Lighting has changed a lot since 1850. New Bedford has been in the thick of things, every step of the way. It began with the moniker “the city that lit the world,” earned with its leading role in the whaling industry. Later, the Whaling City became a hub of electrical manufacturing. Today, New Bedford boasts more solar power per capita than any other city in the continental United States. Still, the city is struggling to move beyond the legacy of pollution and economic challenges left bygone industries.
A recent Renewable Communitiesreport from Environment Massachusetts Research and Policy Center says New Bedford has taken a multi-facted approach to reducing the city’s carbon footprint. They’ve increased energy efficiency in municipal buildings, replaced more than a third of city vehicles with electric models, and installed more solar per capita than other city in the continental U.S. Earlier this year, the U.S. Conference of Mayors recognized Mayor Jon Mitchell for those efforts with the Mayors’ Climate Protection Award.
The city has also been working to position itself for a major role in offshore wind development, with its Wind Energy Center and Marine Commerce Terminal. A recently signed state energy law mandates the purchase of 1,600 megawatts of offshore wind energy, and a large area south of Martha’s Vineyard is under lease to multiple wind developers.
Ben Hellerstein, state director for Environment Massachusetts, says New Bedford is also among those cities actively working to connect residents and businesses with the benefits of energy efficiency and renewables. He cites the New Bedford Energy Now program, which bills itself as a “one stop shop for all things energy” for residents and businesses.
But there’s another side to the story. Conservation Law Foundation (CLF) has released a new report on environmental justice issues in New Bedford. The most obvious is one of the nation’s largest and most contaminated Superfund sites, the result of massive PCB pollution by twentieth-century electrical manufacturers. But CLF argues widespread lead exposure through building materials and drinking water is actually the single greatest public health threat. And the report also highlights combined sewer overflows that can dump raw sewage into the Harbor during extreme rain events; and increasing risk of storm surge flooding in low-lying, and low-income, neighborhoods, despite the hurricane barrier.
Veronica Eady, vice president and director of CLF Massachusetts and director of CLF’s Healthy Communities and Environmental Justice Program, says many of the issues that face New Bedford are not unique to that city. What’s of particular concern is the prevalence of, and overlap with, environmental justice communities – neighborhoods with more than 25% minority or residents lacking English proficiency, or median income less than $40,347. Seventy one percent of the city meets at least on criterion. Nearly a quarter of New Bedford residents live below the poverty line, and 38 percent speak a language other than English at home.
In part, the overlap is the result of development in an era before zoning. Factory workers lived close to their places of employment out of convenience. Fast forward decades (or even centures), and that means there are neighborhoods on top of potentially toxic former industrial sites.
“Most of these sites – just about all of these sites – are legacy sites, and they came about before there were laws in place to protect the public, and to protect the environment,” says Michelle Paul, director of environmental stewardship for city of New Bedford, who sees that as both a challenge and a vindication of modern zoning and environmental laws. “My thought is that environmental justice is doing the right thing all the time, and those are the things that we look at a new business coming in or a new land use. Now that we have these things in place, that’s really the safety net.”
Conservation Law Foundation’s report included a twelve-step action plan, and highlighted three critical challenges going forward. One, of course, is financing clean-up and redevelopment projects that can have million- to billion-dollar price tags. The other two are less tangible, but just as important: the city needs to support civil discourse and build trust with community activists.
Eddie Johnson, president of the Citizens Leading Environmental Action Network (CLEAN), says that what the city needs is an environmental justice ordinance and a plan for turning environmental clean-up into an economic driver for New Bedford’s poor residents. He’s frustrated with what he sees as a lack of action on the part of city officials.
“Even if they tweaked it to suit some of their needs, that would be a good step in showing that the city of New Bedford, the mayor of New Bedford, and the City Council is committed to environmental justice,” says Johnson. “There is no such plan that is going to provide jobs in terms of our economy as much as the environmental impact on our city.”