ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. – As the Environmental Protection Agency backs away from limiting toxic emissions from oil and gas wells, environmental groups are stepping up calls to limit the pollution.
The groups Earthworks and Moms Clean Air Force have released an updated version of their interactive Oil and Gas Threat Map. It identifies areas at risk from emissions from oil and gas production.
Alexandra Merlino with Moms Clean Air Force says New Mexico is vulnerable without federal laws governing oil and gas because the state lacks guidelines for determining what constitutes a significant violation.
"In New Mexico, because we have no state regulations around oil and gas, we depend on national regulations - that's like our health check," she says.
Merlino points out that EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt is working to roll back Obama-era rules that reduce methane emissions, though the effort is currently tied up in the courts. The map reveals potential danger to schools and childcare centers near rigs that can emit methane, volatile organic compounds and other pollutants.
According to the map, more than 32,000 children in New Mexico attend schools and daycare centers located near oil and gas production facilities. These sites release methane, a potent greenhouse gas, as well as smog-forming and cancer-causing pollution, like benzene. Merlino says this puts kids at risk for cancer, respiratory illness, birth defects, blood disorders and neurological problems.
"So, it's not only the direct threat of this oil and gas pollution, and then there's the secondary impact of climate destruction from this pollution that then creates other issues that are health risks to young children," she warns.
New Mexico has two major oil and production areas where children might be exposed to risk - the San Juan Basin and the Permian Basin. A study by the Fracktracker Alliance in 2014 found that hydraulic fracturing and oil and gas drilling in the U.S. unfairly burden Hispanic and non-white communities.
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Lawmakers in Congress are facing mounting pressure from corporate lobbyists to pass business tax breaks before the end of the year but new analysis suggests cuts would be far more costly than promised.
Joe Hughes, federal policy analyst at the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, said reinstating the expanded Child Tax Credit would be a better investment. He pointed out it is unclear whether corporate tax breaks would achieve their stated policy goals, but they would make a lot of very rich people even richer.
"The child tax credit, on the other hand, the beneficiaries and the effects are entirely clear," Hughes asserted. "It's children in low- to middle-income families, middle-class families, people making less than about $86,000 a year."
Reinstating the pandemic-era Child Tax Credit would help nearly 60 million children in Wyoming and across the U.S. Proponents of corporate tax breaks passed in 2017 argue they are essential to economic growth and should be made permanent. Critics of the expanded child tax credit, which expired last year doubling child poverty rates, warned it would discourage people from re-entering the workforce.
Researchers at the University of Chicago and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology found the expanded Child Tax Credit did not affect parents' decisions to enter or leave the workforce. Hughes noted working is not free if you have children. For many parents, it is less expensive to stay home than pay rising child care costs.
"An expanded child tax credit that's available to all low-income families can actually help some families re-enter the workforce," Hughes emphasized. "Because now they can receive child care."
Making corporate tax breaks permanent is projected to cost $500 billion but Hughes stressed making the Child Tax Credit fully refundable, where families get assistance even if they don't earn enough to owe taxes, would have a much lower price tag of between $10 billion and $20 billion.
"The most impactful part of the legislation was what made it available to all families, including very low-income families," Hughes added. "In 2021, as a result of the child tax credit, child poverty was cut in half."
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Education experts say children in New Hampshire are at risk of falling behind their peers in other states with well-funded preschool programs.
Nearly half of 3- and 4-year-olds in New Hampshire are not receiving early education, which is known to provide foundational knowledge and skills used in school and later in life.
Steven Barnett, senior co-director of the National Institute for Early Education Research at Rutgers University, said research shows children who attend preschool are more likely to attend college, find professional success and are less likely to be involved in the criminal justice system.
"We know that kids who miss out from low income families can start two or three years behind their peers," Barnett explained. "And they will rarely catch up."
Barnett acknowledged while individual school districts can opt to pay for preschool, a well-funded state program would help ensure all New Hampshire children get a chance to learn the fundamentals of math and language as well as develop the social-emotional skills they will carry into adulthood.
New Hampshire is one of just six states to not fund preschool, and Barnett pointed out it affects the economy as well. Thousands of Granite State parents report they frequently miss work or have had to quit their jobs due to the lack of affordable and accessible preschool. But where it is available, often staff is not.
Barnett added of more than 200 majors offered in college, early childhood education is one of the lowest paid.
"If we're serious about producing the kinds of benefits that preschool can, we need an adequate paid workforce," Barnett contended.
The Community College System of New Hampshire has created multiple scholarship and tuition assistance programs to help draw more people to the field of early education, but Barnett argued greater federal investments and a state commitment to universal preschool with adequately paid staff are needed to ensure kids get the best start on life.
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Ohio schools are stepping up to meet the needs of a growing number of English learners.
Nearly 40% of around 60,000 English learners in the state speak Spanish as their primary language, but others speak Arabic, Chinese, Somali, Swahili and more.
Debbie Skarsten is an English Learners teacher in Pickerington. She said schools need certified teachers to provide a specialized curriculum, along with more training for other teachers, given a population that has doubled over the past decade.
Skarsten added that there's a significant difference between a child learning playground vocabulary and academic language required for testing.
"These students are required to take the same state tests that every other student takes," said Skarsten, "and pass the same standards that every other student - who grew up as a native English speaker - is expected to take, and at the same time frame."
National Center for Education Statistics data show nationwide, the percentage of public school students who were English learners rose by 4.5 million between 2010 and 2020.
Forty-eight states and the District of Columbia provide funding specifically for English language learners.
Lakota Local School District English as a Second Language Specialist Helen Vassiliou explained language isn't a disability, and said students should learn English in an environment that accounts for their native language skills.
She said many students arrive in the U.S. speaking multiple languages, meaning English is sometimes a child's third or fourth language.
"English learners should receive additional supports from counselors and social workers - as well as certified, licensed ESL specialists," said Vassiliou. "We should provide them and their families with support."
Research shows that grouping English learning students into small communities, training peer mentors, monitoring students' academic progress, and providing culturally responsive teaching are effective at helping English learners.
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