By: Patrice Tomcik, Senior National Field Director, Moms Clean Air Force
Date: March 10, 2026
About: EPA Docket ID No. EPA-HQ-OLEM-2025-0313
To: Environmental Protection Agency
I am Patrice Tomcik, a Senior National Field Director for Moms Clean Air Force, living in Gibsonia, located in Southwest Pennsylvania. Moms Clean Air Force is a community of more than 1.6 million moms and dads nationwide united to protect our children’s health from air pollution, our changing climate and toxic chemicals. We envision a safe and equitable future where all children breathe clean air and live in a stable climate.
I urge the EPA to maintain the current Safer Communities by Chemical Accident Prevention rule to help protect the health and safety of communities living near Risk Management Program facilities.
Unfortunately, the threat of disasters from chemical, petrochemical, oil, and gas facilities are still a real and present danger for many communities across the country. Over one in every three school children in the US attends a school within the vulnerability zone of a hazardous chemical or petrochemical facility. Half of these children are in schools located in more than one chemical vulnerability zone.
In my community 3,200 children attend Mars Area Schools located approximately one mile from the James Austin Bleach Company who are the makers of Austin’s bleach. I am concerned about the risk to their health and safety from possible chemical releases due to accidents. Located about eight miles away is the Markwest Bluestone natural gas processing facility the size of a football field that poses a health and safety risk for the more than 4,000 students that attend the Seneca Valley Schools approximately a mile away. Upwind in the next county over, there is the Shell petrochemical complex one of the largest in North America. There are three schools located less than three miles away from this mammoth facility. The Shell petrochemical facility continuously needs to be fed the feedstock of ethane that comes from the fracked gas wells like the ones in my community and those in the area.
It is critical that the current rule stays in place to protect children who live, learn and play near Risk Management Program facilities. I urge the EPA to:
- Require industrial chemical facilities to assess and plan for natural hazards and power loss.
- Require chemical facilities put safer technologies in place.
- Continue community notification requirements including multiple languages.
- Maintain employee participation measures ensuring that workers inside a chemical facility can help prevent or stop an unfolding emergency.
- Require independent compliance auditing after harmful incidents occur.
I urge the EPA to maintain the current Risk Management Program to help protect the health and safety of children and their families.