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Yahoo
23-05-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Housing advocates warn public encampment ban carries risks for Louisiana
A relocation notice is posted in front of a makeshift shelter at the Earhart Boulevard homeless encampment Jan. 13, 2025. Those living near the corridor were take to a state-operated transitional center in Gentilly. (John Gray/Verite News) A bill requiring local governments to enforce a ban on sleeping on public property passed through a Louisiana legislative committee Wednesday within the hearing's final minutes, though housing advocates and groups that serve the homeless say it remains problematic in its current form. The proposal, House Bill 619 by Rep. Alonzo Knox, D-New Orleans, would direct local governments to enforce a ban on 'public camping' or face possible lawsuits. Local governments could instead designate government-sanctioned encampments – much like the recent state-operated 'Transition Center' in New Orleans – in areas where they wouldn't 'materially affect the property value' of homes or businesses. Any resident or business within 1,000 feet of an illegal public camp, as well as a local district attorney, would be able to sue local governments if they failed to enforce the ban. Knox's bill also requires homeless service providers who receive state funds to provide detailed documentation of their work to municipalities upon request or else lose their funding. Unity of Greater New Orleans, the leading nonprofit serving the city's homeless population, has drawn scrutiny from Knox and others for not providing more specific data on how it spends federal dollars. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX Knox has repeatedly accused housing nonprofits of waste and decried the 'homeless industrial complex.' He pushed for the legislative audit of New Orleans' Continuum of Care providers earlier this year. It found that the city and Unity spent $216 million between 2019-24, with the majority of funds going toward permanent supportive housing. The audit also found that shelters need better oversight to ensure they're meeting minimum health and safety standards. When Knox's measure was brought up Wednesday in the House Committee on Health and Welfare, it was after hearings on two other bills spanned more than three hours. Chairman Rep. Dustin Miller, D-Opelousas, noted that 11 people wanted to speak against Knox's bill but wouldn't have time because the House had already convened on the floor. Committee members were given the option to defer Knox's bill until next week but chose instead to continue the meeting. With limited time, Miller limited the opposition to just three speakers. Two attendees who've experienced homelessness were among those who didn't have the chance to speak. Knox agreed to amendments suggested by Rep Chris Turner, R-Ruston, which included changes in how the bill defines dwelling structures and extended the timeline for encampment clearing notices. Committee members suggested that the amendments should remove opposition to the bill. But opponents said the amendments did not allay their concerns, and in some cases even increased the risk of harm. The state-sanctioned encampments proposed in Knox's bill parallel Gov. Jeff Landry's recent transition center in New Orleans, set up at a warehouse in a remote industrial section of the city. Unsheltered people were taken there from encampments downtown just before the Super Bowl. Knox toured and praised the site while it was open, but his bill has sparked questions about how money for housing can be spent most efficiently. Landry's transition center, which cost about $17 million, ultimately placed 108 people in permanent supportive housing. Since 2023, Unity of Greater New Orleans has spent $2.3 million to permanently house 275 people, according to the audit. The state spent about $100,000 per person on the warehouse site over 10 weeks, compared to the $20,000 per year it costs to provide housing and support services per person, said Angela Owczarek with the Jane Place Neighborhood Sustainability Initiative, a housing rights advocacy. A pandemic-era emergency rental assistance program, which ended last year, cost about $3,000 per New Orleans household to prevent homelessness for those facing eviction, Owczarek said. Elsa Dimitradis, executive director of Acadiana Regional Coalition on Homelessness and Housing, testified that she had 'serious concerns' about Knox's bill, particularly the mandate about sharing client information with local governments. She warned the potential violations of privacy and disability laws could jeopardize $93 million in federal funding for housing nonprofits across the state. Unity of Greater New Orleans is already suing the state for trying to compel the organization to produce protected information about its clients, such as medical histories and Social Security numbers. Dimitradis also testified that the bill as written 'appears to allow for open-ended demands at any time without clear standards or limitations,' which is 'an operational threat.' Hannah Adams of the National Housing Law Project argued the bill should provide exceptions to the ban if local governments are actively working to rehouse people. 'Clearing an encampment when social workers are actively working to rehouse individuals does interfere with their ability to maintain contact and secure long-term housing for their clients,' Adams told the committee. The audit, likewise, noted that unexpected NOPD sweeps and state pressure to clear encampments contributed to delays in the city's rehousing efforts. Monique Blossom, director of policy at Louisiana Fair Housing Action Center, also warned that by directing state officials to inspect group homes, the bill risks violating the federal Fair Housing Act, opening the state to liability. The bill could lead to the shuttering of some group homes, including domestic violence shelters, sober living homes and even homes for seriously ill children who need to stay near hospitals, she said Donna Paramore, executive director of the Travelers Aid Society of Greater New Orleans, told Illuminator the group is in 'strong opposition' to the bill despite the amendments. 'The framework it proposes still undermines essential safeguards for vulnerable populations,' Paramore said. The issues outlined by Dimitradis 'could jeopardize federal funding' and 'create serious legal and ethical conflicts,' she added. Paramore also noted her nonprofit undergoes an independent financial audit each year and has never had an adverse finding. She said that instead of banning public encampments, the state should expand supportive housing, behavioral health services and trauma-informed care. Knox dismissed objections at the close of the hearing, calling some 'technical and nitpicking.' He rejected Adams' request for leniency when social workers are actively working on rehousing someone. 'If that language were to be included, they will always be 'actively working,'' Knox said. The representative's office did not respond to a request for comment after hearing. Knox's bill was advanced to the House floor without objection.
