What's Good with East Palestine

[00:00:00] What's Good Ohio? I'm your host, James Hayes and this is the What's Good Ohio Podcast,

[00:00:21] where we talk to the activists, organizers, visionaries and good treble makers coming together

[00:00:26] to make our state better for everyone. No exceptions. I'm joined as always by Sarah Rodenburg,

[00:00:31] who was good at over at Policy Matters Ohio.

[00:00:34] Hey James, it's so good to see you. We have an event coming up. Actually this will be

[00:00:39] released March 14th, so on the 15th we are hosting a virtual cocktail hour about the

[00:00:46] power of progressive prosecution. I am just going to list all of the other people that are

[00:00:51] co-sponsoring this event with us. We have ACLU Cleveland votes, racial equity buddies

[00:00:56] of Cleveland, family parties of Ohio and the Northeast Ohio Black Health Coalition all

[00:01:01] co-sponsoring this virtual happy hour. It's just going to be talking about specifically

[00:01:06] the Chiahoga prosecutors raise. We are coming up on March 19th, so four days after this

[00:01:14] is released. You can leave the link in the show notes for people to register if they would

[00:01:19] like to attend this. That's what we got going on. How about Ohio voice? What's good

[00:01:27] with Ohio voice? Same old, same old. We've got an election coming up. It's really good

[00:01:32] to hear that you're doing that about the prosecutor races because that's really exciting. There's

[00:01:36] some of those other races I think they're most interesting, especially this time of year

[00:01:40] in the primary. March 19th will be election day. Early voting has already started. The

[00:01:46] folks over RC are doing their election protection program already, testing out the election protection

[00:01:52] in the primary that they'll have to scale it for the general election. Adam, our data director

[00:01:58] is helping groups get in the field during their canvases and getting folks out to vote

[00:02:02] for the primary. There's also a lot going on there with redistricting and signature gathering.

[00:02:07] There's a lot happening this early part of the year which is exciting. It's going to be

[00:02:11] a big year, another existential fight for the state. Central battle we won two last year.

[00:02:17] So looking forward to getting another dub this year with redistricting.

[00:02:22] And if that made you go, what's redistricting? You can go listen to the first episode of season

[00:02:27] two of Let's Get Ohio.

[00:02:44] On February 3rd, 2023, Northfolk Southern bomb train carrying toxic chemicals derailed

[00:02:50] in East Palestine, Ohio, causing an unprecedented environmental crisis along the Ohio River.

[00:02:56] East Palestine organizers have been on the front lines with community led demands since

[00:02:59] the beginning, leading the fight for corporate and government accountability. Today we're

[00:03:04] speaking with an organizer who has been on the ground in the community this whole time.

[00:03:08] I'm excited to be joined by Timothy Adeter and environmental organizer who was actually

[00:03:12] a fellow in our Spadework program last year that we did with Ohio Voice. Welcome, Timothy.

[00:03:16] It's good to see you.

[00:03:17] Hi, great to be here. Thank you. It's good to see you guys too.

[00:03:22] Wonderful. Let's start out. Can you tell us just a little bit about yourself? Where

[00:03:25] you from? How you got into this work, a little background.

[00:03:30] So I'm from East Palestine. I've lived here my whole life before the German. I was like

[00:03:36] a pharmacy technician. So a totally different job with totally different skillset that I

[00:03:42] was not prepared for this at all. The night of the German. So like how I got into this

[00:03:50] work is like a little bit complicated before the German happened. I did a little bit of

[00:03:56] work with my local queer community. We actually put on our very first pride for our county,

[00:04:01] which is pretty big with it being a Brad County and it's not super friendly towards queer

[00:04:07] people. So like it was pretty exciting to like get that you know do that but that is

[00:04:11] pretty much the extent of my organizing knowledge is like fighting homophobes, you

[00:04:17] know. This drama happened and it was like everybody was kind of thrusted into this world

[00:04:24] of chaos. Like, you know before this nobody knew where East Palestine was. Like I would have

[00:04:29] to explain it to people. I'd be like oh yeah from East Palestine. I'd be like where's

[00:04:32] that? I'd be like oh yeah okay. It's like an hour from Pittsburgh 30 minutes from

[00:04:36] young town you know. Now I'm like oh yeah from East Palestine and I get oh that's what

[00:04:43] I get every time and I'm like okay great. I got into this work specific pretty like have more

