Why would hundreds of South Portland citizens of all ages virtually stop living their normal lives – with little time for family and friends, home and garden? Why would they rush home from work, maybe grab a bite to eat, and go to 72 Ocean St. in Knightville to call hundreds of their neighbors for three hours? And, why would they give up their Saturdays and Sundays to go up and down unfamiliar streets to knock on doors? To harm the waterfront?

No, they do it to protect South Portland, its air, water, children, its recreational and working waterfront with its delicious and valuable bounty from Casco Bay. To protect their property values, and their sense of safety and well-being in their chosen place to live. They do it to protect Bug Light park, SMCC, and all the businesses where shopkeepers actually recognize them. They do it to stop polluting smokestacks from being built on Pier No. 2 at Bug Light.

They give up family time because they know that the arrival of tar sands in South Portland would change the very nature of this community: parents will know that their children are going to school next to 20 large storage tanks that could be filled with the dirtiest and most dangerous oil in the world – tanks that could emit dangerous toxins into their children’s schoolyards and through open windows.

Homeowners will wonder if they should move before word gets out that pollution has increased by at least three times, or before a tanker spill shuts down our waterfont industry, and spreads water and airborne illness throughout the community. Should they move because their child with asthma may get sicker from the toxic pollutants associated with chemically diluted bitumin (tar sands)? Some are already wondering if they should move before South Portland becomes the only East Coast port for tar-sands export.

The oil industry cannot defend this tar-sands horror picture, so it has resorted to telling untruths about what the citizens’ ordinance will do. It is distracting the real dangers of the tar-sands oil from Canada, that would be piped under part of Sebago Lake, and then burned off at Bug Light before being loaded onto tankers bound for China and India. Don’t let them confuse you. Vote FOR the Waterfront Protection Ordinance on Nov. 5, to keep life safe and healthy for all of us in South Portland.

Karen Sanford

South Portland