Yahoo
23-05-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
New Orleans activists make the trek to protest Mahmoud Khalil's detention
Demonstrators gathered across from the Central Louisiana ICE facility in Jena to protest Mahmoud Khalil's detention on Thursday, May 22, 2025. (John Gray/Verite News) JENA – A group of protesters headed Thursday from New Orleans to the Central Louisiana ICE Processing Center in LaSalle Parish to demand the release of Mahmoud Khalil. The former Columbia University student and pro-Palestine activist was arrested by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in March and has since been held in detention. Khalil was in immigration court Thursday for a hearing on a motion from his attorneys to terminate his deportation proceedings and release him. The hearing, which began in the morning, was still ongoing by mid-afternoon. By early afternoon, hundreds of protesters had gathered in the grass across from the detention facility, chanting, flying Palestinian flags and playing drums. Some members of the group kneeled and prayed on the street. Khalil, a legal permanent resident who was born in Syria, faces deportation for his involvement with pro-Palestinian protests at Columbia last year. He is one of a number of people the Trump administration has detained over their political activities in the last several months, drawing alarm from free speech activists. Kristi Dayemo, 29, arrived at First Grace Methodist Church on Canal Street for a bus ride to the ICE facility in Jena, along with other New Orleans residents. Dayemo said she comes from a service-oriented family and that she has a spirit to help people. Her parents raised her to have a duty to make the world a better place. 'If we allow him to be arrested without a warrant and deported from this country it calls into question all students that aren't from here, whether or not they're allowed to have their First Amendment rights,' Dayemo said. On the way to the facility from New Orleans Thursday morning, organizers handed out snacks and prepared the riders for their day of action. Sabrine Mohamad, a human rights lawyer traveling with the group, spoke to riders on the bus ahead of the arrival to Jena. 'Today is so much bigger than Mahmoud, it's so much bigger than all of the students that have been kidnapped by ICE. This is really a vital moment in the history of the United States democracy and Palestine,' Mohamad said. On the way to the facility, organizers handed out snacks and prepared the riders for their day of action. Protesters discussed current events, while removing biometric authentication from their phones and writing loved ones' phone numbers on their arms in preparation for potential arrests. Sabrine Mohamad, a human rights lawyer traveling with the group, spoke to riders on the bus ahead of the arrival to Jena. 'Today is so much bigger than Mahmoud, it's so much bigger than all of the students that have been kidnapped by ICE. This is really a vital moment in the history of the United States democracy and palestine' Mohamad said. Once arriving in Jena, the New Orleans protesters joined with another group that had come in from Texas. Organizers disembarked from their buses, prepared their drums and signs and began marching towards the ICE detention center. The group was greeted by facility guards who kept them from setting foot on the property. Noor Abdalla, Khalid's wife, came out to the crowd to thank them for their demonstrations, saying that they are keeping Khalil going as he faces deportation. Abdalla had visited with Khalil on Thursday with their newborn son, Deen. It was his first meeting with the boy, who was born while Khalil was in detention. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX This article first appeared on Verite News New Orleans and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
Yahoo
20-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Electric bills are rising while pathways for aid are threatened at state, federal level
A utility crew restores power at a New Orleans intersection after Hurricane Francine in September 2024. (John Gray/Verite News) NEW ORLEANS – The recent end to a state-led energy efficiency program combined with massive layoffs last month at the federal agency that provides electric bill assistance to low-income households have residents of greater New Orleans worried about how they are going to cool their homes during the hottest months of the year. The Louisiana Public Service Commission, which regulates electric utilities for most of the state, eliminated an energy efficiency program that it had been working on for over a decade in mid-April. In early April, the Trump administration fired all of the Low Income Energy Assistance Program's staff, leaving the future of the program in jeopardy. Without state-level plans to increase energy assistance, spending on electricity will probably rise, experts said. And with LIHEAP in the lurch, people might not be able to access assistance they need to pay those high bills. Logan Burke, the executive director of the Alliance for Affordable Energy called the LIHEAP cuts 'outrageous,' especially because there are already few avenues for energy bill assistance. Burke said that Louisiana spent 7% of its LIHEAP funds on weatherizing homes last year, and that if LIHEAP doesn't continue, then there will be no low-income weatherization or efficiency programs in the state. 