FUTURE
Collective Power: East Palestine and other affected residents unite their voices to promote healing and demand change
By Dani Brown, Director of Strategic Communication at RiverWise
Hilary Flint’s cancer diagnosis took her on a journey to become an environmental and public health advocate.
She lives right over the East Palestine border in Enon Valley, Pennsylvania. Although her health was a concern before the February 3, 2023 train derailment, the aftermath heightened her already weakened immunity.
Hilary was diagnosed with renal cell carcinoma, a type of kidney cancer, in her late 20s.
“When you get stage three cancer when you’re in your 20s, it’s very shocking,” Hilary said.
Other family members had developed similar cancers, but not until they were 50 or older. In hopes of understanding why she developed cancer so young and so quickly Hilary explored genetic testing. Testing revealed that she has a gene mutation that triggered the disease significantly earlier for her than for her family members.
“What the genetic counselor was able to say to me is, everyone has different types of mutations, and most require a trigger. What they concluded was that my kidney cancer was a result of an environmental trigger,” she said. “So there had to be something in my life that made me have cancer way earlier than everyone else in my family.”
Since then, Hilary has become involved with local environmental groups and organizations to fight against environmental polluters. She’s an activist, advocate, and storyteller.
When the train derailed in February, she became sick. Despite living 3.8 miles away from the site, her house smelled like chemicals. Her furniture, clothes — any soft surfaces — reeked with an unfamiliar smell that lasted for weeks.
Hilary, like countless others affected by the derailment, were desperate for answers. Facebook groups and pages were started to try to keep track of the information, or sometimes lack of information, provided by Norfolk Southern and the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency.
Through discussions with neighbors, some residents received different answers. Some were able to get testing conducted in their homes, others weren’t. Some were told Norfolk Southern would cover the bill to move, others received less clear answers. Some were told to put their furniture and clothing outside to let it sit in the sun, while others who spoke to the same EPA officials said they never received instruction to do that.
With all the uncertainty, misinformation, and lack of transparency, local residents formed the Unity Council.
Jami Wallace, an affected East Palestine resident, started the group and is currently its president. Hilary, the group’s vice president, quickly got involved to provide assistance for those affected on the Pennsylvania side.
The Unity Council is a grassroots group doing its best to connect people to services, resources, and a community that understands.
Tamara Freeze continues to feel that support from the Unity Council.
“There are a lot of us that are going through the same thing,” Tamara said of the group. “We all do understand, and it makes it such a great connection to have with everyone.”
“We’re a group of voices and we want to get some action done and make sure that everybody in this town is safe,” she added.
Tamara lives mere blocks away from the derailment site. Before the derailment, she never envisioned becoming an advocate. In fact, she said she considered herself a wallflower for most of her life.
“I would kind of just sit back and analyze things in my head, but not really say what I felt or speak out about it. And that’s the biggest part for me that I’ve really learned to be able to do,” she said.
She’s learned to ask tough questions, even when it’s difficult.
“Just learning how to speak out, learning how to write letters and emails and do interviews, and use my voice for something that we need,” Tamara said. “I feel like I have more of the strength that I didn’t know that I needed to have. They say there’s a silver lining in everything. I was thinking, should I go into social work? What should I do next? Is this my opportunity to venture out from my comfort zone with losing my job? Maybe this is the right opportunity for me to branch out and do something new.”
Misti Allison also branched out differently post-derailment.
Although she and her husband had been active community members well before the train derailment, Misti noticed how divided the community became after months of inconsistent answers. She ran for East Palestine mayor in the most recent election with the hope of uniting people.
“My main focus on my campaign was … to positively influence the future of the community and to bring everybody together. I think communication and transparency goes a long way. You can listen to everybody, and not necessarily agree with everyone. But I think it’s so important to hear the perspectives of everybody. You need to hear all those perceptions and opinions and beliefs and attitudes without ridiculing individuals,” she said.
She didn’t want to simply make noise; she wanted to make a difference.
