Title
Calling on the Trump Administration to reverse the termination of an Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) grant awarded to the City of Philadelphia to support efforts to address flooding in Eastwick, a community that has been disproportionately impacted by environmental injustice and hardships.
Body
WHEREAS, The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) awarded one million dollars to Philadelphia through the Environmental Justice Government-to-Government (EJG2G) grant that was intended to support of the City's efforts to address flooding in Eastwick, a notoriously vulnerable Southwest Philadelphia community; and
WHEREAS, Eastwick is a community that has historically been disproportionately impacted by environmental injustice and hardships. In the 1950s, Eastwick was a target of Urban Renewal, wherein the City of Philadelphia's Redevelopment Authority utilized eminent domain to seize properties and relocate 8,000 residents. An environmental assessment in 1970 determined the area was prone to adverse conditions like landfill pollution and major flood risks, and the development froze. The Urban Renewal developed on flood-mitigating marshland, exacerbating the flood risks for an already low-lying area; and
WHEREAS, In addition to Eastwick's vulnerable geographic location and unjust development, the neighborhood borders the Clearview Landfill, which operated without a permit for twenty years, from the 1950s to the 1970s. Clearview landfill was used to dispose of commercial, municipal and industrial waste collected by the City of Philadelphia and Delaware County; and
WHEREAS, An investigation in 2011 by the EPA found contaminants that created unacceptable risks to human health in the groundwater, surface and subsurface soils, and fish in the creeks and waterways surrounding Eastwick. While the EPA is continuing the cleanup of this site, each flood holds the dangerous possibility of contamination of the local creeks and groundwater; and
WHEREAS, The residents...
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