Sierra Club National Board President Voices Support for Community Demands to Deny General Iron Chicago Permit

Chicago, Illinois — A historic campaign to combat environmental racism is playing out in Chicago, led by community members from the Southeast Side of Chicago who are fed-up with decades of racist zoning and permitting laws that leave their community with contaminated air and water, and their loved ones struggling to breath. 

Leaders from this working-class, majority Latinx neighborhood are fighting to stop General Iron, a heavily polluting metal shredder, from expanding its operations and drastically increasing both toxic emissions and truck traffic. General Iron and its parent company, RMG, have records of local, state, and federal environmental violations. The planned facility is less than a mile from homes, parks, and a public high school, in an area that already suffers some of the worst air quality in Illinois. General Iron recently closed its facility in Lincoln Park, a predominantly white, upper-middle-class neighborhood, to make way for a new luxury development subsidized by more than a billion taxpayer dollars. Its planned relocation to this historically overburdened community is textbook environmental racism.

Community groups have been organizing against this move for two years: attending hearings, calling elected officials, holding rallies, and more. Despite thousands of local objections, both the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency and the Chicago Department of Public Health (CDPH) have issued key permits allowing the facility to move forward. A citywide coalition of grassroots groups, national environmental organizations, health care workers, school teachers, students, unions, faith organizations, and many more are demanding that the City deny the final permit needed to open yet another polluting facility in the Southeast Side. Multiple federal investigations are also underway, looking into racist zoning practices at the city and state levels. 

Community leaders recently put their bodies on the line to protect their neighborhood from more pollution: more than a dozen community leaders went on a hunger strike, with the three original hunger strikers not eating for a full 30 days. Despite this drastic measure, neither Mayor Lori Lightfoot nor CDPH Commissioner Dr. Allison Arwady have committed to denying the permit and protecting the health of Southeast Side residents. City officials have repeatedly ignored or dismissed community concerns and have defended the expansion of the facility. A Federal Judge may temporarily pause the project in an anticipated April ruling. Nevertheless, Mayor Lightfoot and Dr Arwady could stop the project once and for all by denying the permit. 

As the community awaits the City’s decision, and continues to organize to stop General Iron’s move, Sierra Club recognizes the historic campaign they have organized, and calls on City leadership including Mayor Lightfoot and Dr Arwady to meet the community’s demands. 

Ramon Cruz, Sierra Club National President, issued the following statement:

“The environmental crisis playing out in Chicago is a microcosm of what is happening across our nation and world. Communities of color are forced to breathe dirty air and drink contaminated water for the benefit of corporate profits. Chicago is rising up in resistance to blatant environmental racism, as community members put their bodies on the line, not eating for 30 days, to demand what’s right for their community. If a polluter is too dirty for a wealthy white neighborhood, it’s too dirty for a working-class community of color. Sierra Club calls on Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot and Public Health Commissioner Dr Allison Arwady to meet the demands of the Southeast Side community and deny General Iron’s final permit. We call on leaders across the country at all levels of government to prioritize environmental justice.”

Olga Bautista, Leader with the Southeast Environmental Task Force and the Southeast Side Coalition to Ban Petcoke, issued the following statement:

“The Southeast Side has faced decades of industrial pollution, and we’ve been organizing for our community for just as long. We’ve fought off landfills, coal gasification, petcoke, and manganese. We know what we’re up against, and that’s why people put their bodies on the line in a 30-day hunger strike. It’s cruel that we have to fight like this for the right to breathe clean air. We call on the City to deny General Iron’s permit. We also call on City, State, and Federal officials to fix our broken environmental and zoning laws. The Southeast Side should not be a dumping ground. We live here.”

Oscar Sanchez, a community leader who participated in the Hunger Strike for 30 days, issued the following statement:

“The only clean air my grandma can breathe is not from the Southeast Side, it's from her ventilator. I went on a hunger strike for 30 days because I know what my community deserves. We deserve the same thing people in Lincoln Park are getting: clean air. I call on Mayor Lightfoot and Dr Arwady to deny General Iron’s final permit.”