Healthy Communities News
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| 2009-04-22 | |
| In celebration of Earth Day, a bi-partisan group of state senators from across Pennsylvania came together today to discuss and highlight legislative efforts to protect the Commonwealth’s environment and promote a new, clean energy future. | |
| 2009-03-19 | |
| Extreme weather, caused in part by global warming, is increasing the health threat posed by the country’s most toxic waste sites, known as Superfund sites. Superfund: In the Eye of the Storm, a new report from The Center for Health, Environment, and Justice (CHEJ) released by PennEnvironment and the Alliance for a Clean Environment profiles the cleanup efforts at numerous Superfund sites across the nation, which have been affected by extreme weather events and hampered by funding shortfalls. | |
| 2006-09-22 | |
| PHILADELPHIA--The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency today issued two actions concerning the Toxic Release Inventory (TRI) program. The first is a proposed rule that will have an effect on the amount of information available to the public. The second is a notification to Congress that EPA intends to move forward to change TRI's reporting frequency from annually to every other year. | |
| 2006-09-13 | |
| Philadelphia, PA With one of the most broadly supported public health proposals facing a potential veto by Philadelphia Mayor John Street, members of the medical community came out in force this morning to call for the passage of the Smoke-Free Workplaces legislation. | |
| 2006-06-05 | |
| PHILADELPHIA—After nearly five years of debate and inaction, Philadelphia City Council passed a much-needed and highly supported public health policy in the form of the Smoke-Free Workplace legislation by a vote of 9-6. | |
| 2006-02-07 | |
| HARRISBURG--The Pennsylvania House of Representatives took the first steps to permanently fund recycling programs in the Commonwealth today by passing House Bill 1902, the Recycling Fund Reauthorization Act. The bill sponsored by Representative Carol Rubley (Chester County) indefinitely extends the $2 per ton fee on landfill trash disposal that helps fund more than 900 curbside recycling programs across the state. | |
| 2005-12-21 | |
| Pennsylvania’s consumers will pay $328 million more than they should at the gas pump in 2006 because of shortsighted automobile fuel economy policies, according to a report released today by the PennEnvironment Research & Policy Center. | |
| 2005-12-08 | |
| PHILADELPHIA--On the eve of Superfund's 25th anniversary, a new report released today by PennEnvironment finds Superfund's ability to respond to toxic cleanups in Pennsylvania and nationwide jeopardized by persistent funding shortfalls. | |
| 2005-12-06 | |
| PHILADELPHIA--PennEnvironment urged lawmakers today to take action to reduce the burden of soaring energy costs while highlighting easy steps Pennsylvania homeowners can take to reduce their heating costs this winter. | |
| 2005-12-01 | |
| PHILADELPHIA--A new PennEnvironment analysis of a proposed Bush Administration rule reveals that residents of Pennsylvania would lose valuable information about the amounts and type of harmful chemicals discharged by industrial facilities in their neighborhoods if the rule is finalized. | |
| 2005-10-19 | |
| PHILADELPHIA--Residents of Philadelphia's Bella Vista neighborhood held a meeting tonight to hear a panel of experts and local officials answer questions about Philadelphia Gas Works (PGW) plans to build a liquefied natural gas (LNG) import facility in northeast Philadelphia. PennEnvironment's Nathan Willcox spoke on the panel, as did City Councilman Frank DiCicco, and representatives from the city fire and police departments, the U.S. Coast Guard, Clean Water Action, and ActionPA. | |
| 2005-10-10 | |
| By a narrow vote (212-210), the House passed the "No Relief" energy bill sponsored by Rep. Joe Barton (R-TX) this afternoon. | |
| 2005-09-27 | |
| Last week, the House Resources Committee approved controversial legislation that will fundamentally alter and weaken the Endangered Species Act. Resources Committee Chairman Pombo, the most outspoken critic of the Endangered Species Act in Congress, has led this effort. The deceptively titled "Threatened and Endangered Species Recovery Act of 2005" is on a fast track for a full vote of the House of Representatives for this Wednesday or Thursday, September 28th or 29th. | |
| 2005-09-27 | |
