[INSPRATIONAL MUSIC STING] - Hi, everyone, Steve Adubato.

We kick off the program once again with our long-time friend Kim Gaddy, who's the founder and director of the South Ward of Newark, South Ward Environmental Alliance.

Kim, good to see you.

- Good to see you too, Steve.

- Now, Kim, from one former Newarker to one who's a Newarker now, I wanna make it clear, you are not in Newark.

You are in London, England, right now.

- Yes, I am.

I'm attending a international maritime conference.

- Excellent.

Well, we thank you so much for joining us.

Let me ask you this, Kim.

There is a power plant in the city of Newark.

What is this power plant?

Because we're gonna be talking about environmental justice.

It's a big part of our initiative Urban Matters.

The lower 1/3 will go up.

One of the urban matters and urban issues that matters greatly is environmental justice and the concern many folks have about what's going on environmentally in urban communities.

The Newark power plant, what is it and what's the problem?

- Well, the problem is that this will be the fourth power plant in the Ironbound community, Steve.

So that's an environmental injustice.

They already have three power plants.

The Ironbound would be the only community in the United States to have four power plants in one community.

And the impacts from the power plant impacts the health of residents.

You know one out of four children have asthma in the city of Newark.

And so when you have all these pollutants that come out of these power plants, it impacts the health of our young and our elderly.

And we know, because of Superstorm Sandy years ago, that we needed to make sure we are better prepared for the changing times and floods in our community.

But we already have three.

We don't need this power plant.

And so they're trying to say because we don't want to experience another flooding situation that we did with Superstorm Sandy, we now need another, fourth power plant.

And we're saying, "No, you don't."

- Now, Kim, you may be the founder and director of the South Ward Environmental Alliance, but, also, you're a mom.

And this is, on some level, personal for you.

Talk about that.

- Yeah, it's very personal.

You know, unfortunately, having three children with asthma, and I lost my 32-year-old son two years ago with a heart attack, and so I know too well that the environmental issues, the cumulative impacts of pollution from the many sources, can impact our children lives.

And so this is very personal to me and all of the children in Newark because I don't want to see another parent experience an asthma attack with their children or have one of their children die prematurely from a heart attack.

- Kim, who's proposing this fourth power plant?

And Kim talks about the Ironbound.

The Ironbound is the section of Newark.

There are five wards in the city of Newark.

This is the East Ward.

Why is it relevant?

It is the section of the city of Newark below Penn Station.

It is a very congested area.

People live very close together.

This is the fourth power plant.

Who is proposing this?

- PVSC is proposing this plant.

And, you know, Steve- - You're talking about the Passaic Valley Sewerage Commission?

- Yes.

- Okay.

- And the problem is that our state Senator Teresa Ruiz, our Assembly member Pintor Marin, (indistinct) the mayor, the council, they're all against this power plant.

And, matter of fact, First Lady Tammy Murphy came out to support us.

And the only two that is still supporting it is our governor and the PVSC commissions.

- So let me be clear on this, Senate candidate, as we speak toward the end of March 2024, and this may be seen after the June 4th Democratic primary for the United States Senate in New Jersey, Tammy Murphy is against this power plant.

Governor Murphy is for it?

- Yes.

Yes.

And because of all of her work with maternal childcare, and she has been a fighter for environmental justice and climate change since Al Gore, so she understands that the environmental impacts from this power plant will potentially harm not only pregnant women, unborn children, but residents.

And so she even came out and supported us, to say, "No, we don't need this power plant in the city of Newark."

- We will have the governor back on and we'll have Tammy Murphy on.

They can explain their positions on this.

Interesting.

I also wanna, I was remiss in not making it clear that Kim Gaddy is a 2021 Russ Berrie Foundation Making a Difference Awardee.

And we've been honored to be collaborators with the Russ Berrie Foundation.

I've been honored to host that Making a Difference luncheon every year for the past 25-plus years.

And, yeah, it just makes me old.

Kim, stop smiling like that.

(Kim laughs) Make me feel, but, and I remember when you got that award.

It was and is a big deal.

Let me ask you this, water equity, in the city of Newark, what is the issue and why is it a concern?

- Well, you know in the city of Newark, we had an issue with the lead service line replacement.

- That's right.

- So that's the issue because no level of lead is acceptable.

Any level of lead in our drinking water is harmful to our community.

And so when we talk about water justice, we wanna make sure that everyone has a right to safe, affordable, quality drinking water that doesn't harm them, and especially those who are from environmental justice communities.

And so we have been working also to address the flooding in our community.

You know, the Dayton Street neighborhood used to be the East Ward, right?

And the major floods that happened is in the Ironbound section and in the Dayton Street neighborhood of our South Ward.

The maps for the state of New Jersey say that in the next 50 years, that whole community will be underwater.

And so we're also working to make sure green infrastructure is used as a first line of defense against flooding.

- Kim, let me ask you something real quick.

Go back to the lead issue.

We'll have Mayor Baraka back on as part of our series "New Jersey's Next Governor 2025," because he's running for governor.

But as the mayor of the city of Newark, where is the mayor on this issue of lead and the pipes?

Is he saying it's a serious problem or is he saying something different?

- Yes, well, he finally began to speak up and talk about how serious this issue is.

And now there's a issue with the replacement pipes.

They're saying- - That's right.

- That one of the contractors was negligent.

And so now we, matter of fact, we have a call tomorrow with Shawn LaTourette, the commissioner from DEP- - Commissioner, Department of Environmental Protection.

- To discuss, so they could kinda give us some updates.

So, finally, the mayor and everybody is now being at least more transparent and letting us know what is happening.

Because at the beginning, we was not feeling that the information was very transparent, Steve.

- We will have the mayor on, the candidate for governor, Ras Baraka, and he can talk about this, but Kim Gaddy is the founder and director of the South Ward of Newark Environmental Alliance, a 2021 Russ Berrie Making a Difference winner.

Kim, thanks.

Good to see you, my friend.

- Thank you.

- You got it.

Stay with us.

We'll be right back.

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