'The problem here is that those are the minimal backstops that people have depended on for decades — the LIHEAP dollars — both for bill assistance and weatherization of housing, and without them, we simply lose billions of dollars of bill assistance and efficiency upgrades in low income housing,' Burke said. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX Local LIHEAP administrators are silent on how the layoffs will affect residents or the future funding. The Louisiana Housing Corporation — which is in charge of distributing funds to parish organizations that then go through applications and work with residents to provide aid — did not respond to phone calls. Neither did JeffCAP, Jefferson Parish's LIHEAP distributor, or Total Community Action in New Orleans. Even though the average unit cost of electricity is lower in Louisiana than much of the rest of the country, Louisianians use the highest amounts, leading to high bills, said Logan Burke, executive director of the Alliance for Affordable Energy, and average rates have only been increasing in recent years. Between 2018 and 2024, the base rate for energy bills in Louisiana increased 40%, and is expected to increase 30% in the next 15 years, according to analysis from the financial consulting firm BAI Group. Extreme weather, old housing infrastructure and Louisiana's reliance on natural gas, a volatile market, are all partly responsible for the high prices, experts said. 'A lot of our housing stock is old and simply isn't good at retaining heated and cooled air,' Burke said. 'So a lot of our energy is just wasted around leaks and cracks around our windows and doors.' For the past 14 years, the Louisiana Public Service Commission had been working on an energy efficiency program that would have helped residents identify ways to consume less energy by making every unit of power go further — through renovations such as increased insulation in homes or upgraded thermostats, Burke said. But the commission abruptly voted to dissolve the program less than a month before contractors were slated to report to the commission about how the program would work. Republican commissioners said the administrative costs of the program would be too high. The decision frustrated residents of the greater New Orleans area who struggle to pay their energy bills and were looking for state support to lower costs. 'Because if you go around sealing up all these cracks and holes in these old houses, don't you think now they're going to use less to heat and cool their homes?' said Dorginia Lucas, a Metairie resident. 'That's why I would drop it too if I was them. 'Why would I help you lower your bill?' That's how I look at it.' Lucas said she has been working since 14 years old, but still struggles to pay her utility bills, which range between $249 to $440. She said dealing with Entergy's billing system is frustrating and overwhelming. A recent report by the Louisiana Association of United Ways, a coalition of nonprofits that connect residents with health and financial aid resources, found that wages haven't been increasing at the same rate as basic necessities in recent years, making household costs difficult to cover, even in families with steady incomes. And utility assistance has been one of the most sought-after aid requests over the past decade in Orleans Parish (with an exception in 2021 after Hurricane Ida), according to caller data from counseling service center Vialink. Entergy distributes funds to nonprofits for its utility assistance program, 'The Power to Care,' that aids seniors and people with disabilities. The New Orleans Council on Aging distributes those funds to residents in Orleans Parish. Howard Rodgers, the executive director of the New Orleans Council on Aging, said there is a 'tremendous need' for assistance paying utility bills in the city. Rodgers said seniors particularly need assistance because they might rely on benefits and need to pay for medication, which might lead them to deprioritize utility payments to the detriment of their health. The New Orleans Council on Aging helps around 10,000 to 15,000 people every year through 'The Power to Care' program, Rodgers said, and most funds come from charitable donations that Entergy matches. But the program has also changed in recent years. Due to high demand, the Council on Aging no longer accepts walk-ins for utility bill assistance. Additionally, those seeking help have a $500 cap on assistance every year. Rodgers said this allows the council to provide assistance to more people. That might not go too far for many residents. A 2023 Verite News analysis found that the average Entergy bill in New Orleans was $179 in 2022. And consumer advocates worry that the situation could get worse. Last year, the New Orleans City Council voted to approve the sale of Entergy New Orleans's gas business utility to a company backed by private equity. Energy advocates and community members spoke out against the sale, saying that it might increase rates for energy users. Louisiana's investments in exporting liquified natural gas abroad could also lead to higher energy costs at home, according to a Department of Energy report from last September. Jannie Yarbrough, a retired New Orleans resident, said she lives alone and pays around $185 to $200 per month, a squeeze on fixed retirement income. Yarbrough said the city and state could be doing more to lower energy costs. Yarbough said she could ask her daughter to help out, but doesn't want to depend on her. 