By: Brooke Petry, Pennsylvania Field Organizer, Moms Clean Air Force
Date: August 21, 2025
About: Environmental Protection Agency Docket ID No. EPA-HQ-OAR-2025-0194
To: Environmental Protection Agency
Hello. My name is Brooke Petry, and I live in Philadelphia with my family, where I serve as a Pennsylvania Field Organizer for Moms Clean Air Force. While I am proud to be an advocate for clean air and common-sense climate action, the roles I hold most closely are mother, daughter, sister, aunt, partner, friend, and community member. Each of these obligates me to appeal to you—do not rescind the Endangerment Finding and limits on climate pollution from motor vehicle tailpipes. Rescinding these protections would undermine the ability of EPA to protect our children’s health and the health of the planet they’ll inherit from us.
As city dwellers, we don’t own a car, but we are still subject to the impacts of emissions from the transportation sector, which is responsible for more than a quarter of the climate pollution in the US. My family lives with asthma, as do over 1.3 million other children and adults in Pennsylvania, and on days with dangerous heat or unhealthy air quality—or often, both—we have to make careful choices. Can I safely walk to the grocery store and back? Can my teenager spend the day out with her friends without the heat making her feel sick or causing an asthma flare?
In addition to dangerous heat, climate change is increasing the intensity of storms like the devastating Hurricane Ida in 2021— a storm from which many here in Philadelphia have not yet been able to rebuild. We are even experiencing the impacts of climate change on wildfires burning far away. We know that wildfires are burning more land and lasting far longer because of climate change. On the day that my daughter graduated from middle school the air quality was so dangerous due to smoke from Canadian wildfires that it was uncertain if the ceremony would even be held. In the end, we had to mask to walk there, and you could smell the acrid air even inside the school auditorium.
At the beginning of this testimony, I mentioned the roles that matter the most to me. The role of public servant—one you hold—is powerful. You have the opportunity, and the responsibility, to ensure that the EPA upholds its stated mission to protect human health and the environment. The next generation has to rely on you to do so.