I was disappointed to see The Current’s recent editorial on the Waterfront Protection Ordinance. In my opinion, it misses the point. Local citizens have grave concerns about the handling of tar sands in its community. Big oil sees the ordinance as a threat and has dedicated nearly $600,000 to make sure South Portland citizens are stopped from protecting their neighborhoods.

Forty years ago, Portland Pipe Line Corp. lost a case before the Maine Supreme Court. The company sued to try to stop oil spill restrictions and a clean-up fund, a law that was innovative in 1970 but that we now take for granted.

Forty years later, here is another chance to take action to prevent the destruction of the environment and to protect the health of our community. This can be achieved by voting for the Waterfront Protection Ordinance.

In 1981, the state imposed a shoreland zoning ordinance on the city of South Portland. Prior to this zoning, oil companies built tanks up to the waterline and installed oil facilities in floodplains. At a time when rising sea levels and storm surge threaten development along the water’s edge, it is careless to permit the enlargement and expansion of oil tanks in these environmentally sensitive areas. The ordinance will allow them to maintain and improve their facilities; however they need to be 250 away from the water in order to enlarge and expand. This is common sense.

The Waterfront Protection Ordinance was written to stop the loading of tar-sands crude oil onto tankers because these operations would harm the health of residents, threaten Casco Bay with a form of oil that sinks when spilled, risks property values and our economic future, and emits toxic air pollution from two huge new smokestacks. Voters should especially consider the health of the children at several schools located near 19 oil tanks whose already high toxic air emissions could increase by 140 tons/year if filled with tar sands.

Some have called for an alternative to the ordinance. It would be a mistake to think that any ordinance, however drafted that blocked a tar sands facility would not be opposed just as fervently by out-of-state oil interests who see an opportunity to bring tar sands through South Portland. They don’t share our community’s values, and they won’t abandon their tar-sands plans easily.

The collective power of thousands of our citizens can make a difference. Without the ordinance, we remain exposed to the threat of a tar sands permit application from Portland Pipe Line which the city has stated they would grant. It is time to vote for the Waterfront Protection Ordinance.

State Sen. Rebecca Millett

District 7 (South Portland, Cape Elizabeth, Scarborough)