They came and put in air monitors and told us those children were being exposed to chloroprene at levels hundreds of times what had been deemed safe. We went to the school board and they did nothing. Those children are still there. We are suffering, and it seems like no one in the government cares,” said Robert Taylor, director of Concerned Citizens of St. John.

The governor’s office did not respond to a request for comment regarding their plans to meet with citizens in either St. John or St. James parishes. Lack of communication and perceived collusion between the state and the petrochemical industry has fueled tense exchanges between government officials and local residents.

“They said we are fear mongers, and liars,” Taylor said. “The director of the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality warned people not to trust us, but we are not liars. The federal government came down here and told us we have the highest risk for cancer in the nation.”

LDEQ denies accusing Taylor of fear-mongering. “The secretary was not referring to Mr. Taylor when he used that term,” Gregory Langley from LDEQ said. “We support public discourse and individuals’ right to peaceful protest.”

In addition to a lack of action in St. John, protestors point to recently passed legislation protecting pipelines as evidence of collusion between the government and the petrochemical industry.

Last year, Louisiana lawmakers passed a bill widening the definition of “critical infrastructure” to include pipelines and pipeline construction sites, making it a felony to trespass on either. Authorities in St. Martin Parish later arrested fifteen people under the new law during the construction of the Bayou Bridge Pipeline, including a freelance journalist covering the actions, who have posted bond and wait for parish prosecutors to decide whether or not they will go ahead with the cases.

“I’m facing up to ten years in prison,” said Anne White Hat at a press conference in Baton Rouge on May 24. White Hat, a member of the Rosebud Sioux tribe who also protested the Dakota Access Pipeline and has spent ten years as an advocate in the Atchafalaya Basin. White Hat was arrested for trespassing while on private land with permission from the landowner. A judge later ruled that pipeline construction workers and security guards trespassed during their arrest of White Hat and several other activists.

“Who is being held accountable for breaking the law?” Anne Rolfes, executive director of the Louisiana Bucket Brigade, said. “This company made a flagrant decision to trespass and work on this pipeline without the permission of landowners.”

This week, the Bucket Brigade, along with other environmental organizations, White Hat, and other people arrested for felony trespass, joined the Center for Constitutional Rights in filing suit against Attorney General Jeff Landry, alleging that their arrest, and the new pipeline protection law, violate first amendment rights.

“Landowners who have pipelines running through their property have also joined us in this suit,” Rolfes said. “This bill protecting pipelines was written and pushed through the legislature by the Louisiana Mid-Continent Oil and Gas Association to subvert protest, and will also have impacts on fisherpeople and others who live and work in the Atchafalaya Basin.”

In a statement, Attorney General Jeff Landry’s office said that it will “vigorously defend the law as our State has an obvious and compelling reason to protect vital infrastructure from criminal trespass, damage, or possible attack.” The Louisiana Mid-Continent Oil and Gas Association has also defended the bill as important to secure pipelines from threats of terrorism or other damage.

“We already have laws that say you can’t commit acts of terrorism and that it’s illegal to damage private property. They are passing this legislation now to prevent legal protest,” Rolfes said.

Rolfes positions the March Against Death Alley in part as an act of defiance against recent legislative efforts to curtail protest against the petrochemical industry.

“They passed legislation suppressing dissent, so we march to protest that bad legislation and show that people won’t be repressed,” Rolfes said. “The industry seems really powerful, and they can get bills passed quickly, but their efforts to curtail protest and use the levers of the state in their favor show their attempts to hide public outcry. They are not going to change our minds. We know the industry is dangerous for us.”

This article originally published in the May 27, 2019 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.