September, 09 2010, 02:07pm EDT
For Immediate Release
Contact:
Kathleen Sutcliffe, Earthjustice, (202) 667-4500, ext. 235
New York to Force Household Cleaner Giants to Reveal Chemical Ingredients
First-of-its kind disclosure cheered by health, consumer, worker, and environmental advocates
ALBANY, N.Y.
For the first time, the State of New York will begin requiring household cleaning companies to reveal the chemical ingredients in their products and any health risks they pose.
The move was triggered by public health and environmental advocates,
who urged New York's Department of Environmental Conservation to enforce
disclosure requirements dating back more than 30 years. Independent
studies show a link between many chemicals commonly found in cleaning
products and health effects ranging from nerve damage to hormone
disruption. With growing concern about the potential hazards of
chemicals in these products, the advocates mounted a campaign pressing
the State to uphold consumers' right to know and begin enforcing the
33-year-old law.
The first-of-its-kind policy could have national implications, as
momentum builds here and abroad for toxic chemical reform. Congress is
considering legislation to overhaul U.S. chemicals policy and in July
debated a bill forcing the chemical industry to prove the safety of a
chemical before it could be used in products. Internationally, companies
are preparing to comply with a similar European law (known as REACH)
already taking effect.
"Full ingredient disclosure is a critical step toward ensuring safer,
healthier products," said Kathy Curtis, policy director from Clean New
York. "Consumers around the country will benefit from New York's
leadership."
Last year, on behalf of Women's Voices for the Earth, Environmental
Advocates of New York, New York Public Interest Research Group,
Riverkeeper, Sierra Club, and American Lung Association in New York, the
nonprofit law firm Earthjustice sued
household cleaning giants Procter & Gamble, Colgate-Palmolive, Arm
& Hammer parent company Church and Dwight and Lysol-maker
Reckitt-Benckiser for failing to submit required semi-annual ingredient
reports. A judge dismissed the lawsuit last month without ruling on the
merits of the groups' claims. But during the court case, the companies
said they would file disclosure reports if asked to do so by the State.
DEC Commissioner Pete Grannis has now made that request by announcing the agency's new policy in an invitation to a stakeholders' meeting sent to groups late yesterday afternoon.
"By making the companies come clean about what is in their products,
New York State is initiating an age of greater transparency and is
empowering people to protect themselves and their families," said
Earthjustice Managing Attorney Deborah Goldberg, who will be handling a
likely appeal of the case against the cleaning product companies, which
have yet to file any reports.
The stakeholders' meeting, to be held on October 6, will bring
together DEC officials, public health and environmental groups, and
cleaning product companies to begin a process for specifying mutually
acceptable "content, format, and logistics" for disclosure of chemicals
in the products."We are incredibly pleased that the New York DEC is
requesting this information from product makers. Consumers have a right
to know what they are being exposed from cleaning products," said Erin
Switalski, executive director of Women's Voices for the Earth. "Making
product ingredient information public is a critical step towards
protecting the health and well-being of all consumers."
"It's high time that New York State enforce the law and hold cleaning
product manufacturers accountable for the dangerous chemicals in their
products. We applaud the Department of Environmental Conservation for
taking this long-awaited action," said Saima Anjam, Environmental
Advocates of New York.
Cleaning product manufacturers are taking notice of the changing
climate toward toxics in products. In response to a letter sent by the
groups involved in the court case, several companies, including the
California-based Sunshine Makers, Inc. (manufacturers of Simple Green
products), filed reports
with the State for the first time. And three weeks after the disclosure
lawsuit was filed, household cleaner manufacturing giant SC Johnson
announced that it would begin disclosing the chemical ingredients in its
products through product labels and a website.
"We commend the DEC for requiring manufacturers to 'come clean' about
the ingredients in their products," said Laura Haight, senior
environmental associate with NYPIRG. "Sunshine is the best
disinfectant."
