An area branch of the NAACP has joined the fight to keep Chemours and its predecessor company DuPont from shielding thousands of pages of documents from the public eye.
The Southern Coalition for Social Justice on Tuesday filed a motion on behalf of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People New Hanover County Branch objecting to the chemical manufacturers’ attempt to keep the documents under court seal.
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“The people of New Hanover County have been kept in the dark for too long,” NAACP New Hanover County Branch President LeRon T. Montgomery said in a release. “We have a right to know what dangers have been allowed into our water and our lives. Our fight is about protecting our community’s health today and for generations to come, and that starts with transparency.”
The motion comes on the heels of one filed earlier this month by the Southern Environmental Law Center, which is also seeking to intervene in the case brought against Chemours and DuPont as those companies aim to keep documents under seal. That motion has was filed on behalf of Cape Fear River Watch, the North Carolina Coastal Federation, which publishes Coastal Review, and the Environmental Justice Community Action Network.
Related: Groups move for disclosure of Chemours’ sealed documents
It’s a case that goes back to October 2017, when Cape Fear Public Utility Authority, Brunswick County, Lower Cape Fear Water & Sewer Authority and Wrightsville Beach sued to companies to recover costs and damages associated with Fayetteville Works’ plant’s discharges of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, into the Cape Fear River.
For decades, the plant discharged a host of the chemical compounds into Cape Fear River, which is the drinking water supply for tens of thousands of residents in the region.
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That includes all 430 members of the NAACP New Hanover County Branch, according to a release.
“Our communities have a right to see the information that Chemours and DuPont want to keep hidden,” Anne Harvey, chief counsel for environmental justice at the coalition, said in the release. “For too long, families in Wilmington and New Hanover County have carried the burden of corporate pollution without knowing the full truth. We’re fighting to make sure they get the information they need and deserve.”
In February, attorneys for Chemours and DuPont requested the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of North Carolina keep from public view what they argue are mostly internal communications between company employees discussing chemical production that is “competitively sensitive.”
In its motion to intervene, New Hanover NAACP argues that the documents in question are protected by the first amendment, stating, in part, “There is no question that there has been widespread PFAS contamination of the Cape Fear River Basin. Ongoing testing continues to find an expanding field of affected drinking supply wells, but the full scope of the contamination is as yet unknown. At the very least, the public has a right to know what the Companies know about the harm their communities are suffering.”
“The public has a right to the information to enable them to make informed decisions about their homes, drinking water use, and health care,” the motion continues. “That information is particularly essential in light of the Companies’ plans to expand operations at the Fayetteville Works facility.”
