Gracia O’Neill makes me laugh. The smart, sassy, community-minded assistant director of the nonprofit Clean Water for NC shoots straight when it comes to the lack of sex appeal related to her line of work in the field of environmental justice.

“How unattractive does this sound?” she asks me. “‘Will you come out to a public hearing on the Title V wastewater permit next week?’ That’s not sexy. It’s not interesting. It doesn’t sound exciting. It sounds difficult and complicated, and who needs it?”

However, the snooze factor of public comment has a very bright flip side, which O’Neill described during a recent Q&A.

Does it make a difference if people show up for a public meeting or write a letter of comment to a government official?
Absolutely! It makes even more of an impact when people do show up because officials know that people wouldn’t be there unless they really, really cared. And when people don’t show up for a hearing, we get that thrown in our faces all of the time. It gives the impression that nobody cares and that there’s really not a problem.

What’s Clean Water for NC (CWNC) all about?
CWFNC is not just an environmental organization—it’s an environmental justice organization. Environmental justice is “the concept of fair treatment and meaningful involvement of all people, regardless of race, color, national origin or income”(reading with excellent diction from wall poster).

It grew out of the social justice movement of the ‘60s. A lot of studies have focused on the populations living around the industries and facilities emitting toxins into the air, water and soil. They’ve shown that a disproportionate number are sited near populations of either low-income or [people of] color. Environmental justice is the concept that it really shouldn’t be happening this way—that we all need to bear that burden equally.

I’d also add that we never get involved in anything without a community group. We’re not the lead, we support the community group, do what they want to do, and help them do the research.

Could you describe a few recent CWNC projects?
Our organization has been a very strong advocate of cleaning up the Pigeon River in Haywood County. We’ve also been working closely with a group in Madison County called Laurel Valley Watch (where a developer has proposed building a 300,000-gallon-per-day wastewater treatment plant onto a tiny creek). We also worked really hard on a statewide well-user protection bill.

Tell me about your permit monitoring program.
Every five years, anyone who has a permit to discharge waste into a waterway is required to undergo a permit renewal. This is a really key opportunity for the local community to get their two cents in on what they think needs to happen in order to protect the receiving water body.

I monitor all of the permits up for renewal across NC, and I get that information out to members living near the site. I give people tips on where to find more information and how to get their hands on the actual permit. I try to identify problem facilities when I can.

How many staffers do you have?
CWNC has two full-time and two part-time staffers (based in Asheville and Chapel Hill). We like to say around the office that we have a constant amount of work security—not job security, because that requires money.

What do you teach people to look for and point out to public officials?
It helps to have people on the ground who know and live in the area and can say, for instance, “Well, they say here that they want to expand their facility, but I know that there are sewage spills in this facility already.”

How do you keep upbeat?
You always have to keep in mind that it’s not over until a thing is built and belching smoke into the air. It’s not over until that happens, and you just keep hammering away at it and keep feeding off other people’s energy and enthusiasm. When you’re down, you hope they’re up.

Any words of wisdom in your line of work?
If you’re not at the table you’re on the table.

THREE THINGS YOU CAN DO RIGHT NOW TO HELP CLEAN WATER FOR NC
1. Become a member at www.cwfnc.org or by calling 828-251-1291 or 800-929-4480.

2. Resolve to attend at least one public meeting in 2008 to voice your support for stronger regulation of polluters. CWNC emails alerts about five times a year detailing local public hearings and ways to take action.

3. Become a CWNC stream monitor and regularly sample your favorite waterway for pollution. CWNC offers an eight-hour training course twice a year.

Heather Rayburn is the co-chair of Mountain Voices Alliance (MVA), an Asheville-based civic and environmental group committed to preserving the natural beauty, abundant resources, unique character, and quality of life of our communities. MVA came together to support environmental stewardship and to help others negatively impacted by development projects. For more information, visit http://www.mvallliance.net.

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