Congress is reacting to your letters, keep the pressure up!

By Kirsten Kagimoto | Reading time: 3 minutes

Your letters to Congress are working and our delegation is responding!

Collectively we’ve sent more than 240 letters to our four members of Congress and you can rest assured they are not being ignored. Thank you to everyone who mailed letters! If you haven’t yet, please write to Congress today.

So far Representative Ed Case and Senator Schatz have responded directly to your letters. If you haven’t heard directly from them, you can read their responses here. Both share the sentiment that the Red Hill tanks pose no immediate risk to the public and that the Navy has it under control. Our reaction: 😲😡💀!

The May leak goes to show the exact opposite—the Navy’s supposedly improved procedures since the last leak clearly do not prevent leaks from the Red Hill fuel tanks. These antiquated tanks absolutely pose a risk to the health and safety of Oʻahu. Although the Navy swears all of the fuel was contained and it has everything under control, data show that the fuel spilled in May leaked out of the facility and into the soil below the tanks. This situation doesn’t seem very under control at all.

Also in the last couple of weeks, we have received invitations from Representatives Case and Kahele to meet and discuss Red Hill. Again, Representative Case made his position clear that he thinks the tanks do not pose an immediate risk but he also seemed to hear us that the public’s confidence in these tanks is spent. Although no commitments were made, we did have a good discussion about the options for appropriating funds to retire the tanks. Representative Kahele’s office was kind enough to meet on the subject even though the tanks are outside of his district. Kahele’s team seems to understand that everything is connected in our island home, and a risk of this magnitude to the primary drinking water aquifer for the majority of Oʻahu has repercussions for all districts. We used this opportunity to make sure his office has all the latest information and data on the tanks, their track record, and the high risk of future leaks.

We are also in the process of reaching out to Senators Schatz and Hirono to meet with them soon. You might have seen Sen. Hirono’s interview with Civil Beat that included a question on Red Hill and she also touched on Red Hill during a recent congressional hearing.

You are making all of this happen. 🙏🏼

Prior to your letters and sharing your legitimate concerns about Red Hill, the congressional delegation was relatively quiet about the leak from Red Hill in May. But when we all started asking pointed questions, it forced our congressional delegation to make clear where they stand on this issue. Many of you shared with me how surprising it was to learn that our delegation does not think that the Red Hill tanks should be immediately shut down and the fuel relocated. It is incredibly disappointing that this is where they stand but that does not mean that we cannot influence them to change their positions. Your letters are helping to create an opportunity for us to educate our congressional delegation, and to keep Red Hill at the top of their minds, where it should be.

You know as much as we do that the Red Hill tanks have got to go much sooner than 2038, (forget the Navy’s dream of 2045). Now we have to convince our most elite decision makers that this is the only reasonable, prudent course of action. Your letters are already doing that. Now let’s send them more—share this message with your friends and family and ask them to write to Congress too. It is in everyone’s interest to prevent Oʻahu’s pure drinking water from being contaminated by the U.S. Navy.