'I'm blessed that I have a daughter that could pay, but I'm not trying to depend on my child,' Yarbrough said. Despite the rising costs of gas, public assistance pathways for utility payments are also dwindling at the local level. Last July, the city's Office of Community Development shuttered its emergency rental and utility assistance program after four years. The office didn't respond to requests for comment. Entergy has its own energy efficiency program, but it still gets paid for funds it may lose from lower energy energy consumption — a program called 'Quick Start,' according to the Alliance for Affordable Energy. Quick Start will expire at the end of the year, and on May 19 the Louisiana Public Service Commission voted to initiate a three month process to look at and make changes to the program and another that helps public entities with energy efficiency. Under an independent, state-run energy efficiency program, Entergy wouldn't be able to earn back potential profits it lost from energy efficiency upgrades. Rodgers said the Council on Aging is anticipating a higher demand for utility assistance since the LIHEAP layoffs. He said he has already spoken to Entergy employees about the possibility of the end of LIHEAP. An Entergy New Orleans spokesperson did not respond to questions about if and how assistance pathways might change if LIHEAP ended, but said the company's rates are consistently below the national average and that customers can contact the utility for bill management resources. 'We won't know what to do until it happens,' Rodgers said. 'We can think about it, plan for it, but then we are just going to have to be reactionary when that happens.' SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX This article first appeared on Verite News New Orleans and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
Yahoo
09-05-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Effort to make ‘intentional exposure' to STDs a crime in Louisiana fails
Rep. Patricia Moore, D-Monroe, at the Louisiana State Capitol on Wednesday, May 7, 2025. (John Gray/Verite News) A Louisiana House committee shelved a bill Wednesday that would have made it illegal for someone to 'intentionally' expose another person to an 'incurable' sexually transmitted disease after steep concerns that criminalization could worsen the state's proliferating STD rates. This was the second time Rep. Patricia Moore, D-Monroe, had introduced such a bill in five years, despite opposition from public and sexual health advocates as well as people living with STDs. Moore said at a House Administration of Criminal Justice committee meeting that she wants to create a law that offers people recourse for when someone 'knowingly and intentionally' doesn't disclose their STD status. The bill would have created a new felony, carrying up to 10 years in prison and $5,000 in fines, for someone who knows they have an 'incurable' STD and exposes someone else without their knowledge and consent. Those penalties would have increased if the person exposed to the STD is a minor, over 65 years old or has an intellectual disability. The exposure under either charge would have needed to come through sexual contact, donating bodily fluids such as blood or sharing needles. After pushback during public testimony, Moore voluntarily deferred House Bill 76. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX In 2023, Louisiana had the highest rate of chlamydia cases in the country and ranked in the top 10 for syphilis, HIV and gonorrhea, according to data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The legislation comes as other states have repealed or modernized their own laws criminalizing STDs, especially HIV, over the past decade to align with the current medical landscape. An attempt to update Louisiana's own law criminalizing HIV failed last year. Before the bill was deferred, Moore amended it to just focus on 'incurable' STDs, removing a proposal to create a new misdemeanor charge for exposing someone to a curable STD. The four most common incurable sexually transmitted infections are hepatitis B, herpes simplex virus (HSV), human papillomavirus (HPV) and HIV. While no treatments exist to eliminate these viruses, all are treatable and manageable with medication, and HPV can sometimes clear up on its own. But the groups who opposed the bill, including several members of the Louisiana Coalition Against Criminalization and Health, said the bill would have the same problems as another state law on the books that criminalizes 'intentional exposure' to HIV. In the Deep South, health care fights echo civil rights battles Data on how many people have been charged under the law is challenging to compile, but UCLA's Williams Institute identified 147 allegations of HIV-related crimes between 2011 and 2022 in Louisiana, though researchers said that number could be higher. Dietz, the coalition's state coordinator, told the committee that said both the current law and bill contain 'legal loopholes' that allow the law to be used against people living with HIV in their personal relationships, in part because it's on the person living with the STD to prove they received the accuser's consent. In 2024, Dietz and other members of a state task force charged with researching the criminalization of HIV found that Louisiana's current legal approach 'can actually interfere with work to end the HIV epidemic,' according to its report. 'We've already made recommendations for the way the existing law allows for environments of coercion because again … proving that you disclosed your status is challenging,' Dietz said. 