[00:04:49] heavily because of the derailment. I've never done anything like this before this was a totally

[00:04:54] new skill set for me so it was like a really crazy chaotic beginning. That is really interesting

[00:05:01] I didn't realize that the derailment was what got you into this work so that is incredibly

[00:05:06] interesting and makes sense. Yeah no I was kind of want to go back to that time then since

[00:05:13] that's kind of where everything begins for you and your leadership journey and just thinking about

[00:05:18] that night and just wondering do you remember where you were when you first heard about the derailment

[00:05:24] what was the initial reaction for the community? That first you know that first 72 hours that first

[00:05:28] week just kind of want to paint the picture for our listeners about what was happening a year ago.

[00:05:33] Well we had just gotten home from grocery shopping like I was out with my family we're at

[00:05:38] grocery shopping and then we had come home it was like maybe 9 p.m. at night or something like

[00:05:43] it was late but it wasn't like late and we live about a mile and a half from the derailment so it's

[00:05:49] like we weren't like way up there we could see the fire but we we heard all these like fire trucks

[00:05:54] we were like what is going on? What's with all these sirens and at first we my mom being you know

[00:06:02] my mom she's like you know let's check out the Facebook groups or whatever and I'm like okay that was

[00:06:07] it it turned out to be a really good idea because that turned out to be like how we got all of our

[00:06:12] information because there was no information anywhere else like it was pretty much just our community

[00:06:19] members and our neighbors and stuff taking videos with their cell phones and posting them to

[00:06:25] Facebook and going oh my god look at this crazy thing that happened. We just knew that a train

[00:06:29] was on fire we didn't know that there was toxic chemicals nobody knew that there was toxic chemicals

[00:06:34] we barely even knew that it had derailed we were just like oh it had to derailed because it's on fire you

[00:06:38] know and we kind of kept an eye on things and we were thinking like as a few hours you know went on

[00:06:45] we were like you know hopefully they'll get it under control and it turned out that they weren't

[00:06:50] getting it under control and around one in the morning my mom had decided you know I think we

[00:06:58] should leave we should evacuate and I was like you know I'm here for that decision so

[00:07:06] we packed up as best we could it's quick as we could and we left and we went to my brother's house

[00:07:15] who lives in New Springfield Ohio which is like not far it is like 10 minutes away

[00:07:21] we hit out there for a little while and for like maybe about a week we stayed there

[00:07:27] because my mom has like health problems and things so we didn't want her down there with all

[00:07:31] all of what was going on but there was a lot a lot of confusion from the community within those first

[00:07:36] 72 hours it was a lot a lot of panic it was a lot of like we we don't know what's happening

[00:07:43] and it was just a lot of people being really really scared yeah reasonably so there was so little

[00:07:50] information to us you know much further away in the state like I I someone who's on TikTok all

[00:07:57] the time and that's where I got the only information I feel like I heard about the train

[00:08:02] derailment for days so and I can't imagine being in that situation but organizers in the community

[00:08:09] did immediately step up after the derailment providing mutual aid to those affected but also

[00:08:14] compiling community demands in the beginning you had calls of action to governor de wine

[00:08:20] to ask president Biden to declare a federal emergency to mithia you actually helped organize

[00:08:26] a day of action at the state housing Columbus as part of the spade work program to put the pressure

[00:08:31] on governor de wine you also called on Norfolk Southern for monetary compensation and relocation

[00:08:37] assistance to those whose homes were affected and after a lot of pressure you won those demands

[00:08:42] but have you actually seen accountability and resources as a result where are things now that we

[00:08:49] are a year and a few weeks out from this train derailment and where are things now with those demands

[00:08:56] so as far as accountability goes accountability for Norfolk Southern there hasn't really been a lot

[00:09:02] like everybody keeps saying they're gonna hold them accountable everybody and it almost feels

[00:09:06] like a buzz word at this point like people keep saying it but we're not seeing it and it's it's like a

[00:09:11] whole thing a good example would be like for the relocation assistance or for honestly any assistance

[00:09:18] from Norfolk Southern it's all done on like a very case by case basis so like you know you could

[00:09:24] be in the same position as your neighbor and they might get help but you won't and it all could

[00:09:31] just depend on what the person at the assistant center feels like doing also some people they

[00:09:37] have decided like if you didn't relocate like if you like for example for like my situation