Studies show links between chemicals in common household cleaners and
respiratory irritation, asthma, and allergies. Occupational exposures
to some ethylene glycol ethers, often used as solvents in cleaning
products, are associated with red blood cell damage, reproductive system
damage, and birth defects. Some solvents in cleaning products are also
toxic to the nervous system.
"Everyone knows somebody with breast cancer," said Huntington Breast
Cancer Action Coalition President Karen Miller. "While researchers
are connecting the dots between toxic exposure found in products we use
every day, regulatory agencies must step up the pace to provide
consumers with the right to know what they are bringing into their
homes."
"Many chemicals in cleaning products and air fresheners are endocrine
disruptors which are suspected of having links to cancer, and which
alter mammary gland development in animal studies. The public has the
right to know if some of the potentially harmful chemicals of concern,
such as alkyphenols, terpenes, benzene, some antimicrobial agents and
certain synthetic musks are in the products they use," said Capital
Region Action Against Breast Cancer! Program Coordinator Margaret
Roberts.
"This is a long-overdue protection that consumers need and deserve,"
said New York State United Teachers Vice President Kathleen Donahue.
"The State of New York's commitment to full disclosure of chemical
ingredients is a significant step," said Sierra Club Atlantic Chapter
Conservation Program Manager Roger Downs. "Now New Yorkers can make
educated choices about the household products that they use."
"With a New York law already in place to protect children at schools
from the toxic chemicals in cleaning products, the enforcement of this
disclosure requirement will give parents the opportunity to make their
homes as safe as schools," Grassroots Environmental Education Executive
Director Patti Wood.
Earthjustice is a non-profit public interest law firm dedicated to protecting the magnificent places, natural resources, and wildlife of this earth, and to defending the right of all people to a healthy environment. We bring about far-reaching change by enforcing and strengthening environmental laws on behalf of hundreds of organizations, coalitions and communities.
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Mar 21, 2024
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Those killed by the unmanned aerial vehicle in the rubble of the southern Gaza city appear to be unarmed teenagers or young men. According to a translation of the coverage, they were not identified in the reporting.
While Al Jazeera deemed footage "too graphic" to be included on its daily live blog covering the war, a clip of it quickly spread on social media, where critics of the Israel Defense Forces operation expressed outrage.
"OUTRAGEOUS even after months of outrages," declared Palestinian American political analyst Yousef Munayyer. "This video shows an Israeli military drone literally stalking four unarmed civilians posing no threat and eliminating them one after the other!!!"
Tariq Kenney-Shawa, Al-Shabaka's U.S. policy fellow, said: "This is among the worst footage I've seen. Not only were these boys clearly unarmed and present no threat whatsoever, but they were struck multiple times even after stumbling/crawling away. There is no way they could have been considered combatants. This is unreal."
Note: The following video contains graphic images.
Assal Rad, an author with a Ph.D. in Middle East history, said: "Have we ever seen so many war crimes take place right before our eyes? Any country still providing weapons and aid to Israel is complicit in these crimes."
Exiled American whistleblower Edward Snowden asserted that "everyone in the world needs to see this. Note that this footage permits no room for 'it was a mistake,' showing repeated, specifically targeted strikes on the unarmed and even wounded."
"The sort of behavior the ICJ explicitly forbid in the genocide ruling against Israel," added Snowden, referencing the International Court of Justice's preliminary order in January for an ongoing case led by South Africa.
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The resolution will "unequivocally support ongoing diplomatic efforts aimed at securing an immediate cease-fire in Gaza as part of a hostage deal, which would get hostages released and help enable a surge in humanitarian aid," Evans told Al Jazeera. "This resolution is an opportunity for the council to speak with one voice to support the diplomacy happening on the ground and pressure Hamas to accept the deal on the table."
Blinken said Thursday that "there's a clear consensus around a number of shared priorities. First, the need for an immediate, sustained cease-fire, with the release of hostages. That would create space to surge more humanitarian assistance, to relieve the suffering of many people, and to build something more enduring."