'Even if you were to have proof in your hand, even if someone were to write it down, what if someone ripped it up? Or you lost it?' St. Tammany Parish resident Katie Darling, who also serves as the vice chair of the Louisiana Democratic Party, shared the testimony of one of her residents who said she had been living with HIV for 25 years. Darling said the resident had her first husband sign an affidavit acknowledging that he knew she had HIV and consented, even though she was taking medication that prevented transmission. When the marriage turned physically abusive, the resident testified that her former husband threatened to take her to court over her HIV status. 'Thankfully, I had the document he signed on file at my doctor's office. But what if I hadn't?' Darling read from the testimony. The St. Tammany resident has now had her second husband sign a similar affidavit. Those who opposed the bill also acknowledged that there is a need for people to have justice when they are unknowingly given an STD, whether that's under new legislation or current laws around sexual assault. Jennifer Tokarski, who is living with HPV, testified in support of the bill. She shared the story of her former husband who had sex outside of their marriage, refused to admit it and ultimately transmitted the virus to her. 'After five years in what I believed was a faithful relationship and Catholic marriage, I became severely ill,' Tokarski testified. 'My husband attended appointments, rejected STD testing, reassuring doctors we were monogamous.' When she learned of his infidelity, she said he battered her and filed for divorce. 'Only then did I learn he had infected me with a lifelong and incurable STD,' Tokarski said. 'This is not just a private betrayal, this is a public health failure.' Moore and Tokarski said they believed such a law would help promote honest conversations about sexual health that would lower the spread and give survivors a voice. Studies have shown that criminalizing STDs do little to lower the number of cases and increase stigma. During testimony, public health advocates said Louisiana should invest more heavily in resources for testing and treatment as well as sexual health education, which isn't required in schools. At Wednesday's meeting, Moore said she planned to work with the bill's opponents to improve the language and possibly return the legislation to the committee if there's time before the session. Otherwise, Moore said she will bring a form of the legislation back next year. SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE This article first appeared on Verite News New Orleans and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
Yahoo
06-05-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
St. James environmental advocates feel ‘left'out' after recent pro-industry votes
Sharon Lavigne, founder of the environmental justice group Rise St. James, holds a sign while pointing out where her property was damaged by high wind during Hurricane Francine. (Drew Costley/ Verite News) As a resident of St. James Parish, Barbara Washington is already surrounded by plastics manufacturers, chemical companies and natural gas refineries that populate the parish. But the local government is looking to pave the way for more industry — at the expense of her community's health, she told Verite News. Washington, a co-founder of environmental justice group Inclusive Louisiana, spoke with Verite days after the parish council voted to approve two motions that showed their support for growing the presence of the petrochemical industry in town last month. The council approved at its April 2 meeting property tax exemptions for Air Products and Chemicals, along with a resolution expressing support for Formosa's efforts to bring a plastics plant to the parish. The developments come as the Trump administration pulls support for environmental justice communities around the United States and threatens to roll back environmental regulations that could protect communities like the one Washington lives in. Despite a federal court reopening a lawsuit brought by Inclusive Louisiana and other local environmentalists that could pause new industrial development, Washington said it feels 'overwhelming' to fight against various industrial projects at once. That it doesn't slow her down, though. 'We've been here before the plants ever came here,' Washington said. 'And we know something is wrong, and we keep saying it's wrong, and they keep ignoring us.' SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX St. James Parish is located in an area known as 'Cancer Alley' for its disproportionately high cancer rates. Elevated cancer rates in parishes in the industrial corridor that stretches from New Orleans to Baton Rouge have been attributed to high levels of toxic air pollution from nearby facilities by researchers from Tulane University. Most of those facilities are located in predominantly-Black neighborhoods, which environmental justice activists have argued violates residents' civil rights. 'The segregated and racialized land use system of St. James Parish is directly traceable to land use methods necessary to the system of chattel slavery and the subsequent periods of violence, dispossession, and residential segregation white people carried out during the post-Reconstruction periods of neo-slavery and Jim Crow,' the lawsuit reads. Washington said the recent council votes came at the expense of the parish's public health and infrastructure. The council unanimously voted to grant Air Products & Chemicals, a petrochemical company in Convent, property tax breaks through the Industrial Tax Exemption program for the next decade. Washington said she was dissatisfied with the parish council's decision. 