Submitted by Sr. Ellen Donovan

I would like to state at the onset, the wonderful spirit of the group of which I was privileged to be a part. We hardly knew each other before the journey began and we bonded almost instantly. I believe it is because we are very concerned about our Planet Earth and have a passion for its recovery from ecological disasters.

We stayed in Fort Valley in an antebellum 1916 Georgian mansion. The hostess was hospitality personified and treated us to southern breakfasts.

On Sunday, we worshipped in a Baptist Church a two-and-a-half hour service filled with faith and soul music. The pastor, Rev. Morris Hillsman, is very active in the environmental movement to clean up the toxic waste lying in the backyards of Fort Valley. I will mention him again later.

In the afternoon, we visited the Harriet Tubman Museum where we saw many remarkable exhibits artifacts, cultural mementos, stories of black inventors, musicians, educators who have made history.

I was really touched by the story of Dr. Drew, who isolated plasma from blood a remarkable medical first. However, when he was very ill himself, he was denied the very gift of plasma he had discovered for the world and died as a consequence.

On Sunday evening, Marvin Crafter, elected city official and chairperson of the Woolfolk Support group to clean up the toxic waste, spoke to us informally for about two hours. His life had been threatened at least three times for his environmental efforts, but he avows that the cause is worth dying for. So many of his people have died of cancer; others are suffering from lupus, chronic lung disease, severe skin disorders and peripheral neuropathy.

Now for my impressions of Fort Valley and the actual site of the contamination. The town is lovely dotted with many peach and pecan trees and cotton fields. The population is about 9,000 with 82% being black. In 1910, companies brought in powerful pesticides and insecticides containing 47 different chemicals, the highest percent of which is arsenic. During the war, poisonous gas was manufactured there, including anthrax, which is a biological weapon. The area of toxic waste is an acre of land, parallel to Preston Street. Every household on this street has lost a family member at an early age. What drew my anger the most was that the company responsible for the cleanup, decided to build a library on the contaminated soil. Fort Valley already had a library and with the high rate of illiteracy among the black population, another library was almost an affront to the people there. As we stood on the street across from the site, a school bus laden with children slowly wended its way down the street. I thought to myself, "How many more of these innocents will die before something is done?"

We visited three homes and heard heart-wrenching stories of environmental racism fromt he politically forgotten. The minister I mentioned earlier lost two sons to cancer a baby of two months and a seven-year-old. There are also many instances of stillbirths and birth defects.

Monday was a day of workshop presentations. Powerful but sombre talks were given by two young men of the Sierra Club and one of our team gave an overview of the Sydney Tar Ponds, Canada's largest toxic waste site. Shirley Christmas, a Mi'Kmaq/Maliceet native from our team, opened the day's proceedings with a sweetgrass ceremony, chanting and drumming songs of Mother Earth.

One of the young men, John McCowan of Sparta, Georgia, told how his father, a doctor, was killed in a mysterious plane crash. He was a civil rights activist and was spending his life trying to set his people free from oppression. John told us in his talk that black people were not even considered to be human beings and the day a law was passed to declare that they were, the big corporations declared that they, too, were to be considered human persons rather than just legal entities. Oppression and exploitation are no strangers to the people of Fort Valley.

In 1991, people from local and national grassroots struggles gathered in Washington, DC for the first National People of Color Environmental Leadership Summit. The following statement adopted by the group serves as a working definition of the principles of environmental justice:

"We, the People of Color, gathered together at this summit, to begin to build a national and international movement of all peoples of color to fight the destruction and taking of our lands and communities, do hereby re-establish our spiritual interdependence to the sacredness of our Mother Earth; to respect and celebrate each of our cultures, languages, and beliefs about the natural world and our roles in healing ourselves; to insure environmental justice, and to secure our political, economic and cultural liberation that has been denied for over 500 years of colonization and oppression, resulting in the poisoning of our land and the genocide of our people."

Pope John Paul, in a statement of January 1, 1990, declared that "simplicity, moderation, and discipline must become part of every day life, lest all suffer the negative consequences of the careless habits of a few. An education in ecological responsibility is urgent."

"I stand still

until I wear

The colors of the sunrise in my soul,

Until the grasses of the meadows

and the great sky

are my clothes.

And I have become the song

of the earth."

I went to Georgia on a "Toxic Exchange" program. I returned with a deep ache in my heart for the black people of the south.

My deep gratitude to the Sierra Club of Canada for sponsoring our trip to Fort Valley, Georgia. We will welcome the team from Fort Valley to Sydney in May

Return to TOXIC EXCHANGE

Submitted by Sr. Ellen Donovan

We stayed in Fort Valley in an antebellum 1916 Georgian mansion. The hostess was hospitality personified and treated us to southern breakfasts.

On Sunday, we worshipped in a Baptist Church ­ a two-and-a-half hour service filled with faith and soul music. The pastor, Rev. Morris Hillsman, is very active in the environmental movement to clean up the toxic waste lying in the backyards of Fort Valley. I will mention him again later.

In the afternoon, we visited the Harriet Tubman Museum where we saw many remarkable exhibits ­ artifacts, cultural mementos, stories of black inventors, musicians, educators who have made history.

I was really touched by the story of Dr. Drew, who isolated plasma from blood ­ a remarkable medical first. However, when he was very ill himself, he was denied the very gift of plasma he had discovered for the world and died as a consequence.

We visited three homes and heard heart-wrenching stories of environmental racism fromt he politically forgotten. The minister I mentioned earlier lost two sons to cancer ­ a baby of two months and a seven-year-old. There are also many instances of stillbirths and birth defects.

In 1991, people from local and national grassroots struggles gathered in Washington, DC for the first National People of Color Environmental Leadership Summit. The following statement adopted by the group serves as a working definition of the principles of environmental justice:

Pope John Paul, in a statement of January 1, 1990, declared that "simplicity, moderation, and discipline must become part of every day life, lest all suffer the negative consequences of the careless habits of a few. An education in ecological responsibility is urgent."

"I stand still

until I wear

The colors of the sunrise in my soul,

Until the grasses of the meadows

and the great sky

are my clothes.

And I have become the song

of the earth."

I went to Georgia on a "Toxic Exchange" program. I returned with a deep ache in my heart for the black people of the south.

My deep gratitude to the Sierra Club of Canada for sponsoring our trip to Fort Valley, Georgia. We will welcome the team from Fort Valley to Sydney in May

On Sunday, we worshipped in a Baptist Church a two-and-a-half hour service filled with faith and soul music. The pastor, Rev. Morris Hillsman, is very active in the environmental movement to clean up the toxic waste lying in the backyards of Fort Valley. I will mention him again later.

In the afternoon, we visited the Harriet Tubman Museum where we saw many remarkable exhibits artifacts, cultural mementos, stories of black inventors, musicians, educators who have made history.

I was really touched by the story of Dr. Drew, who isolated plasma from blood a remarkable medical first. However, when he was very ill himself, he was denied the very gift of plasma he had discovered for the world and died as a consequence.

We visited three homes and heard heart-wrenching stories of environmental racism fromt he politically forgotten. The minister I mentioned earlier lost two sons to cancer a baby of two months and a seven-year-old. There are also many instances of stillbirths and birth defects.