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The 2022 figures reversed two consecutive years of declining U.S. life expectancy, largely due to Covid-19, which has killed nearly 1.2 million people in the country. However, U.S. life expectancy in 2022 was still below its pre-pandemic high of 78.8 years in 2019.
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One 2022 study found that more than 338,000 U.S. Covid-19 deaths could have been prevented if the country had a single-payer universal healthcare system like Medicare for All.
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U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Congressional Progressive Caucus Chair Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) last year led more than 120 lawmakers in reintroducing bicameral Medicare for All legislation.
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AOC, Sanders Renew Fight for Green New Deal for Public Housing
"Every American deserves to live in a safe, vibrant, and environmentally conscious community—including public housing residents," said Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
Mar 21, 2024
Backed by dozens of progressive groups and congressional Democrats, U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Sen. Bernie Sanders on Thursday reintroduced legislation designed to tackle both the affordable housing crisis and the climate emergency.
The New York Democrat and Vermont Independent are leading the renewed fight for the Green New Deal for Public Housing Act, which would invest up to $234 billion over a decade into "weatherizing, electrifying, and modernizing our public housing so that it may serve as a model of efficiency, sustainability, and resiliency for the rest of the nation."
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"Public housing is an essential source of stable and affordable housing for 1.7 million Americans, and our research shows we are rapidly losing units to conversions, demolitions, and deterioration," said Kira McDonald of Climate and Community Project. "This legislation would constitute decisive action to stave this loss and transform living conditions for public housing residents. In so doing, it would improve residents' health, safety, help eliminate carbon emissions, and help build the new green industries we need to decarbonize."
As Ocasio-Cortez's office summarized, the bill would:
- Expand federal programs to provide residents with meaningful work investing in their communities, to own and operate resident businesses, to move toward financial independence, and to participate in the management of public housing;
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- Replenish the public housing capital backlog and repeal the Faircloth Amendment, which limits the construction of new public housing developments.
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As world leaders dragged their feet on climate action last year, declining to demand a global phaseout of planet-heating fossil fuels at the most recent United Nations climate conference, all life on Earth was forced to contend with record high temperatures. The United States alone saw 28 disasters that each caused at least $1 billion in damage, collectively costing at least $92.9 billion.
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That record number comes from an annual report
released by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development in December. As Common Dreamsreported at the time, academics and advocates have long stressed that the formal figure only represents a faction of the people dealing with housing insecurity nationwide.
"It is unacceptable that, in the richest country in the history of the world, people are choosing between paying rent and putting food on the table," argued Sanders. "It is unacceptable that our nation's public housing is in a state of chronic disrepair and energy inefficiency after generations of government neglect. It is unacceptable that we have not done more to transform our energy systems, our communities, and our infrastructure away from fossil fuels and toward renewable energy. This legislation is a major step in the right direction, and I am proud to partner with Congresswoman Ocasio-Cortez in introducing it today."
The rent is too damn high y'all.
It's time we pass transformative legislation like @RepAOC and @SenSanders' Green New Deal for Public Housing. Everyone deserves access to safe, clean, affordable housing without spending over 20% of their income on rent.
Let's get it done!! ✊🏿 pic.twitter.com/U9rO1yQY3G
— Congressman Jamaal Bowman (@RepBowman) March 21, 2024
Joining the pair in backing the bill are 55 other House Democrats and Sens. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), Cory Booker (D-N.J.), Ed Markey (D-Mass.), Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), Alex Padilla (D-Calif.), Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), and Peter Welch (D-Vt.).
Markey, who has
spearheaded the broader battle for a Green New Deal with Ocasio-Cortez, said that "in the five years since its introduction, Green New Deal advocacy has catapulted environmental justice to the top of the national agenda, helped deliver historic victories, and charted a course for a better future."
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