Prevent, mitigate, and clean up toxic chemicals

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Environmental Champion,

Toxics in our daily consumer products. Toxic waste sites. Dirty polluted stormwater. These sources of toxics wash into Puget Sound and directly impact all of us who call this region home—from fish, to orcas, to people.

The Toxics in Fish Implementation Strategy outlines the regional plan to prevent, mitigate, and clean up toxic chemicals in Puget Sound. Across Puget Sound, toxics in fish are at concentrations high enough to affect their health and survival, and can be higher than is safe for us to eat. Toxics in fish, therefore, disproportionately impact communities that eat higher proportions of fish, including Asian and Pacific Islander communities, and threaten Tribal Treaty fishing rights.

The same toxics that impact fish also pose a significant and disproportionate threat to communities of color and lower income communities because these communities tend to live closer to toxic waste sites, in neighborhoods with higher air pollution, and are exposed to consumer products with more toxic chemicals.

Implementing the Toxics in Fish Implementation Strategy has the potential to transform our landscapes, drive redevelopment, clean up our neighborhoods – and we believe it must be implemented equitably with strong community engagement.

Let the Puget Sound Partnership and the Department of Ecology know that this regional strategy must be implemented in an equitable way that centers the voices of those most impacted by toxic contaminants. [[link removed]]

Together with partners, WCV worked to raise environmental justice and Tribal Treaty concerns in the development of the implementation strategy. Toxics impact communities who are not responsible for the contamination, yet they bear the burden of the health, social, and economic impacts. That’s not fair.

Your voice will reiterate that Puget Sound recovery must incorporate environmental justice and must be implemented in a way that reduces racial disparities of toxic exposures across the region. Addressing toxic contamination throughout our region is essential for healthy and thriving communities.

Take action today: Ensure the Toxics in Fish Implementation Strategy takes a comprehensive approach to addressing toxics and centers the communities most impacted. [[link removed]]

Thank you for your help in fighting for a healthy, safe, and clean Puget Sound.

Onward,

Grace Drechsel

Communications Associate

Washington Conservation Voters

1402 Third Avenue, Suite 1400 | Seattle, WA 98101

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