Focus on Minnesota

This week, we checked in with Peter Starzynski, Coalition Coordinator for Healthy Legacy. This is an organization that supports the passage of laws and policies in Minnesota that will help its citizens lead healthy, toxic-free lives.

BPA BAN

Last May, Minnesota made national news by becoming the first state in the nation to ban Bisphenol-A (BPA). The BPA Free Baby Bottle Bill went into effect on January 1, prohibiting use of BPA in baby bottles and sippy-cups.

Retailers have until January 1, 2011 to sell existing stock, so Minnesotan babies will be using BPA-free bottles next year.

TSCA REFORM

Minnesota is leading the way with reform on the federal level as Senator Amy Klobuchar last week took a leadership role in Congress, underscoring the need for TSCA reform and calling for stronger laws regulating cadmium, a toxic substance contained in jewelry. Senator Klobuchar stated, "It's time to take a serious look at the best ways to strengthen our standards, since these standards were put in place over 30 years ago ... The recent scare over the toxic substance cadmium, included in children's jewelry manufactured in China, illustrates the continuing need to update our laws."

Today, "Cupid" dropped off over 5,500 public comments from around Minnesota at Senator Klobuchar's office, urging her to be a leader on reform of TSCA. Healthy Legacy released a press release urging a toxic-free Valentine's day:

"The fact is, it's hard to fall in love with so many toxins around us. We need real reform of TSCA to ensure ALL love is toxic free."

Starzynski says, "It's clear the work done in Minnesota, along with many other states, has helped lead the way to action on the federal level. Our hope is to do the same thing with green cleaners and green chemistry."

GREEN CLEANING CHEMICALS

Minnesota's legislative session began last week, and this year Healthy Legacy is focused on green cleaning chemicals in state buildings.

Municipalities that have switched to green chemicals have reported success with the ban, and the city of Minneapolis has reported a cost savings over a three-year program which used green cleaning products.

Healthy Legacy is interested in green cleaning products for several reasons:

- One in three cleaning products contains ingredients known to cause harm to human health and contaminants that negatively impact air and water quality. Traditional cleaning products can contribute to many chronic illnesses, including asthma in young children. Chemicals in cleaning products are hormone disruptors, so they can cause reproductive problems and health effects.

- Healthy Legacy wants to protect janitors from workplace exposure. Long-term exposure to chemicals from cleaning products are associated with elevated risk of leukemia and brain cancer. Additionally, 6% of janitors every year are injured by cleaning chemicals.

A successful bill would mean that workers in Minnesota's state buildings and institutions and children attending school would be free from toxic exposure from cleaning chemicals while in these buildings. Overall toxic exposure to Minnesota's families would be lessened on a daily basis from this unprecedented statewide push toward green cleaning products.

CHEMICALS OF CONCERN

Much like the EPA is doing on the federal level, the Minnesotan government is taking a look at their "chemicals of concern" list -- a list which would prioritize harmful chemicals, and lay the base for protecting citizens through state laws and policies.

DEFINITION OF GREEN CHEMISTRY

This is a little wonky, but stick with us here for a moment: Healthy Legacy is working to create a definition of "green chemistry" and get it on the law books in Minnesota. Once this occurs, then economic incentives can be created around this law like tax-breaks for those companies that use green chemistry. Basically, it's setting the state up for an entire push toward developing products with the least amount of hazardous substances and energy consumption during the development process.

If you live in Minnesota, sign up for Healthy Legacy's action alerts here so that they can email you when urgent action is needed.