In his Feb. 7 newsletter, Sen. Dan Sullivan criticized Democratic senators for their proposed protections of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, pointing out that the environmental degradation in their own Northeastern states disqualifies them from voicing opinions about Alaska’s affairs.
I fear that Sen. Sullivan is showing his youth. I am an environmentalist partly because I grew up in western Pennsylvania in the 1950s and 1960s, and the unchecked and ongoing environmental degradation was severe. The environmental movement gained momentum in the 1960s and ’70s precisely because of this environmental catastrophe. Pennsylvania land and water was being destroyed, Los Angeles air was unbreathable and Sen. Sullivan’s Cleveland was at least as bad as Pittsburgh. It was thought that Lake Erie would never be able to recover from its pollution, and the great memorable symbol of environmental crisis was when the Cuyahoga River caught on fire; this must have happened near Sen. Sullivan’s home.
I was eager to get out, and I did in 1970 to Alaska, and never looked back. But I realized by the late 1980s that the environmental movement had done much good work, and the place I fled from was recovering in ways that were unforeseen and inspiring. Pittsburgh, for example, strives to be a green city; bike trails abound and the rivers produce fish and recreation instead of poison. Cleveland’s success is less noticeable but there has been progress. Lake Erie supports a fishery and much of the Cuyahoga River is now included in a national park. Los Angeles is not blanketed in smog.
Much has been achieved, but I fear that much success has been forgotten or overlooked. We have come to take our success for granted and now environmental health is under attack. Sen. Sullivan should step back and take a wider view of what has happened not only in his Cleveland but in the industrial Northeast. The environmental degradation he scorns was a trigger for environmental action.
Sen. Sullivan claimed the attempt to protect ANWR is an attempt “to further impoverish my constituents.” Now, let’s remember that Alaska has tapped the nation’s largest oil field for decades, reports tell us that more prospects are opening up, and that most of the Arctic is and has been open for oil development for years. Not tapping ANWR in the past never made us poor and tapping it now won’t make us rich. We have fallen into that trap before.
— Clarence Crawford
Anchorage
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