Candidates’ record on environment important

Jim Kotcon, Morgantown
West Virginia has one of the highest death rates from cancer in America, so I am quite disturbed that the state Legislature voted last year to raise the amount of carcinogens allowed to be discharged into our water. The bill (HB 2506) also allows an increase in non-carcinogens.
The legislation, sometimes called the “Cancer Creek bill,” was not in response to some new industry or job opportunity, it was just a way for polluters to pollute more.
Fortunately, Monongalia County’s Delegates Barbara Fleischauer, Rodney Pyles and John Williams, as well as state Sens. Bob Beach and Roman Prezioso, voted against that bill. Unfortunately, they were not in the majority.
As you meet candidates for office this summer and fall, please thank those who voted to protect our drinking water, and ask those who voted for that bad bill why they think more carcinogens are good for West Virginia.
For more information on legislators’ environmental voting records, see the Sierra Club Scorecard, available at sierra club.org/west-virginia/political.