NORTH CAROLINA OPEN THREAD for Sunday, July 4, 2021
320th Weekly Edition
This is a weekly feature of North Carolina Blue. We hope this weekly platform gives readers interested in North Carolina politics a place to share their knowledge, insight and inspiration as we work on taking back our state from some of the most extreme Republicans in the nation. Please join us every week. You can also join the discussion in four other weekly State Open Threads.
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6/27/2021 1:00pm EDT
Click here for Covid-19 data from Worldometer Real Time World Statistics.
USA NC Total Cases New Cases Total Deaths New Deaths Total Recovered Active Cases
1,014,359 13,434 992,472 6,453
Following are stories and information I hope you find interesting and useful. Click the titles for more. Please jump the fold, the floor is yours...and HAPPY 4TH ! <Insert imaginary waving flag here>
LGBTQ-inclusive non-discrimination ordinances take effect in four NC communities
NC Policy Watch, Kyle Ingram, 7/2/2021
As the legacy of HB 2 continues to fade, nine North Carolina cities and counties now bar discrimination against LGBTQ individuals
Four new North Carolina communities now have LGBTQ-inclusive nondiscrimination ordinances, protecting citizens from discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity.
The cities of Asheville, Durham, and Greensboro, as well as Buncombe County, passed anti-discrimination ordinances earlier this year, but they officially took effect on Thursday, making these communities the latest in a wave of local governments passing similar protections.
“It’s a huge step towards cultural change, and it’s a huge step to giving people a mechanism to push back against discrimination,” Kendra Johnson, executive director of Equality NC said.
After repealing HB 2 — North Carolina’s controversial “bathroom bill” — legislators passed HB 142, which put a three-year moratorium on any local governments passing non-discrimination ordinances. Since that moratorium lifted last year, nine local jurisdictions have passed LGBTQ-inclusive protections, a list that includes the four new communities plus Apex, Chapel Hill, Carrboro, Hillsborough and Orange County.
Pittsboro officials have activated emergency response over 1,4-Dioxane release that could threaten drinking water
NC Policy Watch, Lisa Sorg, July 2, 2021
High levels of 1,4-Dioxane could contaminate the drinking water for Pittsboro as early as today, prompting town officials to activate its emergency response, which includes extensive sampling and testing of the drinking water.
As Policy Watch reported Thursday evening, the contaminated discharge originated upstream, at Greensboro’s TZ Osborne wastewater treatment plant. The plant sent effluent containing levels of the likely carcinogen — 20 times higher than the EPA health advisory goal — into South Buffalo Creek, a tributary of the Haw River.
The Haw River is the drinking water supply for the Town of Pittsboro, then drains into Jordan Lake and southeast into the Cape Fear River. Both the lake and the Cape Fear provide drinking water for hundreds of thousands of people, including residents of Cary, Apex, Fayetteville and Wilmington.
Preliminary sampling results show that levels of the likely carcinogen ranged from 543 parts per billion to 687 parts per billion in the wastewater. The EPA’s drinking water health advisory level is 35 parts per billion; in surface water the level is 0.35 parts per billion.
There is no EPA drinking water standard for 1,4-Dioxane; however, discharging these contaminants into waterways violates the Clean Water Act, according to the Southern Environmental Law Center.
Greensboro violates consent order, discharges high levels of 1,4-Dioxane, heading toward Pittsboro, Fayetteville
NC Policy Watch, Lisa Sorg, July 1, 2021
The City of Greensboro has discharged levels of of 1,4-Dioxane 20 times higher than EPA recommended levels into the South Buffalo Creek, a tributary of the Haw River, according to a NC Department of Environmental Quality press release. The contaminated discharge came from the city’s TZ Osborne Wastewater Treatment Plant; the source of the contamination has not been disclosed.
Preliminary sampling results show that levels of the likely carcinogen ranged from 543 parts per billion to 687 parts per billion in the wastewater. The EPA’s drinking water health advisory level is 35 parts per billion; in surface water the level is 0.35 parts per billion.
DEQ has notified Pittsboro and Fayetteville, both downstream from Greensboro, that their drinking water could become contaminated. Pittsboro could be affected as early as tomorrow, and based on the levels in the discharge, DEQ said the town’s drinking water could exceed the health advisory level. Greensboro reported sampling results to the North Carolina Division of Water Resources this afternoon. Additional sampling is underway at the Pittsboro raw water intake.
EPA has identified 1,4 dioxane as a likely human carcinogen. 1,4 dioxane is a clear liquid that is highly miscible in water. It has historically been used as a solvent stabilizer and is currently used for a wide variety of industrial purposes. It is difficult, if not impossible to completely remove from drinking water using traditional treatment methods.
1,4-Dioxane
Wikipedia
Toxicology
Safety
Dioxane has an LD50 of 5170 mg/kg in rats.[4] It is irritating to the eyes and respiratory tract. Exposure may cause damage to the central nervous system, liver and kidneys.[11] In a 1978 mortality study conducted on workers exposed to 1,4-dioxane, the observed number deaths from cancer was not significantly different from the expected number.[12] Dioxane is classified by the National Toxicology Program as "reasonably anticipated to be a human carcinogen".[13] It is also classified by the IARC as a Group 2B carcinogen: possibly carcinogenic to humans because it is a known carcinogen in other animals.[14] The United States Environmental Protection Agency classifies dioxane as a probable human carcinogen (having observed an increased incidence of cancer in controlled animal studies, but not in epidemiological studies of workers using the compound), and a known irritant (with a no-observed-adverse-effects level of 400 milligrams per cubic meter) at concentrations significantly higher than those found in commercial products.[15] Under California Proposition 65, dioxane is classified in the U.S. State of California to cause cancer.[16] Animal studies in rats suggest that the greatest health risk is associated with inhalation of vapors in the pure form.[17][18][19] The State of New York has adopted a first-in-the-nation drinking water standard for 1,4-Dioxane and set the maximum contaminant level of 1 part per billion.[20]
It also has low toxicity to aquatic life and can be biodegraded via a number of pathways.[21] The problems are exacerbated since dioxane is highly soluble in water, does not readily bind to soils, and readily leaches to groundwater. It is also resistant to naturally occurring biodegradation processes. Due to these properties, a dioxane plume can be larger (and further downgradient) than the associated solvent plume.