[00:09:43] we relocated for a week but then we came back and I've been here since the only assistance I've

[00:09:49] gotten from Norfolk Southern was $1,000 and that was our inconvenience payment that we got at the

[00:09:54] beginning and that's been it despite the fact that my creeks that runs behind my house is contaminated

[00:10:01] and like all this other stuff so it's crazy but I do want to say like I've been pretty blessed with

[00:10:06] this like they haven't I haven't had like a whole whole lot of problems people have had it we

[00:10:10] worse there's a woman who lives up by the Jerome and Satan she lives like right there that while

[00:10:16] they were doing a lot of the cleanup the chemicals because part of what they did was they had taken some

[00:10:22] of the chemicals out of the cars and it turned into like a slurry and they like dug a trench and

[00:10:28] like buried it and they thought they could get away with it and then they had to read that's a big

[00:10:31] reason why they had to remediate a lot of that dirt but as they were doing that some of the a lot

[00:10:37] of that slurry a lot of that dirt a lot of those chemicals ended up getting into like there was a woman

[00:10:42] she had like chemical soup in her like backyard it was insane and it was just there where her kids play

[00:10:49] and stuff and she's like what you know I can't you know we can't go outside like this is not good

[00:10:55] not to mention like a lot of during the remediation they ended up fixing this after a while but I

[00:11:01] think I might have been from us pushing it might not have been I'm not sure but they had

[00:11:09] their trucks the trucks that they were using to haul away the remediated dirt a lot of them they

[00:11:16] needed like they were supposed to have tarps on them to like keep the dirt from coming off with

[00:11:20] their driving through and they weren't and so those dirt that dirt was like blowing on to people's

[00:11:25] homes blowing into like it was insane and it's just the EPA was supposed to oversee Norfolk Southern

[00:11:33] doing this cleanup and if that's the way that they oversaw it I don't think that that's I don't know

[00:11:39] I just didn't seem kosher to me so like as far as accountability goes with Norfolk Southern who

[00:11:45] knows you know they keep saying they're gonna do it I haven't seen a whole lot another part of it

[00:11:51] is that they Norfolk Southern has discontinued their relocation assistance which was helping people

[00:11:57] which was you know reimbursing people for their hotel stays a lot of people like I said they were

[00:12:03] doing everything on a very case by case basis so some people like got to stay in the hotels but there

[00:12:10] was only like a couple only a few but most people ended up like after I think it was February nights

[00:12:16] of this year having to like go back into their homes or find somewhere else to go so they were like

[00:12:24] essentially go back to where you don't feel safe or be homeless so that's a big issue with

[00:12:29] Norfolk Southern so we have we've pushed for it but we haven't seen a lot of it because like these

[00:12:34] structures don't seem to allow for the accountability for it you know another thing is they were

[00:12:41] disposing we've been pushing from the beginning too for them not to dispose of the chemical dirt

[00:12:47] at heritage thermal heritage thermal if you don't know what that is it is a incinerator in East Liverpool

[00:12:54] Ohio which is 30 minutes just down the road I mean it's also in a largely by-pock area it's an east

[00:13:02] end of East Liverpool which has I can't remember the exact statistic but it has a relatively large

[00:13:09] concentration of like black and brown people so it's another situation where they're you know

[00:13:16] doing environmental racism I'm glad you brought that up because I remember hearing about that

[00:13:21] and I wanted to ask about that because yeah there were just so many additional implications and I

[00:13:26] feel as it takes so long for us to really understand all the environmental impacts of you know

[00:13:33] that have happened you know and it's only been one year and I feel like it's going to take so

[00:13:38] long but yeah so yeah could you say a little bit more about how other communities have been impacted

[00:13:43] outside of just East Palestine like you said in East Liverpool they dropped all that wastewater

[00:13:50] off there for you know oh yeah that was a really good example so a lot of these different communities

[00:13:55] have been impacted by this a lot of the researchers have even stated that it could have it affects

[00:14:01] up to a 30 mile radius if not further especially a big part of this issue that gets overlooked

[00:14:08] is how affected Pennsylvania got because whenever the Jerome had happened and not the Jerome

[00:14:15] whenever they did the controlled burn and there was the big toxic smoke cloud the winds had shifted

[00:14:24] and it blew a lot of that carcinogenic smoke eastward onto Pennsylvania so like the crazy thing is

