May, 05 2014, 04:50pm EDT
For Immediate Release
Contact:
Jackie Wei, NRDC in CA
310-434-2325, jwei@nrdc.org
Elizabeth Heyd, NRDC in DC
202-725-0648, eheyd@nrdc.org
Rachel Stich, Waterkeeper
818-636-2033
Supreme Court Allows Major Southern California Water Quality Victory to Stand
Justices Deny Review; LA County Must Now Clean Up Its Toxic Discharges
WASHINGTON
A decision today by the U.S. Supreme Court will protect millions of people living near and visiting Los Angeles rivers and beaches from the harmful effects of water pollution. The Supreme Court declined Los Angeles County and the County Flood Control District's request to review a Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruling finding Los Angeles County liable for untreated stormwater pollution that plagues local waterways. The decision stems from a lawsuit initiated by the Natural Resources Defense Council and Los Angeles Waterkeeper in 2008.
The Supreme Court previously remanded the case to the Ninth Circuit Court, which sided with NRDC and Waterkeeper last August. In an attempt to shirk its responsibility for cleaning up the region's chronically polluted waterways, the County petitioned the Supreme Court for review in January 2014.
Denying review of the case allows the lower court ruling to remain in place and holds Los Angeles County liable for water pollution, with documented and persistent violations of its Clean Water Act permit in the Los Angeles and San Gabriel Rivers since 2003. This final resolution of liability now obligates Los Angeles County to take immediate action to clean up its stormwater runoff and protect people and water quality.
Following is a statement from Steve Fleischli, senior attorney and water program director for the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC):
"After six years of litigation, it is finally official: Los Angeles County must take responsibility for its polluted stormwater runoff in the Los Angeles and San Gabriel Rivers. This water quality victory puts an end to Los Angeles County's persistent attempts to avoid liability for its massive water pollution problem, which threatens the health of millions of Southern California residents and visitors who enjoy beloved local rivers and beaches.
"Los Angeles County needs to face the facts and get to work to clean up its mess. It's time for a cleaner water future for the region. With a trove of 21st century green infrastructure solutions, the County has no excuse not to ensure this pollution is addressed immediately."
Following is a statement from Liz Crosson, executive director of Los Angeles Waterkeeper:
"Today represents a significant milestone in efforts to clean up the Los Angeles and San Gabriel rivers. No longer can the County deny the problem. No longer can the County ignore the law," said Liz Crosson, executive director of Los Angeles Waterkeeper.
Background:
This case addresses Los Angeles-area stormwater pollution, which is created when rain mixes with debris, chemicals, dirt, and other pollutants and flows into storm sewer systems and then into local waterways. Anything that enters a storm sewer system is discharged, largely untreated, into the waterbodies we use for swimming, fishing and recreation. Each year, billions of gallons of this untreated stormwater pollution are discharged into Los Angeles rivers and ultimately popular beaches, causing residents and tourists alike to become ill.
This pollution can be prevented through the deployment of green infrastructure solutions, such as on-site water capture and filtration. These techniques trap stormwater pollution at the source, rather than allow it to flow to the sea untreated, and allow rainwater to be reused instead of wasted. Green infrastructure is not only good for public health and smart environmental policy, it will save money, increase water supplies, reduce flood risks and clean up local beaches and rivers. To date, the County has failed to implement effective pollution control.
The lawsuit initiated by NRDC and Waterkeeper in 2008 sought to hold the County responsible for documented violations of the County's Clean Water Act permit in the Los Angeles and San Gabriel Rivers since 2003, and to require the County to act immediately to clean up the toxic mix of mercury, arsenic, cyanide, lead and fecal bacteria found in billions of gallons of annual stormwater runoff.
Case History - Related Links:
- August 2013: Federal Appeals Court Finds Los Angeles County Liable for Polluted Waterways: https://www.nrdc.org/media/2013/130808.asp
- January 2013: Supreme Court Returns Los Angeles County Water Ruling to Lower Court: https://www.nrdc.org/media/2013/130108.asp
- June 2012: Supreme Court Agrees to Hear Los Angeles County Stormwater Pollution Case: https://www.nrdc.org/media/2012/120625.asp
- March 2011: LA County Ordered to Clean Up Water Pollution: www.nrdc.org/media/2011/110310d.asp
- March 2008: Lawsuit Charges L.A. County with Failing Clean Water Standards: www.nrdc.org/media/2008/080303.asp
NRDC works to safeguard the earth--its people, its plants and animals, and the natural systems on which all life depends. We combine the power of more than three million members and online activists with the expertise of some 700 scientists, lawyers, and policy advocates across the globe to ensure the rights of all people to the air, the water, and the wild.
(212) 727-2700LATEST NEWS
Biden Tax Boost Targeting the Rich Called 'Fair, Popular, and Long Overdue'
"Republicans have already made clear they're on the side of the 1 Percenters and big corporations by trying to shield rich tax cheats and endangering Social Security and Medicare with deficit-busting tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations," said one expert. "The contrast couldn't be sharper."
