Tell Port Houston Commissioners: We need a stronger plan to protect clean air and our communities.

It's time for the Port of Houston to clean up our air. Children living within two miles of the Ship Channel are 56 percent more likely to develop a kind of leukemia than children living 10 miles away, one study found. Port Houston has long ignored the health of people in the region it claims to serve. The new Clean Air Strategy only confirms it. The strategy is as outdated as the dirty, diesel-powered equipment, trucks and trains that pollute the air nearby communities are breathing.

Join us and tell Port Houston: We need a stronger plan to protect clean air and our communities.

Subject: RE: Port Houston Clean Air Strategy

Your Letter:

To: Port Houston Commissioners

Houstonians have the right to breathe clean air, and Port Houston's Clear Air Strategy has many issues that need to be addressed. The technology that would lead to a more effective plan is already available.

Port Houston should consider and commit to making available a transparent emissions inventory that can serve to benchmark improvements over time; enacting a meaningful, near-term plan to retire older, dirtier equipment; adopting a commitment to environmental sustainability that comes not just through industry collaboration, but centering communities' aspirations and needs; committing to take better advantage of current incentives, like DERA and TERP.

You have the power to envision a plan for a sustainable, zero-emissions port that enhances the health and wealth of the greater Houston region.

Failing to do so already has put Port Houston decades behind other, busier ports that have invested in clean cargo-handling equipment, drayage trucks and switcher locomotives; continuing to fail to do so threatens Port Houston's long-term competitiveness.

The strategy is the wrong one for healthy communities, and it's the wrong one for a healthy economy. It's time to deliver the right one.

Sincerely,

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