Living With Pollution in Southwest Detroit

How an oil refinery in southwest Detroit could spur a lawsuit from the city.

 

Marathon Petroleum has requested the state of Michigan to allow it to expand its facilities and the amount of pollution those facilities can emit. Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan has promised to sue the state if it allows Marathon to expand, citing the level of pollution that will damage the area around the oil refinery. Detroit Today host Stephen Henderson talks with former Democratic state lawmaker Rashida Tlaib, now with Sugar Law, and Director of the Transnational Environmental Law Clinic Nick Schroeck, about environmental justice and Marathon’s plans.

 

Raising Voices: “People who are living next to these facilities, do they actually have a voice in the process?” Schroeck asks.

 

Communities: “I think it’s fundamentally unfair to put the burden…on a poor minority community in a city like ours is just unfair,” says Schroeck.

 

Lawsuit: “It can take years to go through the courts, or go through the monitors, but we’ve already breathed it in,” Tlaib says.

To hear more of Stephen’s conversation, click the link above.

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