'And here we see that our highways are really in need of fixing,' Washington said. 'The burden of all of this falls on the community when they don't pay their fair share of taxes.' Air Products has resumed use of machinery that converts methane, a potent greenhouse gas, into the cleaner fuel hydrogen, which had been sitting idle since 2020, said Art George, a spokesman for the company. The plant where the machinery, called a natural gas reformer, is located is a part of the company's Gulf Coast hydrogen gas pipeline system, according to a state database. The pipeline delivers refined hydrogen gas across the coast, making it the largest hydrogen pipeline system in the world, George said. But the reformer in Convent also produces gases that speed up climate change such as carbon dioxide and pose dangers to human health such as carbon monoxide. 'We feel left out, because every time we go to the council meeting or the planning commission, it seems like their minds have already been made up [to be] pro-industry,' Washington said. 'They tell us that they're looking at the economic impact, but they're looking at wealth, and we are looking at health.' The St. James Parish Council also voted to symbolically voice support for a controversial petrochemical complex that would be one of the largest in the world if completed. Formosa's 'Sunshine Project' would manufacture plastic items and emit known carcinogens like ethylene oxide, benzene and formaldehyde into the nearby community, a predominantly Black residential neighborhood in St. James' Fifth District. The project has faced several delays due to lawsuits and permitting issues. Anthony 'AJ' Jasmin, the council parish representative for 5th district, introduced the resolution reaffirming the parish government's support for Formosa with the support of Parish President Pete Dufresne. All but one parish councilmember — Donald Nash, who represents the 7th district — voted yes on the resolution. Sharon Lavigne, the founder of environmental justice organization RISE St. James, is one of Jasmin's constituents. She said she was disappointed by the resolution he introduced. 'It felt like a betrayal,' she said. 'I feel like he let us down.' St. James Parish Council members did not respond to requests for comment. The communities around the proposed Formosa plant are already at high risk of exposure to toxic air releases, according to the Environmental Protection Agency's EJScreen, an environmental justice mapping tool that was taken down by the Trump administration in February. 'As a citizen of St. James Parish, naturally, me being here with all of the toxic pollution that we are breathing and getting sick from and dying from cancer, I'm very disappointed in them passing a resolution that will continue to harm our air, our water and our land,' Washington said. The parish council passed the resolution despite the troubled economic outlook for plastic production. An April report from the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analytics recommended that Formosa abandon its project in St. James. Oversaturation in the plastics market, slow industrial growth and shifts to sustainable goods contribute to the poor projections for the project and the polyethylene sector as a whole, the report reads, and the company's performance has declined over the past four years. Despite the bleak picture painted by the report, a Formosa spokesperson, Janile Parks, reaffirmed the company's commitment to the project. 'FG is disappointed by the delays the project has faced, but remains confident that all permits were properly issued,' Parks said in a statement. 'We do not intend to give up the fight for this important economic development project that will benefit the people of St. James Parish and Louisiana.' But Formosa's claim that it has all the permits necessary for construction is 'misleading,' said Mike Brown, an Earthjustice attorney. Earthjustice represents Rise St. James in their lawsuit against Formosa. Brown said Formosa can't meet the newer and stricter standards for fine particulate matter and ethylene oxide emissions, which means that the company might not be able to renew expired permits. And although the Trump administration announced last month that the EPA is working to roll back standards for particulate matter, Brown said that effort might take years. Formosa also cannot begin construction until it receive a wetlands permit from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. In 2021, the Army Corps ordered Formosa to complete a full environmental review of the project, a complex process that takes years to complete. Parks did not respond to questions about whether or not the environmental review process had even begun, or when it is set to finish. She said the project has been paused for the past four years while Formosa works with the Army Corps. Lavigne said Rise St. James will do everything in its power to stop Formosa from completing the plans, including calling on other organizations and activists to join. 'We're not gonna roll over and say, 'Oh no, we lost,'' Lavigne said. 'We will still fight. If we lose, we will continue to fight.' SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE This article first appeared on Verite News New Orleans and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