“I’m just the type of person who wants to be a part of the solution and not just part of the problem that’s going on. I don’t want to just sit on the sidelines and complain about something or have ideas about how something should be done. I really think that we should be able to move forward and make the best out of a really bad situation without alienating a whole group of people,” Misti said. “I’m here for the long haul and making sure that health is a priority in town.”
Although Misti narrowly lost the election, she is still actively working to help find solutions to people’s needs. She works closely with The Way Station to do just that.
The Way Station is a faith-based, nonprofit organization that gives people “the tools that they need to get themselves out of poverty,” according to the executive director of the East Palestine location, Chaney Nezbeth.
The organization provides discount clothing, free diapers, free food and free hygiene products as well as job training, financial education and more. In the aftermath of the derailment, Chaney and her team gave away thousands of clothing items, food, and water and received truck loads of donations from people across the country.
She remembers receiving a call the Monday after the derailment about whether the organization was equipped to provide clothing to the entire village of East Palestine, and others impacted.
“And, of course, my reaction was, ‘Absolutely, whatever you need, we’ll give it to you,’” she said. “I hang up the phone and look at my staff, and I’m like, ‘Are we prepared to meet the needs of an entire community?’”
The answer came quickly — yes, but with some help.
Chaney and her team made a call for volunteers, and 40 volunteers showed up immediately.
“I think 30 of them were from East Palestine and were people that were in hotels. They were people who were displaced themselves, and they came to help,” she said. “People are used to helping people in this community. It’s an underlying foundation here. It has a trickle-down effect, and people want to do it alongside you.”
While the neighborliness native to East Palestine was present in the beginning of the derailment aftermath, many locals say things have changed.
A community divided.
Chase Kinder owns a dog training, boarding, and breeding business on the outskirts of East Palestine. He’s one of countless residents who have decided to leave the region because of the derailment.
Within two weeks of the train derailment “one-third of my sheep herd just dropped over, dead,” Chase said. “My wife’s lips were tingling; we had headaches. My kids’ noses were running and bleeding, and my grandchildren had rashes.”
“To me,” he added, “it was absolutely clear — and this is strictly my opinion — this was not the place it was prior to February 3. No doubt.”
Chase said he would watch as his sheep would walk over to their water dish, take a drink, and fall over and die.
“The chemicals would lay in my dogs’ water dishes,” he said.
Chase made the decision to move out of state, but it didn’t come easily. His father helped him build his East Palestine home — a beautiful cabin with lots of land and character. Memories and love are buried beneath each stone.
“My dad never says anything. He’s more of a man of action. So, if he does something, that’s how he tells you he loves you. So, that’s how he told me. Now, I gotta leave that, and that bothers me a lot. A lot more than I’ll ever be able to tell somebody. That really messes me up. There’s nothing you can ever do about that,” Chase said. “And the railroad will never care.”
Chase said he also feels guilty for leaving his community, when he knows many aren’t resourced to do so.
“Why was I lucky enough to have the ability to get out of here?” he said. “The railroad will never know the repercussions of how the bowling pin hit the front of that set of pins. It just busted everybody up here. Cousins, nephews, uncles, we were one of the ones that had enough resources to kind of keep everybody together, but some of these folks… some of them don’t have the resources to do it.”
The biggest change Chase has seen in the community is how it’s divided so many.
“The money that hit the administration and leadership in this town has divided these people tremendously,” he said.
The division comes between those who are sick and not receiving the services they need and others who are not sick and want the town to move on and focus on rebuilding the local economy.
Stella and Daren Gamble have felt that division.
The couple has been living in an Airbnb for months because everytime Stella goes back to East Palestine, she becomes sick.
“I go in town, and I’m there probably 15 minutes, and I can feel my stomach start to get upset,” Stella said. “I get lightheaded. It’s almost like you’re drunk or high. My nose starts to get numb. I don’t understand how or why some people are getting sick and others aren’t.”
The couple has been together nearly 40 years. Their home was a place where family members, friends, and neighbors would come for peace and fun. They have a swimming pool and trampoline, and all of their grandkids had their birthday parties in the backyard.
