Each month, we highlight a Supermom of the Month, a member who has gone above and beyond to advocate for clean air and children’s health. Our members in states across the country are more important than ever as we work to preserve clean air and climate protections. Will you join us?
This month, we’re celebrating Jackie Shock-Stewart, a licensed clinical social worker who moved from Beaver County, Pennsylvania, to Ohio with her family in 2022 to escape a polluting Shell plastics facility. Jackie was nominated by Moms’ Ohio River Valley Field Organizer, Rachel Meyer.
Jackie’s superpower is her vulnerability. She is that special kind of advocate who is always willing to share her family’s story. In 2021, she participated in a community air quality monitoring program and got involved with Moms Clean Air Force. Through these connections, she has eagerly accepted several opportunities to speak with press. She has been featured in Inside Climate News, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, The Allegheny Front podcast, and many other regional outlets. She spoke with us about her decision to move away from the Shell facility and her interest in the value of storytelling in advocacy.
Tell Congress: Protect Families From the Plastics and Petrochemical Industry
How did you first become interested in environmental and air quality issues?
I developed my social consciousness in college, and that included environmental issues, like air quality and air pollution. I also grew up in the Pittsburgh area, where it’s always in the background. I grew up hearing about how terrible the pollution in the area used to be decades ago, and it still ranks among the worst in the country.
When did you realize the Shell plastics facility in Beaver County posed a risk to your family?
We moved to the Beaver County area in 2014, and I think Shell already had the contract at that point—but it wasn’t on my radar at all. I had babies in 2015, 2017, and 2019, and my vision turned inward.
Once the pandemic started to recede, I could start to look outward. The Shell plant was closer to being operational, and we were hearing more about it in the community. In the spring of 2021, it really hit me—this is happening. I started researching as well as I could, not being a scientist, trying to figure out the implications for environmental and public health. I spent hours and hours doing research.
How did you know the toll of living near the Shell facility was going to be too much for your family to bear?
Somewhere in the course of doing all that research, I found some air quality projection maps. These showed what scientists projected based on what Shell would be emitting and what the wind patterns are. My husband took the map and overlaid it on a grid map of our community. I saw our kids’ future elementary school in a potentially high-risk zone. We could already see the plant from our house, and based on this prediction, they could be spending eight hours a day for years breathing in really compromised polluted air. I don’t want that for any child. That was a really shocking moment for me.
Even before the Shell facility officially opened, they were conducting test runs. Were there any warning signs?
There was one morning when there was a pervasive smell of maple syrup throughout the community. It was such an odd, strong smell. At first we thought, Is someone in our neighborhood having a pancake breakfast? Texting friends who lived in town, we collaboratively discovered that everyone in the region is smelling this, and we don’t know what it is. It came out that it was an unexpected output of a test that the Shell plant was running. It wasn’t supposed to happen, and it wasn’t a good thing.
They also kept doing these flaring operations [burning off excess gases]. When we would see these happen and all the smoke, we thought, Oh, that’s not “fine” particulate matter; that’s particulate matter we can see.
So there was a visual cue with the flaring, and there was an olfactory cue. But what about the things we couldn’t see and smell?
How did you talk to your children about the air quality issues at the Shell facility and your decision to move?
At the time that we moved, our kids were two, four, and six. They hadn’t known any other home, and we knew it was important for them to know why we were looking for another nest. We were also cognizant that it needed to be developmentally appropriate. So we referred to the plant as a “factory.” We said, We can see this factory from our house, it’s making a lot of pollution, we’ll all be breathing it in, and we just want to be farther from it for our safety.
Why is it important for you to share your story, and how do you think it moves the needle?
Any way we can share information with others is important. We can hear a statistic or data and know intellectually that it’s true, but it won’t have the same profoundness as if we can relate on a human level and hear it as someone’s story. There are many more stories a lot more profound to tell than mine. But any of us who can share experiences in these ways, it gives people the opportunity to realize that pollution and petrochemical plants affect real people in real time. They’re not just data and statistics. Any time we can share with others to raise awareness or shift a perspective, there’s value in that. And I do believe in power in numbers. The more people who speak up on an issue the better.
Tell Congress: Protect Families From the Plastics and Petrochemical Industry