This coverage was achieved through a partnership between GRIS and DadNPR station in Atlanta.
Thomasville, Georgia, has a water problem. Its treatment system is out of history, which is serious health and environmental risks.
“We have an old wastewater infrastructure.” “He – she‘It is important to work to replace this. “
But it is expensive to replace it. Ciley said that the regime is particularly bad in the parts of the city deprived of the city.
In September, Thomasfille applied for some assistance from the federal government, and after less than four months, the city and its partners were granted nearly $ 20 million. Community change grant From the American Environmental Protection Agency to make long wastewater improvements, build a mineal center and a health clinic, and to upgrade homes in many historical neighborhoods.
Ciley said: “The same grant was really a gift from God for us.”
In early April, with the elimination of the Environmental Protection Agency for grants for similar projects throughout the country, Federal officials confirmed Thomasfille that their financing was on the right path. Then on May 1, the city received the termination notice.
Ciley said: “We felt, as you know, with a little guard when I brought the bottom out of us.”
Thomasfille is not alone.
Under the Trump administration, the Environmental Protection Agency or a boycott was canceled Hundreds of grants It aims to improve healthy health and preparedness because the agency “decided that grant requests no longer support management priorities,” according to a statement sent via email to Grist.
These cuts are part of the broader inclusion of federal programs that aim to enhance environmental justice, and it is the term as an umbrella to help societies that have been exposed to difficult through pollution and other environmental issues, which often include low -income societies and color societies.
In the Thomasville case, the city has a history of heavy industry that led to poor air quality. Air pollution, health concerns, and high poverty The surrounding district qualification For the Justice40 initiative for the Biden Administration, which has given the priority of funding for disadvantaged societies. Thomasfille has some of the highest risk of exposure in Georgia to toxic air pollutants that can cause respiratory, reproductive and developmental system problems, according to the Environmental Defense Fund Climate Weak Index. The city wastewater problems in the city only mean the possibility of reserves for summer water in homes and spills to local waterways, but also the risk of higher respiratory problems, according to the fanatic Hoover, a former official in the Environmental Protection Agency in the Environmental Protection Agency who is now recommended to advocate groups for the Environmental Protection Network and Lawyers for the good government.
With the permission of the city of Thomasville
“These projects were chosen because they have a really clear way to alleviate the health challenges facing this community,” he said.
Critics argue that there is a separation between the Trump administration’s attack on the concept of environmental justice and the facts that money pays.
“What is going on about building a new health clinic and upgrading the sewage water infrastructure … This is not compatible with the management policy?” Democratic Senator Georgia John Osov, director of the Environmental Protection Agency, asked Lee Zeladen In a modern hearing.
Zilden has repeatedly responded by discussing the agency review process that aims to comply with President Donald Trump’s executive orders, especially those related to diversity, equality, and policies, but OSSOFF cut it, and pressed a specific answer on the Thomasville grant. “Did a new health clinic wake up for Thomasfille, Georgia,?” He asked.
SEALY from Thomasville said it realizes that the federal government should make severe financing decisions – this is also true locally – but the loss of this grant has left its city in Lurch. In addition to the planned work on the sewage collection system, the city needs to update its treatment plant to meet the environmental protection agency standards. She said this reform may cost $ 60 million to $ 70 million.
“How do you finance that?” He asked Celly. “You cannot finance this on the appearance of people who pay our prices.”
Funding discounts left cities throughout Georgia – including Athens, Nortraros and Savana – as well as non -profit groups, in a state of uncertainty: some grants that were terminated, some are suspended and then repeated, some are unclear. This puts the city’s officials in an impossible position, unable to wait or move forward, according to the sustainability director in the Athens-Clak Mike and Erton Province.
“Do you abide by new programs? Do you abide by services?” He said. “Here you are sitting for several months.”
Like Thomasville, ATHENS has also received a 20 million dollar community change grant. The city would have used funds for backup, solar energy generators, storing batteries in the General Safety Complex – to ensure 911, police, prison, shelter for domestic violence, and other services that all work during power outages. This grant has been terminated.
Warton said that the problem exceeds this money that does not come; The city had already spent the time, resources and money for the grant.
“We spent $ 60,000 in local financing to employ people to write grants,” he said. “For a period of 14 months, we have invested more than 700 hours of local employees time. So we have transferred our services to focus on these things.”
These frustrations play with beneficiaries of grants throughout the state and the country, according to Lahouf. He said he is not just confusing – he is costly.
He said: “They are causing the project’s high costs because they continue to freeze, cancel projects and re -equip them.” “One of the major engines of exceeding costs in any infrastructure project, the public or private sector, to lay off your teams and re -renew them.”
Thomasfille and Athens officials said they are resuming the termination of grants, which requires them to submit an official letter that determines the reasons for their appeal and ask the agency to reconsider the decision. They are also communicating with their elected officials, in the hope that pressure from the members of the Senate and members of Congress can obtain them on the federal funds they promised.
Other cities and non -profit organizations, in addition to a group of democratic state lawyers, have raised the pretext that ending their granting without following the appropriate procedures is illegal. But this is a difficult step to take many areas.
“The federal government is prosecuting to confirm your legal rights is very difficult, even if the law is next to you,” Hoover said.