[00:14:32] like I live a mile and a half away I live in East Palestine and I'm less affected than some people

[00:14:38] who live three four five miles away but they live in Pennsylvania and people who live because this

[00:14:45] happened like right on the border of Ohio and Pennsylvania like right on the border but unfortunately

[00:14:51] like a lot of people from Pennsylvania haven't been able to get the aid that they need because of our

[00:14:58] Ohio politics and you know Mike DeLon not you know fighting us to get this emergency declaration

[00:15:06] declared that's a big reason why getting this emergency declaration to clear is been so important

[00:15:10] is because it would unlock like federal resources not just for us but for Pennsylvania as well

[00:15:15] and West Virginia and like all these other places like it got into the river it got you know

[00:15:22] it's it's a whole thing there was down so far as southern Ohio to West Virginia they had to

[00:15:27] reroute their waterways because of the deronement because of the chemicals that got into the river

[00:15:34] because they used surface water for the drinking water and they couldn't you know so they had

[00:15:38] to reroute because of the contamination so like it's affected quite a bit and yet there's been so

[00:15:44] little conversation about it wow I don't think I I mean I knew it was bigger and also that it would

[00:15:50] take us a long time to see what the real effects of this are but I don't think I realized like

[00:15:55] truly land area wise how far it reached yeah it's insane there was just another question that

[00:16:03] it came up to me as we as I was listening to you talk about this happening right on the border

[00:16:06] and clearly there's so much of like in the environmental concerns and impacts this also happened

[00:16:12] on a railroad and you know there's all sorts of issues you know with just the way that the

[00:16:17] railroad industry has been deregulated and taken over private equity and who owns north folks

[00:16:23] other and you know and so I just wanted if you could talk a little about some of you know that

[00:16:27] perspective just around like the railroads safety and if there's been any conversations that

[00:16:32] y'all have been having about that well Sherrod Brown and JD Vance and a couple quite a handful of

[00:16:41] other senators have proposed the Railway Safety Act like in response to what had happened in East

[00:16:46] Palestine I see what they're doing I think it's great I think we do need to make our railways safer

[00:16:51] we need to have a two-man crew like it's crazy that they only want one person on an on a train

[00:16:57] like what if someone has a heart attack or a stroke you know something could happen and there's

[00:17:01] a lot that could be done there I think there has been some federal response in that regard

[00:17:06] and I honestly think that making our our railway safety is probably the best way to prevent this from

[00:17:12] happening again in the future you know as you said there has been deregulation within the railway

[00:17:17] industry as far as like even looking at that train specifically there were multiple instances where

[00:17:23] that could have been caught before it derailed and it wasn't a really good example is up in Salem

[00:17:29] Ohio which I actually used to work so it's like 30 minutes the other way there was security

[00:17:35] camp footage from butch tech bliss which they had security camp footage of this of the train coming by

[00:17:42] and on that you could see very clearly that that bearing was on fire as far as Salem Ohio

[00:17:49] and as it was passing through that railway passed through other detectors too there was one in

[00:17:53] Latonia that it passed and it tripped and they alerted the people they needed to alert and they told

[00:17:59] them to keep going so like in order to make sure that our railways are safer we really do need to

[00:18:04] make sure that we have safer railway safety legislation and reinstate those regulations that we didn't

[00:18:09] have before or better ones but I just also had no idea that there were multiple like points where

[00:18:16] they could have like wow I had absolutely no idea once again why why are all of these details not

[00:18:22] being told to the general public it's crazy I think they they get mixed up and like because it's

[00:18:28] there's a lot that goes into this there's a lot of details that they missed that could have prevented

[00:18:33] this and it's just loss they just didn't it's insane and going back to what James was just saying as

[00:18:43] well who owns Norfolk Southern one specific owner black rock is the second largest shareholder in

[00:18:50] Norfolk Southern and just recently less than a month ago the Cleveland Sustainability Summit invited

[00:18:56] not even just a couple days after the one year anniversary the keynote speaker was someone from

[00:19:02] Black Rock at the sustainability summit and rightfully a lot of organizers and people in attendance

[00:19:10] and 50 some people walked out and held an alternative programming talking about having racial equity

[00:19:17] in any sustainability efforts that we do I don't even really have a question about that I just was

[00:19:24] that may be very angry right we should start having a little segment just like a Sarah Rance

