Volunteer and witness to the oil spill: My interview with Kerry Kennedy
By Alex Fischetti
America today is in it’s most fragile state. Not only is the economy still not up to par at this point, but we are in the midst of quite possibly the worst environmental disaster to ever strike our nation. The BP oil spill is without a doubt the natural disaster to end them all. Over 5,000 barrels a day are being leaked out into the oceans, and at this rate have already reached beaches in Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas.
Recently, I spoke to a woman who stands for not only the people affected, but the helpless animals as well: Kerry Kennedy. She and her organization: The RFK center for Human Rights, have joined in the effort to help those affected by the spill. And from what Kerry told me, the stories down there in the gulf are both heartbreaking but also hopeful.
“You recently were part of Larry King’s telethon to raise money for the spill. What was your involvement in that?”
Kerry Kennedy: Last night Larry King raised a telethon for the Gulf Coast. He had 45 celebrities who were answering phones and I was one of them. It was a wonderful evening because I heard from people across the country and a few Canadians who were just so concerned about our neighbors in the Gulf Coast. Everybody was sending in donations and trying to help out.”
“You and your daughter were down in the Gulf near the impact zone where the spill was taking place. When you were down there, what was the one thing that impacted you most?”
Kerry Kennedy: I was out on a boat one day, and I saw a Pelican that was covered in oil, and it was trying to get onto a rock. And if it could climb on to this rock, it could get on land and it would be saved from the horror it was surrounded by. But since his feet were still covered in oil, every time he made it onto the rock, he would slip off. So it would flap his wings, struggle to get on to the rock and then slipped off. Struggle and fall right off the rock. It was such a sad, and pathetic and heartbreaking sight. And when we got back to the shore, I was thanking the captain, and he looked at me and said: “I’m going to be dreaming about that Pelican tonight.” He then paused for a moment and he said: “I hope our community is not like that Pelican.”
“What was the human impact like down there in the area?”
Kerry Kennedy: “I think people have been there for generations and they made it through Hurricane Ike, Katrina and Gustov. Now, once again they are worried about their communities and their future. They believe that their way of life is being destroyed, and there is both a physical health and mental health impact for everybody involved. The physical aspect of it comes from oil mixed with the dispersant is giving people headaches and making them feel nauseous. It makes their eyes ache. It has other physical attributes, but being able to work and pay mortgage on your boat or our house or your car has had the mental impact as well. Also, many of the community leaders spoke to us about increasing levels of depression that the people are suffering which leads to divorce, domestic violence, and even suicide.”
“BC said they would donate billions of dollars to help clean up this mess, but what else can they do to help out?”
Kerry Kennedy: I think the first thing they need to do is talk to the communities who are impacted and ask them what they want, what are their needs. What they need to do immediately which they haven’t done yet is to release to both patients and health care officials what the chemical makeup is of the dispersant so that health care workers can diagnose the problems and address them properly. I think that would be a good start. I also think President Obama should sign an executive order for taking a portion of the 19 billion dollars that has been allocated but not spent on Katrina, and creating a civic works campaign that would add 100,000 green jobs to the Gulf coast communities.”
“Do you feel that President Obama is doing enough to take care of this situation?”
Kerry Kennedy: I think there are always more things that he can do. His admiration is made an enormous effort to help out. Lisa Jackson, the administrator of the environmental protection agency is beloved down there in every community we went to in Alabama, Louisiana and Mississippi. But I think there’s a great deal of frustration, and the Obama administration is working night and day to address it but there’s a lot more that needs to be done and has to be done.”
“Most recently, the President issued an oil drilling banned which was banned by a judge. Do you feel that this action was a good idea?”
Kerry Kennedy: Well, one of the concerns that people have is that the economic pillars of the community are tourism, fishing and oil. Because of the oil industry, tourism and fishing have died and the President was concerned that the oil industry is going to say: “Well, now we should able to drill ten times as much. Also, you got to understand in Louisiana because of a bad decision by governor Huey Long, Louisiana do not receive royalties where the oil gets drilled. None of it goes to the state.”
“Do you feel that the state governments are doing enough to help out these communities?”
Kerry Kennedy: I think there are many things that can be done by the state governments. When we were down in those states, people talked about how BP said they would give all the boat captains $2,500 dollars but people in the Vietnamese communities who didn’t know any English were getting just $1,000 each so that’s an issue that needs to be addressed. BP would originally not allow health care officials on their compound and only after tremendous pressure would allow a nurse onto the compound but afterwards they would say to their employees: “If you want to be treated, you can only go to the BP doctor.” BP also in the beginning would not allow employees to wear respirators and other equipment because they felt it would look bad for the cameras, so there are a serious of issues that BP has had with their workers, and that needs to be addressed.”
“What’s the most important thing we as people can learn from all of this?”
Kerry Kennedy: I think one lesson is that this is a tsunami. This is an environmental disaster of epic proportions. There is a sense that people feel that states “There is nothing that I can do.” That’s wrong. The big lesson is to take a stand. If you live far away from the area, you can do three things: You can send money, you can sign an petition pleading with President Obama to create the civic works program which will help create 100,000 green jobs and three you can lessen your use of US oil. You can bring reusable bags to the grocery store, change your light bulbs, recycle, ride a bike instead of car. Use less oil.”
“What can oil companies such as BP do to make sure this sort of thing never happens again?”
Kerry Kennedy: Well BP knows exactly what they did wrong and what they need to do. They had a disaster in 2005 in which workers were killed, they had another one in 2006 where they poised Prudhoe bay, they are the company that never cleaned up their act. There are steps that they can take. They continuously go around the protections that the government had put for both the environment and for workers. One thing they can do is to comply with those restrictions and one thing we can do is demand those restrictions be more strictly enforced.”
As it has been so often in her life, Kerry’s heart was in the right place. I pray that the companies take from her examples, and that the people and the communities down there never have to go through this torture again.
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He loved talking to me, and I loved talking to him. It was amazing the stories he told about his career, his relationship with Fats Domino (He talks to him frequently), and the effect Hurricane Katrina had on his hometown of Gretna, LA.