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Yesterday the NYS Office of the Comptroller released an audit of the NYS Department of Environmental Conservation’s Air Quality Monitoring and Permitting program.

The findings align with research we’ve done internally for our campaigns – many industrial operations have expired permits, sometimes years out of date, or are operating on permits issued to previous operations, or do not even have a permit at all!

Read the press release here, or click here to read the full audit.

“While the State Administrative Procedure Act (SAPA) extensions allow Title V and Air State Facilities (ASF) to operate beyond their permit expiration date, and the Department monitors facilities under the original permit conditions, the longer the permits remain extended, the greater the risk that facilities are not operating under requirements that align with the most up-to-date air pollution control standards. For example, one permit for a Title V facility would have expired in September 2021; however, the facility submitted its renewal application timely in March 2021 and therefore qualified for SAPA extension. The facility, since the initial permit was issued, had shifted its operations to cryptocurrency mining, with projected emissions equating to more than six times its previous emissions over a 4-year period. The Department ultimately denied the renewal as the facility’s increase in greenhouse gas emissions did not align with the newly issued Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act. The facility has challenged the Department’s decision and continues to operate under its previous permit in accordance with SAPA.”

The audit further reviews the implications that delayed permit renewals have had on Environmental Justice goals and makes recommendations to address concerns raised. We are still reviewing this report and update as we learn more.

If you are interested in the air permit for any facilities near you, check out the DEC InfoLocator – https://gisservices.dec.ny.gov/gis/dil/
Zoom into the area of the facility you are interested in, and in the panel on the left under “Permits and Registrations”, click the boxes to activate the Air Facility Registrations, Title V Air Facilities, and Air State Facilities layers, then on the map click on the facility you are interested in. A box will pop up with information including the most recent reported emissions. Scroll down in this box to the section that says “Permit” and click the link next to that – a PDF will pop up of the current permit.

Action Alert! Please take a moment to send a letter to Governor Hochul and the local and state DEC offices in support of the residents of North Tonawanda in their long fight against the use of the former Fortistar gas-fired peak power plant by Digihost Technologies for cryptocurrency mining. Click here to send a letter now!

In response to the Town of Tonawanda’s Draft Comprehensive Zoning Amendment, our Tonawanda Tomorrow Team worked tirelessly this summer to conduct public outreach and engagement, and to develop feedback on the draft. Below is a copy of the comments we submitted, and if you would like to send a letter supporting our comments, you can do so by clicking here.

Download (PDF, 194KB)

Additionally, we also reached out to colleagues at Smart Growth America for a review of the draft, and these are their findings, which we submitted as a supplemental to our comments.

Download (PDF, 243KB)

The TTT also advocated strongly for an extension of this public comment period, requesting that the deadline be shifted from August 31 by 30-45 days, to September 30 or October 15. Unfortunately, despite a petition with 78 signatures, 7 emails sent through our ActionNetwork tool, and multiple direct asks by Clean Air staff at Town Board and Zoning Board meetings, this request was not honored. In response to our comments, however, we have been informed that there will be additional time for public comments throughout the environmental review process, and that additional public meetings will be scheduled.

Update – the Town of Tonawanda announced on September 7 that the comment period has been extended to October 31! This is a big win – we asked that the town extend the comment period by 30-45 days, and this extension is by 61 days!

You can submit your comments until October 31 directly by calling town representatives at 716-871-8847, Ext.1, or by emailing jhartz@tonawanda.ny.us.

Clean Air is also still collecting comments through our form, and if requested can submit your comments anonymously. 

When the Town publishes it’s response to our comments on the draft amendment, we will share the feedback on our comments here as well as through our social media. We expect that responses will be shortly followed by a public hearing to vote on approving the final version of the Comprehensive Zoning Amendment – stay tuned for more information, or contact Bridge to get involved with the Tonawanda Tomorrow Team!

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Our Tonawanda-area Environmental Justice Organizer Bridge Rauch and Geologist consultant Tom Morahan attended the 2023 EPA Brownfields Conference in Detroit earlier this month. The two attended sessions on a wide range of topics, from anti-gentrification strategies for brownfield redevelopments to technical topics like vapor intrusion.

Clean Air’s work encompasses the full life of the sites we advocate about – for example, although we successfully fought for an equitable closure of Tonawanda Coke five years ago, we anticipate that our related campaign work will continue for decades to come as the longer term Brownfield and Superfund cleanup processes are ongoing and when the site is eventually reused.