| In the wake of already high gas prices exacerbated by Hurricane Katrina, drilling proponents have increasingly called on Congress to allow oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, claiming that drilling can be done with little impact on the environment. But a new report by PennEnvironment demonstrates that oil spills on Alaska’s North Slope have increased sharply since 2000. The report release comes just weeks before an anticipated vote in Congress over a budget bill likely to include provisions for oil drilling in the Arctic Refuge. | |
| 2005-09-15 | |
| Not a single state senator received a 100% score on PennEnvironment’s bi-annual environmental scorecard, while four local Philadelphia County legislators voted with the environment over 80% of the time. | |
| 2005-08-04 | |
| PHILADELPHIA-Oil refineries needlessly put 4.4 million people in the tri-state area of Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Delaware at risk of injury or death in the event of an accident or deliberate attack, according to a new report released today by the PennEnvironment. | |
| 2005-02-01 | |
| WASHINGTON, DC--Yesterday's train derailment in East Deer, PA is a grim reminder that Congress has still not acted to pass legislation that would prevent accidents at large chemical facilities, according to PennEnvironment. This accident came right on the heels of the worst chemical railroad accident in the US since 1978, which caused 9 fatalities in Graniteville, South Carolina on January 6, 2005. | |
| 2004-05-27 | |
| PHILADELPHIA-Pennsylvania consumers will spend almost twice as much as they should to travel to Memorial Day hotspots, because of shortsighted automobile fuel economy policies, according to a report released today by PennEnvironment. | |
| 2004-04-21 | |
| PHILADELPHIA--Pennsylvania's environment faces a long list of threats because of the Bush administration's environmental policies, according to a new Earth Day report released by PennEnvironment. The report, "Pennsylvania's Environment at Risk" details the local impacts of recent decisions at the federal level to weaken environmental protections. | |
| 2004-04-08 | |
| PHILADELPHIA--Chemical facilities owned by companies enrolled in an industry-sponsored voluntary safety program have had more than 1,800 accidents per year since 1990, according to a new report released today by the PennEnvironment. | |
| 2004-03-02 | |
| PHILADELPHIA-A commonly used flame retardant threatens health and illustrates the need to reform U.S. toxic chemical policy, according to a new report released today by PennEnvironment. In lab tests, scientists have linked decabrominated diphenyl ether ("Deca")"a chemical closely related to two flame retardants recently banned in California" to health effects including neurological damage or permanent memory loss, and have detected the chemical in the breast milk of American women at higher levels than anywhere else in the world. | |
| 2002-10-10 | |
| Many of the nation's largest corporations, with help from the Bush administration, are destroying some of America's last wild places for short-term economic gain, according to a report released today by PennEnvironment. "The Big Buck Awards" recognize companies and several government officials that have done the most damage to America's public lands and other resources. | |
| 2002-09-05 | |
| Philadelphia - Every year, more than 25 calls are placed to public health officials in Pennsylvania regarding suspected clusters of diseases ranging from childhood leukemia to multiple sclerosis. But according to a report released by PennEnvironment, an environmental advocacy organization, disease cluster investigations are often delayed or deterred because most states lack adequate tracking for chronic diseases. At the same time, many cluster investigations are aided by the presence of good information on disease and environmental exposures. | |
| 2002-06-25 | |
| PHILADELPHIA--Trucks and trains each carrying 240 times the radioactive material released at Hiroshima could rumble through Pennsylvania communities if the Senate votes in the next few weeks to allow the Yucca Mountain project to go ahead, according to a report released today by PennEnvironment. Radioactive Roads and Rails: Hauling Nuclear Waste Through our Neighborhoods details the Department of Energy's proposal for more than 105,000 truck shipments of highly radioactive waste from all across the country to Yucca Mountain, Nevada. | |

