Why is the EPA so timid in the East Palestine train disaster?

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When a Norfolk Southern train carrying nearly 116,000 gallons of vinyl chloride derailed in East Palestine, Ohio, last month, local officials made a pivotal decision: to drain the highly toxic chemical into a ditch and set it on fire in a "controlled burn" to avoid a catastrophic explosion.

Officials didn't mention that the plume could rain dioxins and other enduring poisons down on the community and others downwind. And two days after the burn, residents in the one-by-two-mile evacuation zone were allowed back into their homes — before any testing for dioxins and other contaminants on the surfaces inside had been done.

Dioxins are some of the most potent carcinogens on Earth — there's no "safe" dose for humans, and pregnant women and young children are especially vulnerable to their effects.

But even now, a month after the derailment, the people of East Palestine don't have solid information about the risks they and their families face — whether they have already been exposed, what they should be doing to avoid future exposure and whether they just need to move.

Why would the Environmental Protection Agency allow this horrific situation to continue? It should have ordered comprehensive testing the very day of the burn. It should have told residents, especially pregnant women and families with young children, not to return home until it was safe to do so. Instead, it timidly stood back, leaving local authorities, corporate interests and rumors to fill the void.

In a situation like this, the EPA should immediately conduct authoritative tests and come up with a plan to address any dangers, and communicate all of it loudly and clearly to the affected communities. Instead it waited a full month, and then asked Norfolk Southern to test for dioxins and come up with a plan.

This is a terrible approach. Not only are the interests of a company accused of polluting quite obviously distinct from those of the public, but giving an nongovernmental entity responsibility for undertaking these steps means more time will be lost in an additional layer of review and approval.

There have been other troublesome missteps and delays. Residents were most at risk during, and immediately following, the moment the large toxic cloud spread across the community. Yet the EPA waited until just a few days ago to announce that residents living within one mile of the train derailment could get money to relocate temporarily. Weeks after the evacuation order was lifted, residents were offered commercial cleaning inside their homes, long after many cleaned on their own. That, too, should have happened on Day 1.

Many of these failures most likely happened because the EPA deferred too much to the less experienced Ohio EPA. That agency answers to Gov. Mike DeWine, who since the beginning has not seemed to grasp the seriousness of the situation.

But by acting as a reluctant regulator, the EPA has left the residents of East Palestine and the surrounding areas desperate for answers. In a recent community meeting, residents demanded more information. These are people who are concerned for their health, the safety of their own homes and the well-being of their children. They deserve better.

You can see this excessive deference in nonemergency situations, too, in Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas. In these states, the EPA has stood by for decades as serial polluters pumped contaminants into the air and the water in communities where petrochemicals are manufactured. According to EPA records, people in Louisiana and Texas were breathing in air with more toxic chemicals than the residents of any other part of the country. Yet the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality approved permits for a giant Formosa Plastics complex in St. James Parish, and the EPA did nothing publicly to oppose them. (The permits were later thrown out by a judge, but that ruling has been appealed.) Time and time again, the state has failed its people and the EPA hasn't done enough to step in.

The EPA needs to take two actions now.

First, it needs to conduct comprehensive environmental testing for dioxins in and around East Palestine. It has been testing for what it calls indicator chemicals — used to assess potential exposure to toxic substances — and has stated that the results "suggest a low probability for release of dioxin from this incident." Let's hope that is true — but why spend time on indicator chemicals when the EPA knows how to test directly for dioxins?

Second, the EPA needs to establish federally funded medical monitoring for everyone along the plume. Even those who appear healthy now should be offered baseline testing.

There is much to do. But the EPA can't do it without more people and money. After years of funding cuts, the agency is down to 15,115 employees this year, from 18,110 in 1999. For effective enforcement of our environmental laws, Congress needs to approve more funding for this crucial agency.