[00:19:31] segment that is what my private tiktok is for James

[00:19:55] at that point what are the current demands that the people of East Palestine that you are

[00:20:00] working towards still a full year later so things have definitely changed because of Biden being

[00:20:06] here but I don't want to skip around too much on these questions we want our health care needs

[00:20:11] addressed our health care needs are probably the biggest most key thing every time I can this and

[00:20:18] I talk to people even people who are like against what I'm doing they're like yeah I am worried about

[00:20:24] my long-term health care and my long-term health effects and I'm like yeah yeah we all heard so like

[00:20:30] that's a big one that needs addressed and another one would be we've been dealing with the way that

[00:20:36] the EPA has been testing this hasn't been spectacular from day one I'm not like a scientist so I don't

[00:20:43] I can't really get into a hole the details because I don't understand a lot of it but I do

[00:20:49] understand enough to know that they're not testing the way they should be they weren't doing indoor

[00:20:54] air monitoring for a long time especially in people's homes part of what they called their indoor

[00:21:00] air monitoring was like and I kid you not this is gonna make you laugh it was a sniff test so we

[00:21:06] would have to trust and I don't want to say his name but there was this one EPA official who

[00:21:10] went around and did these but he would just walk into your home and like smell and like see if he

[00:21:15] could smell chemicals and then would be like if he couldn't smell anything he'd be like okay you're

[00:21:21] fine it's like at least bring out your little meter yeah or a dog like I feel like I would trust

[00:21:29] a dog yeah yeah yeah yeah how do you get that job like what does on your resume

[00:21:37] that's what I want to know like this guy supposed to be some big head EPA guy and I'm like who are

[00:21:45] you but yeah that was that was one they weren't really and one of the things though the composite

[00:21:52] samples they've been using when they do soil testing they are supposed to there's two ways that

[00:21:57] they've been that you can do it but one way is better than the other way and the way that they've

[00:22:02] been doing it has been the less good way they have been in order to sample the dirt they will

[00:22:08] they've been using composite samples which means they take like a core sample of dirt

[00:22:12] and they take it up and it's like shook and around or like mixed up and then they test the dirt

[00:22:19] for the chemicals right well see here's the thing with this that kind of waters down the results

[00:22:26] because like some of the dirt underneath where the derailment happened is obviously not going to

[00:22:31] be contaminated they really do need to like test the entire sample instead of shaking it up a lot of

[00:22:36] people have had issues with the way that the EPA has been testing and doing that so one of the things

[00:22:42] that we really want is that we want them to do some independent environmental monitoring so that

[00:22:47] we can actually trust the results that we're getting because like there have been independent

[00:22:51] testers that have come in and tested and the results will say something totally different than

[00:22:56] what the EPA's results are and it's like well can we like explain this and like get us some answers

[00:23:01] instead of him going around and while the EPA not jump like it just seems like they have

[00:23:08] vested interests in not helping people despite that being the job who are they protecting?

[00:23:16] Exactly that's what I would like to know it seems like I don't know I don't know it makes me

[00:23:21] wonder but that's been an issue with them so that's a big demand is our health care

[00:23:25] getting us our environmental monitoring that we need that we can trust we still want him

[00:23:30] to declare this emergency declaration like we've been asking for it for over a year now

[00:23:35] with that being said like I told you guys already like it would open up so many more resources

[00:23:39] it would open up FEMA resources for us and it would open up a lot of resources for Pennsylvania which

[00:23:44] desperately needed all those sounds like a great direction and if you said I know things have shifted

[00:23:49] since president Biden visited East Palestine on February 16th just a couple weeks ago for the first

[00:23:55] time right for the first time since the incident more than a year after the derailment I'm sure

[00:23:59] it's not just because there's an election this year but I'm sure many East Palestine residents

[00:24:03] you know we're feeling like it's likely too little too late I'll just want to if you can

[00:24:06] describe to our listeners what happened during the president's visit and some of the general

[00:24:12] sentiments from the community and from organizers. As far as what happens it was crazy because nobody

[00:24:19] knew when he was going to be here what what was happening but when he showed up he was only

[00:24:24] and he's policy for maybe two or three hours and then he left to boil it down in a nutshell he did

[00:24:29] speak to some of the people who are in the movement some of the people who carry our message so