Explosion hazard
Like some other ethers, dioxane combines with atmospheric oxygen upon prolonged exposure to air to form potentially explosive peroxides. Distillation of these mixtures is dangerous. Storage under metallic sodium could limit the risk of explosion.
Environment
Dioxane has affected groundwater supplies in several areas. Dioxane at the level of 1 μg/L (~1 ppb) has been detected in many locations in the US.[5] In the U.S. state of New Hampshire, it had been found at 67 sites in 2010, ranging in concentration from 2 ppb to over 11,000 ppb. Thirty of these sites are solid waste landfills, most of which have been closed for years.
Gov. Cooper vetoes GOP bill cutting off federal unemployment benefits
Republicans pushed the bill, saying the federal unemployment insurance supplement s contributing to a labor shortage because it keeps people from looking for work.
Others argue that it’s a lack of childcare, worry about contracting COVID, or people seeking jobs better than the ones they had that’s contributing to the struggles employers are having filling vacancies.
More than 20 Republican-led states have opted out of the federal unemployment supplement.
All North Carolina Senate Democrats voted against the bill, making it unlikely that the legislature will be able to override Cooper’s veto. The federal unemployment supplement is set to expire September 6 of this year. Three House Democrats joined Republicans in passing the bill by a vote of 66-44.
Editorial: UNC trustees did their job and did the right thing
WRAL, July 1, 2021
CBC Editorial: Thursday, July 1, 2021; Editorial #8681 The following is the opinion of Capitol Broadcasting Company.
On the last day of June. In the closing hours of the day, the currently composed University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Board of Trustees fulfilled their duty.
On a 9-4 vote (see roll call below), the trustees did their job and decided on the request to grant tenure to Nikole Hannah-Jones, who has been hired to be the Knight Chair in Race and Investigative Journalism at the Hussman School of Journalism and Media.
It was their duty to vote on the tenure request. They did it. It was their responsibility to do the right thing. They did that by granting Hannah-Jones’ tenure request.
“At our worst moments we forced people to go across the low stone walls that surround our campus to speak,” said Trustee Gene Davis, who chaired Wednesday’s meeting, after the tenure vote was taken. “And at our best moments we have invited the world’s leading thinkers, conservative and liberal people alike, to our campus and said: ‘Here’s the podium, we may or may not agree with you, but we want to hear what you have to say.’. We are open to ideas. We want to learn together. And that is exactly what a university is. A place for diverse ideas and viewpoints. A place for open inquiry and a place for civil, constructive disagreement. Our university is not a place to cancel people or ideas.”
By nearly any measure, what became one of the most visible, controversial and contentious matters in American education should have been a matter of routine. This tenure decision was not.
Rural Organizing in North Carolina
Down Home North Carolina is a new organizing project led by the working people of North Carolina’s small towns and rural communities. Together, we are taking action to increase democracy, grow the good in our communities, and pass a healthy and just home down to our grandbabies.
Our Vision
- All are welcome in Down Home North Carolina.
- We unite to build the power and raise the voices of working people in small-town and rural North Carolina in order to take action on the issues that matter to us.
- By weaving together our different experiences, we can shape a democracy that serves working people, where our labor is valued, and our food, water, and land are healthy.
- Come on in y’all, we’ve got work to do.
- Staff and members
The Latest from Down Home
Building Statewide Rural Power for Poor and Working People
The NC People’s Budget: If they won’t ask what we need, we have to go tell them.
Tarheel Founding Fathers: Samuel Johnston
bluenc, scharrison on Sat, 07/03/2021
Samuel Johnston was born in Scotland, but moved here with his Uncle (Royal Governor Gabriel Johnston) when he was just two years old. He attended Yale but did not graduate, instead returning home to study law under Thomas Barker. Johnston began his public service career at 22, and continued his government career non-stop for the following half-century. He was the defacto Governor of NC in 1775 when Josiah Martin slunk off, and was later elected Governor (3 times) and became the first elected (U.S.) Senator from NC. But it was his service in the Continental Congress during the war that give him TFF status:
Dear Sir: Philadelphia, 15th February, 1781. I had the pleasure of receiving yours of the 5th inst., last night. I wrote a line by an express to the Governor, which I hope you will receive. I have very little hope that this will reach you. By a vessel, which arrived last Sunday from Cadiz, we have letters as late as the l9th December. The fleets at that time, as well of France and Spain as Great Britain, were in port; the Dutch had acceded to the armed Neutrality, notwithstanding which, the British continued to take their ships, and it was thought would make some attempts on their settlements in the East Indies. Mr. Cumberland is still permitted to continue at the Court of Madrid-a very suspicious circumstance. There is great reason to apprehend that the British mean to fortify and support their station at Portsmouth, or some other in that neighborhood, in order to shut up the navigation of the bay, and by making frequent incursions into the country, prevent the State of Virginia from sending aid to the Carolinas. Congress is every day engaged in a variety of matters, but under our present situation, it is probably best to say little as to the particulars.
Thanks for reading and contributing, I hope you have a safe week.