Clean environment

As a parent, you worry for the safety of your children – not only from the threats you can see – but also from the things you can’t see.  You wonder, what’s in that water they are drinking?  
 
My lifelong commitment to protecting the environment began by pulling abandoned tires out of the San Francisco Bay as a child on the first Earth Day.  I continued by working for the Natural Resources Defense Council in law school, helping to preserve open space as a local official, pushing to successfully ban dangerous toxins from children’s food and toys as a state legislator, and fighting as a community activist to reverse decades of pollution in Connecticut’s rivers.  
 
We must craft national policies that are good for both the environment and our economy.  The dramatic increase in extreme weather incidents around the world – disturbed rainfall, tornadoes, hurricanes – are wreaking great human and economic havoc, and should be a wake-up call to all countries that we need to take seriously the impact of human actions on the global environment.  
 
Protect our air and water.  Every family deserves clean air to breathe and clean water to drink.  We pay for air and water pollution with increased incidents of asthma, cancer and other health problems.  I strongly oppose Republican attempts to dismantle critical environment protections.
 
Make polluters pay.  I am committed to cleaning up brownfields to restore economic growth and reduce the health risks of pollution.  We must hold polluters accountable by making them pay to clean up their own mess.
 
Develop a clean and energy-efficient future.  We must move quickly to a more energy-efficient and clean-energy future, that includes incentives for renewable energy like wind, solar, and bio-fuels, and the building of more fuel efficient vehicles.