“It was our safe place,” Daren said, “and it’s not anymore.”
In addition to feeling physically sick when Stella returns to East Palestine, the couple said the emotional distress is overwhelming.
“There are people in town who are sick and are afraid to say they’re sick because if they do, they’re going to get bullied, they’re going to get ostracized,” Stella said. “It’s not that the people that are sick don’t want the businesses to thrive. We do want the businesses to thrive! But there were eight kids in one week who had nosebleeds at the school and nobody acknowledged it. There is something not right.”
Displaced and sick residents feel like they shouldn’t have to choose between making the community economically viable again and getting the care they need. It’s a false dichotomy.
“New parks, infrastructure, water lines, new buildings and walkways, bicycle trails… putting money into mental health clinics and infrastructure for signs and different roads. That’s all great. I get it. But the most important thing you have is your ability to be here. Your health,” Chase said. “So, what’s the one thing in the end that you could never buy? It’s your health. Why is it more important that they protect the infrastructure and all these new things versus… Why not my health?”
Rob Two-Hawks, another East Palestine resident who was affected by the derailment, said those who are sick understand the importance of economic vitality.
“Most of the people who are ill, most of them get the economic side of it. In general, they understand our future prospects: are we going to become a ghost town? Everybody gets that,” he said.
But those on what Rob calls the “other side of the fence” tend to condescend and disparage those who are feeling sick.
“We’re hearing, ‘You’re making it up,’ ‘it’s all fake; it’s not real,’ ‘you’re claiming symptoms for the money,’” Rob said. “There is such a string of various rationalizations that are all about denial.”
As president of the Unity Council, people call Jami constantly with questions. Sometimes people call in hysterics because their child is still ill or to ask for guidance and resources.
Every day it feels like a new fire to put out, or a new way to exercise empathy.
“Can you imagine tucking your kids in bed at night when they’re having nosebleeds and you know it’s from your house and you have no way to get them out?” Jami said through tears. “It’s just a hopeless feeling for people.”
On a personal level, Jami’s had family members displaced. Stella and Daren — her mom and stepdad — being two of almost 50 relatives that once lived within East Palestine.
“When you talk about the things Norfolk Southern has taken, they’ve taken my home town from me. I need to do door to door canvassing and I’m afraid in my hometown because of all of the threats and stuff being said about the people who are fighting for answers. They took away my family — 47 family members in a 1-mile zone. And they took away my country,” she paused as tears welled up. “I have never been so disappointed to be an American in my life. It’s a horrible feeling.”
But somehow, Jami carries on. She, Hilary, and those on the Unity Council as well as countless others affected by the derailment, are choosing to continue speaking out against what happened on February 3.
“A lot of us on the Unity Council talk about how we want to be on the right side of history,” Hilary said. “We are going to keep fighting for the truth.”
Despite the division, the small group of community members continue to use their collective voices. They’re in this together.
“What keeps me hopeful is having other community members that, when it starts to get very hard for me, I tap out, and I say to Jami, or I say to everyone in Unity Council, it’s too much for me this week. And then someone else keeps the work going. And then when it’s their turn to say, ‘I can’t do this, I’ve been crying for hours today, I’m not going to be in this meeting,’ someone else picks it up. And so that’s the most important part about building collective power. No one person can take all of this on all the time. But if we have a collective group, and we all understand what we’re working towards, and sometimes what we’re working against, it makes it doable, and it makes it possible,” Hilary said. “So, it’s not just about what keeps me hopeful, it’s what keeps everyone else in the group hopeful.”
And seeing how even through the disaster, the physical illnesses, the trauma, and the harassment from neighbors, some residents are finding themselves and using their collective voices to fight for the basic human rights of health and safety.
“By exercising your own power, you’re also opening up the door for other people to do that,” Hilary said. “I learned that once I was as true as I can be to myself, and as soon as I exercised my voice and my power, I learned that I can influence other people to do the same thing. And that’s been a really beautiful part of the Unity Council.”
“And that’s how we grow as Americans,” Hilary added. “We remember that it’s ‘We The People’ who have the power.”