Mar 10, 2023
While far-right Republicans continue threatening to blow up the global economy unless Congress makes cuts to popular social programs, progressive taxation experts are celebrating U.S. President Joe Biden's latest push to invest in "widespread prosperity" by raising taxes on wealthy individuals and corporations.
As part of his fiscal year 2024 budget blueprint unveiled Thursday, Biden calls for a 25% minimum tax on the wealthiest 0.01%; reforms to ensure high-income individuals pay their fair share into the Medicare Hospital Insurance trust fund; and repealing 2017 tax cuts and restoring the top tax rate of 39.6% for people making over $400,000 a year.
Along with pushing for raising the corporate tax rate from 21% to 28%—which is still far below the 35% rate that was in place prior to Republicans' 2017 tax overhaul—the president advocates expanding the child tax credit while eliminating tax subsidies for cryptocurrency transactions, fossil fuel companies, and real estate.
Biden also "proposes to reform the international tax system to reduce the incentives to book profits in low-tax jurisdictions, stop corporate inversions to tax havens, and raise the tax rate on U.S. multinationals' foreign earnings from 10.5% to 21%," according to a White House fact sheet.
Although many of these proposals are unlikely to go anywhere due to the GOP-controlled U.S. House and divided Senate, Groundwork Collaborative executive director Lindsay Owens said Friday that "it's great to see President Biden leading the charge to increase taxes on billionaires, crack down on stock buybacks by massive corporations, and prevent the wealthiest Americans from cheating on their taxes and avoiding paying what they owe."
"The tax policies laid out in this budget are fair, popular, and long overdue," she declared. "The next time someone claims that we can't afford to protect Social Security and Medicare for future generations—or that we need to cut popular investments in education, healthcare, housing, or clean energy—show them President Bident's latest budget proposal and ask them why they care so much about protecting the ultrawealthy from paying their fair share."
According to Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy executive director Amy Hanauer, "President Biden's budget proposal presents a bold vision for what tax justice should look like in America."
"The provisions would raise substantial revenue, fund important priorities, and increase tax fairness," she stressed. "The revenue raisers are laser-focused on taxing very wealthy individuals and corporations, and the budget would reduce the deficit while easing costs for American families, particularly for middle and low-income parents."
Americans for Tax Fairness executive director Frank Clemente asserted Thursday that "President Biden's budget plainly shows whose side he's on: working families struggling with the high cost of healthcare, childcare, housing and more—not the wealthy elite and their big corporations rolling in dough and dodging their fair share of taxes."
"Republicans have already made clear they're on the side of the 1 Percenters and big corporations by trying to shield rich tax cheats and endangering Social Security and Medicare with deficit-busting tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations," Clemente added. "The contrast couldn't be sharper."
As Common Dreams reported earlier Friday, the House Freedom Caucus said its 45 members would "consider voting" to raise the U.S. debt limit if their colleagues in Congress abandon some of Biden's key economic priorities, slash hundreds of billions of dollars in social spending, and restrict federal agencies' future budgets.
Responding on Twitter, Biden said that "extreme MAGA House Republicans are showing us what they value: tax breaks for the rich."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Three Years Into Covid Pandemic, World Leaders Say 'Never Again' to Vaccine Apartheid
"These past three years should act as a warning for future pandemics," said former U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. "We need a return to genuine cooperation between nations in our preparation and response to global threats."
Mar 10, 2023
Around 200 current and former world leaders, Nobel laureates, health and faith leaders, and activists this week marked the third anniversary of the World Health Organization's Covid-19 pandemic declaration by taking aim at the "vaccine apartheid" that according to one advocacy group was responsible for one death every 24 seconds during the outbreak's first year alone.
A letter led by the People's Vaccine Alliance notes that three years have passed since "the World Health Organization (WHO) first characterized Covid-19 as a pandemic" on March 11, 2020 and implores governments to "never again" allow nationalism and capitalist greed to supersede human needs."
"We have seen extraordinary feats of scientific innovation and an enormous mobilization of public resources to develop effective vaccines, tests, and treatments," the letter continues. "But we have also seen a global response held back by profiteering and nationalism."
The signers asserted:
We are hopeful that an end to the acute stage of the Covid-19 pandemic may be in sight. Thus, the world is at a critical juncture. Decisions made now will determine how the world prepares for and responds to future global health crises. World leaders must reflect on mistakes made in responding to the Covid-19 pandemic so that they are never repeated.
There are decades of publicly funded research behind Covid-19 vaccines, treatments, and tests. Governments have poured taxpayer money by the billions into research, development, and advance orders, reducing the risks for pharmaceutical companies. These are the people's vaccines, the people's tests, and the people's treatments. Yet, a handful of pharmaceutical companies has been allowed to exploit these public goods to fuel extraordinary profits, increasing prices in the Global North while refusing to share technology and knowledge with capable researchers and producers in the Global South.
"Instead of rolling out vaccines, tests, and treatments based on need, pharmaceutical companies maximized their profits by selling doses first to the richest countries with the deepest pockets," the letter adds. "Billions of people in low- and middle-income countries, including frontline workers and the clinically vulnerable, were sent to the back of the line."
