more than 100 municipalities in the us state of Pennsylvania are declaring the
environmental regulations of the state and federal governments null and void. They have, in fact, passed ordinances to abolish the constitutional
rights of corporations.
Led by a local environmental group, the Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund (celdf), the municipalities'
attempt is to save their townships from corporate control over the environmental permitting process and clearance in the country. "Municipal
lawyers and local officials say they have no authority to challenge a 'well settled law' that protects the privileges of corporate minorities from
community majorities attempting to exercise their right to self-government," says Ben Price, director of celdf.
"The ordinances are designed to return the decision-making power in environmental cases to local bodies."
The townships are primarily fighting the application of biosolids (leftovers of sewage treatment) to farms in the township of East Brunswick, and the
dumping of dredged material from the bottom of rivers into an old strip mine near the town of Tamaqua by a company the Lehigh Coal and
Navigation.
However, the municipal interference was not taken well. The attorney general of Pennsylvania, Tom Corbett, threatened to sue the municipal
authority for its supposed conflicts with an existing law. But the threat went nowhere after the town's citizens supported the ordinance in a meeting
with a representative from Corbett's office. As of now, no other legal challenges have arisen.
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