Activists in a mostly black section of Macomb County claim that pollution concerns at a park and school result from “environmental racism” by local officials, reflecting a trend that they say spans several decades.
The pressing issue involves a former waste dump on Quinn Road in Clinton Township, which is emitting methane gas from below the Prince Drewry Park, and potentially threatening the adjacent Robbie Hall Parker Elementary School.
“If this happened in a white neighborhood, people would be up in arms demanding a quick resolution to the problem,” said Greg Murray, director of the Michigan Advocacy Coalition (MAC), a group that operates similar to the NAACP.
Critics say township and state officials made little effort to warn residents and parents of Parker Elementary students when it was discovered in July that the methane levels underground could present the threat of a fire or explosion if not properly vented.
Murray noted that two landfills and one trash incinerator operated in the neighborhood along Quinn Road (the equivalent of a 14 ½ mile road), east of Gratiot, over the past several decades.
“There were large swaths of land throughout Clinton Township in the 1960s and 1970s, so it’s by no means an accident, we believe, that these facilities were placed in the Quinn Road community – placed there intentionally,” he said. “That’s the very definition of environmental racism.”
The Parker Elementary School lies adjacent to a former garbage dump with high levels of methane gas that could be dangerous.
Clinton Township Supervisor Bob Cannon said the state is addressing the problem at the park. As for Murray’s claims of a history of environmental racism, “That’s totally incorrect. Time will prove (Murray) wrong. What’s out there, that’s just the way the township was developed,” Cannon said.
The state Department of Environment, Great Lakes and Energy (EGLE) – formerly the Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) – alerted officials in the summer about high levels of methane gas.
Since then, Murray said that Cannon, county Board of Commissioners Chairman Bob Smith and Congressman Andy Levin have not responded adequately to the prospect of a township park and an elementary school becoming a dangerous — and perhaps deadly — area.
Methane, a byproduct of rotting garbage, can be dangerous if it seeps into a building or other confined space rather than vanishing in the atmosphere.
An August public forum was organized by EGLE, which mailed notifications to 15 residences surrounding the park. Only three residents showed up. Subsequent plans by MAC to hold a large community event never took shape.
After the August gathering, the Clinton Township Fire Department installed natural gas detection meters in the Park Elementary School and offered them to the surrounding community.
This is an excerpt from a column I wrote for Deadline Detroit.
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