News Releases

With the Trump administration proposing to weaken federal air quality and global warming emissions standards, air pollution remains a threat to public health. According to a new report by Environment Washington Research & Policy Center 3.8 million people in the Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue metropolitan area experienced 26 days of degraded air quality in 2016, 250,000 people in Yakima experienced 84 days of degraded air quality, and 554,000 people in Spokane-Spokane Valley experienced 51 days of degraded air quality, increasing the risk of premature death, asthma attacks and other adverse health impacts. 

Major industrial facilities illegally dumped dangerous levels of pollution into Washington’s waterways 55 times over 21 months, according to a new report by Environment Washington Research and Policy Center. The facilities rarely faced penalties for this pollution due to inaction by state and federal agencies responsible for implementing the Clean Water Act. Environment Washington’s Troubled Waters report comes as the Trump administration tries to weaken clean water protections and slash enforcement funding for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the states.