Lobbying: Safe Chemicals Act (blog post 1)

When I first started to brainstorm topics to lobby, I wanted to focus on environmental protection. Ever since my trip to the Dominican Republic, I have been interested in this issue. I started to look at statistics about Philadelphia's environmental protection policies, as compared to those of other cities. To my surprise, I found that Philadelphia is actually doing a good job, and is also steadily improving. Mayor Nutter even has a website dedicated to his Greenworks Philadelphia plan. At first, I thought I would move up to state level, and focus on Pennsylvania's plentiful environmental policy issues. I considered talking about fracking, but many other students in my class were already focused on that issue.

In the end, my topic found me: I was reading Scientific American, and spotted a brief article about the Safe Chemicals Act of 2011 (PDF here), a bill that would act to control the dangerous chemicals that so often show up in everyday items. The act, introduced by Senator Frank R. Lautenberg, would give the Environmental Protection Agency more freedom – and responsibility – to test and regulate chemicals. Currently, under the Toxic Substances Control Act of 1976, the EPA has little power over industry's use of chemicals.

As I researched the Safe Chemicals Act, I found a group, Safer Chemicals, Healthy Families, which strongly supports the bill. The describe themselves as "a nationwide effort to pass smart federal policies that protect us from toxic chemicals". They are pushing hard for reform on the Toxic Substance Control Act, and think that the proposed Safe Chemicals Act would be a major improvement. They want to "hold industry responsible for the safety of their chemicals and products".

The American Chemistry Council is perhaps less enthusiastic, but not against the bill. According to a statement by President and CEO Cal Dooley, the ACC is "strongly aligned on the need to modernize the 35-year-old Toxic Substances Control Act." However, they believe that Lautenberg's proposal "contained provisions that would not have produced the benefits intended by its authors" and "could put American innovation and jobs at risk."

I believe that the Safe Chemicals Act would be a step forward. According to the article in Scientific American, "even extremely low levels of some environmental contaminants may have significant damaging effects on our bodies." This is a serious risk, and I believe that the health and safety of all citizens should be a high priority for the government.