 

If you are interested in joining our work in the Tonawandas, please fill out the form below and we will be in contact!

• River Road Watchdogs – keeping tabs on existing industry in the River Road corridor and fighting for strong Brownfield and Superfund clean up standards at former sites
• Tonawanda Tomorrow Team – fighting for just and equitable community development in the Tonawandas to prevent future environmental injustices

The next conference will be in 2025.

The Town of Tonawanda is currently accepting public comments on the draft townwide zoning code and map! This is a lot of information for anyone to go through, so Clean Air is here to lend residents a hand.

Join Clean Air on Tuesday August 15 or 29 anytime between 4-8pm at the Sheridan Parkside Community Center (169 Sheridan Parkside Drive in Tonawanda) for our Zoning Workshops to the basics about zoning and planning and review both the current and draft zoning code and map, as well as related documents. We will also offer assistance and templates to help you submit any comments you would like to send in about the draft code.

Please register to help us better plan these workshops –

• August 15
• August 29

These workshops are designed to be drop-in and you do not need to attend all four hours. We will have food and childcare available, and other accessibility needs will be made available with pre-registration.

Can’t make it? Please take a moment to send a letter to the town planner requesting an extension on the public comment period! If the comment period is extended, we plan to hold one more workshop on Tuesday September 12.

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The Town of Tonawanda will be hosting a virtual public meeting on Tuesday July 25 starting at 6pm to review and discuss the draft zoning code.

Click here to receive an email reminder of the meeting, and visit the town’s webpage at tonawanda.ny.us/development/comprehensive-zoning-law-amendment.html to find the link on July 25!

We strongly encourage our members and supporters to request an extension of the current comment period as part of your remarks in this meeting. At present, the comment period is scheduled to end August 31.

Learn more about the town’s rezoning from our prior blog post.

We have lots of updates to share from our Tonawanda Tomorrow Team!

If you are interested in engaging with this work, either as a resident of the Tonawandas who wants to see equitable development, or as an professional or armchair urbanist who enjoys working for equitable development, then please click here to sign up for our team and we will be in contact with you shortly! We also will be canvassing in the Tonawandas this summer – click here to sign up for a canvassing shift!

Town of Tonawanda Draft Zoning Open for Public Review

The Town of Tonawanda has publicly released the draft zoning code and map for review!

• click here to view all the draft documents
• check out our earlier blog post with related background information and documents
• click here to see an overlay comparison between the current zoning and the draft zoning
• To see a larger version of the current zoning map, visit bit.ly/TOTCurrentMap
• To see a larger version of the draft zoning map, visit bit.ly/TOTDraftMap
• Draft Code Documents – 
  • Part 1: Introductory Provisions (Applicability and Definitions)
  • Part 2: District & Use Regulations
  • Part3: Development Standards
  • Part 4: Application and Review Procedures

We strongly encourage residents of the Town of Tonawanda as well as those in WNY who care about implementing just transition development in the town to take a moment to review the new draft code and map – good zoning, as we have discussed, is crucial for fighting environmental injustices.

If you would like to submit a comment to the town Planning and Development department, then please click here to fill out our comment form, or call their office at (716) 871-8847 or email jhartz@tonawanda.ny.us.

Comments are currently being accepted through August 31, but it is anticipated that this comment period will be extended into the fall.

The town should also be holding a virtual engagement meeting  later this month – as soon as we have more information, we will share it with you. We plan to hold our own neighborhood meetings to engage residents in August and, assuming the comment period is extended as anticipated, in September as well.

Town of Tonawanda Wins it’s Eminent Domain Court Case on Huntley

Speaking of the coal ash ponds at Huntley, the Environmental Protection Agency is currently considering updates to strengthen nationwide regulations on coal ash ponds at legacy facilities. You can read more about these proposed changes from EarthJustice’s press release and at Grist.org, which published some fantastic in-depth reporting on this topic. We strongly encourage sending a letter to the EPA encouraging robust regulations using EarthJustice’s one click tool. Comments are due July 17.

The EPA is also finalizing rules around carbon pollution standards at power plants still in operation – click here to send a letter to the EPA using another one click tool from EarthJustice. Comments are due August 8.