[00:24:35] that was really really awesome he spoke to three wonderful spectacular leaders and I'm really grateful

[00:24:39] that that had happened. He also addressed the public with like a live video he like went live from

[00:24:47] a point at the derailment site he went up to the derailment site and he was up there and did

[00:24:51] a live and addressed us in that he said that he was giving grants to I think it was Case Western

[00:24:59] Reserve University but there was probably some others in order to possibly get us long-term

[00:25:04] healthcare testing and also possibly some environmental monitoring so that's a good thing we're

[00:25:09] excited about that but we we want to look into those and see you know what all that'll entail

[00:25:15] he also went to 1820 house which is a candle shop in East Palestine it's actually a really cute

[00:25:22] candle shop and he met with some bit members of city council he had a cup of coffee one of the things

[00:25:31] that he did that was maybe a small point of contention he drank some water some like tap water

[00:25:38] and that's kind of an issue down here it's I don't even want to say I take issue with it it just

[00:25:43] felt like a flint Michigan moment you know what I'm talking about like when Obama went to flint

[00:25:48] Michigan and it like barely touched his lips it's that's what it felt like to me as a person who

[00:25:53] hasn't drank their tap water any year you know because a lot of people down here like they don't

[00:26:00] feel comfortable they don't feel safe for many different reasons because we at the beginning some

[00:26:05] people worried that the drinking water was contaminated and I think that that's still a thing the

[00:26:11] people are anxious about so it's a whole thing but that's what he did in a nutshell was he came

[00:26:17] down here and he did that and then he left a lot of people kind of feel like it was maybe a step

[00:26:24] in the right direction as far as too little too late though I'm gonna be honest that specific

[00:26:29] phrasing was really taken and used by a lot of pro Trump people who were just protesting because

[00:26:36] they didn't like Biden I mean everyone's a lot to do with their a lot to do you know first their

[00:26:40] first amendment right but that's not my opinion of it um and it's not the opinion of a lot of

[00:26:45] people in the movement most people in town at are justifiably upset that it has taken him a year

[00:26:53] nobody's happy about the timing of this but I personally believe that even though he was a

[00:27:00] little bit late like it's never too late to do the right thing so like if he's gonna come out and

[00:27:05] help I was I was grateful for the help and hopefully we can hold him accountable and he's

[00:27:10] and he still does what we need him to do yeah no that's I really appreciate that because I got me

[00:27:15] thinking about you know how little I know about East Palsty and his community and you were saying

[00:27:19] earlier you know when you tell people you're from East Palsty now they say oh before they then

[00:27:24] didn't know anything and now all they know is that there was a tragedy they don't they still don't

[00:27:28] know anything really about the community so you grew up there your families from there if you

[00:27:32] just share a little about what is East Palsty in light you know outside of the context of just

[00:27:37] this particular tragedy it's actually a cute little town we have like antique stores and stuff

[00:27:43] which is nice a lot of people used to come here for the antique stores the other thing is too like

[00:27:47] I worked at the only pharmacy in town for a good amount of my adult life so far I interacted with

[00:27:54] a lot of the people there you know it's kind of a customer service e-type job it's cute it's quaint

[00:27:59] it's a lot of like older people and it's a lot of people who are kind of stuck because of

[00:28:06] poverty but it's a very proud town like people like if you there's a lot of people mispronounce that

[00:28:12] as East Palestine and it's it's spelled like that so like honestly us local people need to give

[00:28:18] people grace but because of the way that we talk because of our little Appalachian dialects that

[00:28:25] we got going on we all have pronounced these palestine or whole lives and like it's it's funny

[00:28:30] because you'll see some of the pride come out in people whenever like especially with this

[00:28:34] Jerome and like people were coming in and they were pronouncing it all wrong and like all of these old

[00:28:38] funny duties were like it's East Palestine get it right it's like okay guys like this guy's

[00:28:44] from like California he doesn't know how to do this like please chill out but it it's it's it's

[00:28:54] a nice little town is a quaint little town people are very proud to be here it is a kind of a

[00:28:58] community that we rely on each other like I don't know how many times I've gone to like a spaghetti

[00:29:03] dinner for a benefit for somebody who's like going through cancer or something you know like

[00:29:09] whenever things go wrong people usually do come together and try to make things better

[00:29:14] and I think at the beginning of the derailment that happened for a good two months

