The current edition of the Alexandria Gazette Packet includes this letter to the editor in which David voices his support for permanently closing the Mirant power plant on the Alexandria water front:
More Still To Be Done
To The Editor:
Now that Virginia’s Department of Environmental Quality has officially verified what we Alexandrians have known for years — that Mirant Corporation’s Potomac River Generation Station is poisoning us with toxic emissions — we need to make sure this coal-fired dinosaur stays closed for good. Mirant officials have called the forced closure of the plant “temporary” while they develop a strategy to meet air quality standards. Considering the magnitude of the problem (sulfur dioxide emissions alone are more than 13 times the danger level), the location of the plan among our densely populated residential neighborhoods, and the plant’s abysmal record of resistance and delay, that’s not good enough.
As the parent of a young child whose lungs are developing in the shadow of Mirant’s poison, I consider the plant to be a direct threat to my family’s health and safety. Our community owes a debt of gratitude to volunteer activists like Elizabeth Chimento, Poul Hertel, Ernie Lehmann, Mary Harris, and dozens of other Alexandrians who have fought to bring a dangerous situation to light and to shut down the plant. However, the ultimate duty to ensure the health and safety of the air we breathe falls on our government’s shoulders and not on the shoulders of neighborhood volunteers. While City Council has done everything in its power to force Mirant to close — and deserves our gratitude for it — state and federal authorities have largely failed us.
If I am elected in November to succeed Del. Marian Van Landingham, I will fight in the General Assembly to enact a strong and meaningful Clean Smokestacks Act, along the lines of the law passed in North Carolina in 2002, requiring all coal-fired plants in Virginia to severely reduce emissions of nitrogen oxide, sulfur dioxide, mercury, and other pollutants. Moreover, we need to strengthen the ability of local governments to shut down power plants and other industrial facilities whose emissions threaten our health and safety. We will all breathe a little easier when we no longer have to worry about plants like Mirant poisoning our air and water and threatening our future.
David Englin
Candidate for Delegate, 45th District