Step up Lamont, Ban the Killingly Power Plant

Speech given: 17 January 2021, march in downtown New Haven CT, in affiliation with Sunrise Movement New Haven. English version.

Good afternoon everyone,

The English Station Power Plant, located near the Fair Haven neighborhood, was a thermal power plant until the UI company shut down in 1992 for economic reasons. We all know coal, oil, and gas are “dirty” energy sources, but what does that really mean? Imagine this power plant in operation right now, coming in under the promise of a clean, safe, and prosperous neighborhood full of employment and opportunity to achieve the “American Dream.” At first it seems nice until months and years go by as our children breathe in the contaminated air that it pollutes and develop asthma, as the power plant workers come home, coughing, sick, and underpaid, as our families and neighborhood fall into poverty. Months and years go by as we drink the polluted, dirty water that was once sacred and clean, and as our schools slowly degrade. Then, once we are down, we are left abandoned by the companies that promised stability and growth. Left without clean air and water, without good schools, left with no jobs and no money- all because we are no longer deemed “profitable.”

This same exact scenario will happen in Killingly, Connecticut if Governor Lamont keeps sitting around, passing blame. We went to his mansion on December 15 to try to wake him up to this grave injustice, and he has not done a single thing. He is more worried about how people perceive him than the health and safety of his citizens. The construction of the Killingly Power Plant will not only affect the children and working families of Killingly and the surrounding area, but all of Connecticut. We will all bear the consequences of climate change if we do not hold sleepy politicians like Governor Lamont accountable to their words. It will be our homes, businesses, and cities that will be underwater as a result of climate change. It will be Fair Haven, and the city of New Haven that drowns in the waters of political apathy and inaction from politicians like Governor Lamont.

I ask that you march and shout as if it were your children breathing in dirty air as they walk to the store or walk to school. I ask that you march and shout as if it were your family that falls into poverty and goes hungry. I ask that you march and shout as if it were your family member who arrives at the family reunion, coughing and ill, with no money to see a doctor. I ask that you march and shout to show Governor Lamont that we notice his hypocrisy and his inaction and that we are disgusted. To show him that we will remember what he has failed to do once we are at the polls. We should not have to beg for him to do his job.

Lamont, here’s the people’s public comment:

Ban the Killingly Power Plant.

End the use of fossil fuels that kill our community.

Invest in a Green New Deal, Invest in our lives.