[00:29:22] a good solid two months and then Norfolk Southern has a lot of influence and there was some

[00:29:29] division that had happened that nobody is happy about but we're all trying to make it better so

[00:29:34] oh Matt perfectly leads into the next question because you're still here doing this work

[00:29:39] so despite all of the disaster all of the potential long-term effects like you obviously still have

[00:29:46] hope that things can be better that people can do the right thing what gives you that hope what keeps

[00:29:53] you still fighting as opposed to just giving up because I have seen this community pull together

[00:30:00] we've come together and done some really great things and some really insane circumstances

[00:30:05] so towards the beginning whenever everything had happened a lot of people all came together and

[00:30:11] started like doing mutual aid and like giving water and it wasn't even like orgs entirely like

[00:30:17] there were orgs don't get me wrong like there were organizations that came in and did a lot

[00:30:21] of mutual aid but they were also just regular people just going hey do you need this I have this

[00:30:29] let me help or people like I would see on Facebook even right after the derailment happened people

[00:30:34] were like hey if you need a place to stay I have this extra vacant home that's out of the way

[00:30:39] go stay there if you need somewhere to stay and you know I'm somewhere to stay there were things

[00:30:43] like that there are people like who help with other people's like livestock and stuff and it's

[00:30:48] just it really did give me a lot of hope at the fact that I was like wow these guys are this is

[00:30:52] really really awesome that we can all actually stand up together and fight I wasn't a kid who had a

[00:30:57] lot of team spirit when I was in school I wouldn't do sports I was like not that kid right and then

[00:31:04] for like the first time in my life I was like amidst all this chaos because it was chaotic but

[00:31:12] like we were coming together I just saw like my neighbors and my friends and like people that

[00:31:17] I've known for years like people who went to the pharmacy that like used to give me a hard time

[00:31:23] and they were out here like hollering and fighting for our community and I was like okay this is sick

[00:31:29] let's do this like let's let's help and like the fact that we still see some of that has died

[00:31:35] down over the past year because like you know people get burnt out and they fall out of the movement

[00:31:40] which is perfectly okay but there are still people out here who are still like hey we're fighting

[00:31:45] for this and we're doing this and this is the way it is and that gives me a lot of hope

[00:31:49] awesome awesome chair let me just put the listeners about how folks can get involved and

[00:31:54] how people can support your work if anybody an Ohio is local and feels like driving all the way

[00:32:00] down here you could come out and help out camsick but other than that you can always reach out to me

[00:32:07] I can give you my contact information we're trying to do a lot of different stuff we're trying to

[00:32:11] get some more mutual aid built back up because people are still needing it and it's really frustrating

[00:32:18] not being able to drink your tap water after a year later so like it would be great if we could

[00:32:24] figure that out and get people the help that they need especially some people are still relocating

[00:32:29] some people you know have lost a lot of like there's people who lost everything from this and like

[00:32:35] I'm just really grateful that I personally haven't lost everything but like we've still all lost a lot

[00:32:41] so just reach out to me I guess okay cool and then I guess my last question you said you've got started

[00:32:49] really on this journey as a leader and organized it really for just a year now and

[00:32:54] but you've had a hell of a year and so I just wanted if you could share some reflections on like

[00:32:58] what lessons you've learned about organizing in the course of this year oh my god there's been so many

[00:33:06] one of the things that I learned specifically at spadework is because I didn't think about this

[00:33:12] way I'm I'm an aries so I'm full of anger all the time um I'm a Libra I will

[00:33:19] span your fire work I love that so like whenever I first jumped into this I had a lot of feelings

[00:33:26] of frustration and anger like this big corporation came in and blew up a chemical toxic train a

[00:33:32] mile and a half from my house and now I don't know what I'm gonna do for the rest of my life so

[00:33:37] it's a crazy time and whenever I first got into spadework and I was I think I was like that at that

[00:33:43] first retreat that I went to like somebody had brought up a conversation about organizing out of

[00:33:50] like anger versus organizing out of like love and I was like wow that's an interesting concept to

[00:33:57] me because like I'm pissed and I'm over here like doing this because I want things to be better

[00:34:04] because I'm angry about it and it took me a little bit of being in that environment but also talking

[00:34:11] to the people talking to like my fellows that were in spadework with me and like talking learning

[00:34:16] their experiences and things like that that I realized that this should definitely this work