These inequities, the alliance said, resulted in over 1.3 million preventable deaths—one every 24 seconds—in the pandemic's first year alone. Even today, as the pandemic enters its fourth year, much of the Global South lacks adequate access to Covid-19 testing and treatments.
The letter's signatories urge world leaders to take immediate action to:
- Support a pandemic accord at the WHO that embeds equity and human rights in pandemic preparedness and response;
- Invest in scientific innovation and manufacturing capacity in the Global South through projects like the mRNA Technology Transfer Hub established by the WHO and partners;
- Invest in global common goods; and
- Remove the intellectual property barriers that prevent knowledge and technology sharing.
"In the AIDS pandemic, pharmaceutical monopolies have resulted in an appalling number of unnecessary deaths—and it has been the same story with Covid-19," lamented Winnie Byanyima, executive director of UNAIDS and co-chair of the People's Vaccine Alliance.
"It was only the production of inexpensive generics in developing countries that made the first generation of HIV medicines available and affordable to people in the [Global] South," she added. "But governments still have not learned that lesson. Unless they break the monopolies that prevent people from accessing medical products, humanity will sleepwalk unprepared into the next pandemic."
East Timorese President José Manuel Ramos-Horta, who also signed the letter, said that "in the Covid-19 pandemic, those of us in low and middle-income countries were pushed to the back of the line for vaccines and denied access to the benefits of new technologies."
"Three years on, we must say 'never again' to this injustice that has undermined the safety of people in every country," he added. "Steps that we take today can hasten global access to vaccines, medicines, and tests in the next pandemic, with regional hubs researching, developing, and manufacturing medical products for everyone, everywhere."
Former United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon asserted:
The great tragedy of the Covid-19 pandemic has been the failure of multilateralism and the absence of solidarity between the Global North and Global South. These past three years should act as a warning for future pandemics. We need a return to genuine cooperation between nations in our preparation and response to global threats. That requires a pandemic accord rooted in equity and human rights, which places the needs of humanity above the commercial interests of a handful of companies.
Independent Panel for Pandemic Preparedness and Response co-chair Helen Clark—who served as New Zealand's prime minister from 1999 to 2008—noted that "publicly funded science contributed a lot to the phenomenal success of Covid-19 vaccines."
"Yet, that public investment did not lead to vaccines being treated as global common goods," Clark continued. "Rather, nationalism and profiteering around vaccines resulted in a catastrophic moral and public health failure which denied equitable access to all."
"We need to fix the glaring gaps in pandemic preparedness and response today," she added, "so that people in all countries can be protected when a pandemic threat emerges."
Keep ReadingShow Less
South Carolina Teen Sues School, Teacher Who Shoved Her Over Pledge of Allegiance Refusal
"The thing that's beautiful about America is we have freedoms," said the student's lawyer. "Students in our schools should feel safe."
Mar 10, 2023
Marissa Barnwell, a 15-year-old high school student in Lexington, South Carolina, was joined by her parents and the family's lawyer on Thursday as they spoke publicly about a federal lawsuit they filed against her school district, the state Department of Education, and a teacher who they say assaulted Barnwell late last year for not reciting the Pledge of Allegiance.
Surveillance footage from River Bluff High School shows Barnwell walking through a school hallway on November 29, 2022 when the pledge began playing over a loudspeaker.
A state law passed three decades ago requires public schools to play the Pledge of Allegiance over their intercom systems each day at a specific time, but it prohibits any punishment of people who refuse to recite the pledge as long as "they are not disruptive or do not infringe on others."
Barnwell continued walking and was quickly confronted by a special education teacher, Nicole Livingston, who yelled at her and pushed her against a wall before sending her to the principal's office.
"I was just in disbelief," Barnwell said at the press conference Thursday. "You can hear me say in the video, 'Get your hands off of me.'"
Barnwell's parents learned about the incident when she called them in tears, according to the Associated Press. The school did not talk to them about the alleged assault and has reportedly "never responded" to their requests for an explanation.
"It will not be tolerated, and we will get justice for this action that [Livingston] did," Fynale Barnwell, Marissa's mother, toldNews 19 WLTX, a local CBS affiliate.
The lawsuit was filed last month, with the family arguing Livingston violated Barnwell's "constitutional rights by yelling and demanding that M.B. stop walking and physically assaulting her by pushing M.B., on the wall and forcefully touching M.B., in an unwanted way without her consent."
The Secular Coalition for America applauded the family for taking legal action.
Tyler Bailey, the Barnwells' attorney, said Barnwell was "threatened for exercising [her] constitutional rights."
"The thing that's beautiful about America is we have freedoms," Bailey said Thursday. "Students in our schools should feel safe."
According toThe State, a local newspaper, Livingston is still employed by the school.
"Nobody did anything," Bailey said. "This is why the federal civil rights lawsuit has been filed."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Most Popular
SUPPORT OUR WORK.
We are independent, non-profit, advertising-free and 100%
reader supported.
reader supported.