[00:34:23] should not come from that because I also noticed as that was happening and I was working out of

[00:34:28] anger like a lot of things were going on it was super chaotic and I was not getting the results

[00:34:33] I wanted I think because I was just doing things like angerly and not like doing things like

[00:34:38] thinking things through and doing things in a way that should have been you know that was more

[00:34:43] measured a more measured response and then I kind of like took that and I was like okay I'm gonna

[00:34:50] like keep that in my heart and like really think about it and I learned about like doing this out

[00:34:56] of the love for community and that was a very easy thing to switch over to and since then because like

[00:35:04] it is my community it's not just my community it's myself and my family and I obviously love my

[00:35:10] family I love my neighbors I love my you know the people who are around me I love all the friends

[00:35:15] that I made when I worked at Raidade and I would talk to them you know what I mean and that was a

[00:35:20] really big lesson was learning how to organize that up the love of community and not the anger at

[00:35:25] the situation another thing that I really learned too was I thought once upon a time that I knew

[00:35:33] how to talk to people because I worked in customer service I learned through canvassing that was not

[00:35:39] the case and canvassing it in itself I think is a wonderful beautiful tool it's a good way to like

[00:35:49] open up conversations with people you may never have spoken to or may never have spoken to in that

[00:35:54] capacity and what was happening to me as I was canvassing in like in my hometown was I was

[00:36:01] running into people that I used to know you know when I worked at Raidade and so I would reconnect

[00:36:07] with these people and they'd already like have this relatively good connotation of my personality

[00:36:14] so they would open up to me really quickly and I would just hear their stories and I was like wow

[00:36:19] this is like totally different than what I'd ever thought I would ever be doing and this is

[00:36:25] really good this is wonderful yeah definitely learning how to talk to people on a deeper level

[00:36:30] through canvassing and also through mutual aid doing mutual aid also same same effect like you know as

[00:36:36] you're talking to people what I was I was doing things where I was handing out water to a lot of

[00:36:40] people they would sometimes they'd sit there and they chat with me and they talk to me and you know

[00:36:45] that was that was really really good that was awesome and I was really really happy to learn how to

[00:36:50] how to have those types of deep conversations with people awesome thank you for sharing that's

[00:36:55] beautiful thank you to nathia for your time for sharing your your story with us for sharing the

[00:37:01] lessons you learned over the last year for giving us an update on where things are at now yeah

[00:37:06] you've been through a lot your whole community has been through a lot in the last year it's been really

[00:37:09] inspiring to see and hear the stories of resistance I know it's not easy and it's going to be an

[00:37:16] ongoing long-term fight and we're gonna have to continue to pay attention to it is those of us

[00:37:22] some outside from from other parts of the state and from outside of the state who care because

[00:37:28] this could have happened in any community you know there's so many communities that train like

[00:37:32] you said it was already on fire you are there was already an issue they've been flagged 30 minutes

[00:37:37] before it derailed actually did derailed and as the road industry has continued to be controlled by

[00:37:45] firms like blackrock and pushed for deregulation it's it there's so many communities that you know

[00:37:51] that are just one unfortunate incident away from from things in a similar happened so thank you

[00:37:57] so much for sharing your experience and and hopefully we won't see this again but I know there's been

[00:38:03] a number of derailments fortunately none quite as catastrophic just in this last year but hopefully

[00:38:09] you know this work will continue on and and and we'll give a light for other communities that are

[00:38:15] facing similar fights and yeah it's been really inspiring to get to know you and to hear your story

[00:38:22] and thank you so much for joining us today I'm really grateful for you guys having me and

[00:38:27] you know shutting some light on on this work I'm really grateful for all of it and I'm really

[00:38:33] grateful for all the help you guys have given us and honestly I'm really grateful for spadework

[00:38:36] and all the help that they've given me and learning how to how to do this because I I didn't know

[00:38:41] how to do that and then I learned and now I'm great or feel great about it you are great

[00:38:50] go down no down and that's a good yeah it's a good a good shout out to spadework based in the bay area

[00:38:55] that they do some great training work they do some great training work well thank you so much and

[00:39:00] I'm sure we'll see you down the road sometime

[00:39:10] as always visit whatsgoodohio.com for show notes and links and subscribe to what's good Ohio wherever

[00:39:15] you get your podcasts we'll see you next time to keep talking about whatsgood here in Ohio