Ladies and gentlemen , Thank you for allowing me to address this panel. Today I'd like to speak to you not about a gas driller in Dallas, Texas, but about John Glenn the astronaut. Upon his return from space Mr. Glenn explained that one thing that truly shocked and amazed and impressed him more than any other thing from his flight was how very tiny and thin the layer of air is that

surrounds ourthe earth

.A layer merely thousands offeethighadjacent to the vast infinity we call space. He gave an analogy in which he stated that ifthe diameter of the earth was the height of his body, the layer of air around it would be about this thick: Just a few millimeters. Think about it. How precious this wonderful life-giving layer ofair is! Beyond it-there's nothing but the vacuum of endless space. Ladies and gentlemen , OUR little layer of air is being abused ; it has no voice; and so I am here to speak for it.By trade, just up until last year, I was for the past twenty-five years a traveling saleswoman throughout the state ofTexas. I wholesaled optical frames that I carried in large, heavy sales rep bags

. Because my home office in New York only paid me $50 per night for

hotels, I tried to look for inexpensive Motel 6 type of places and I'd always ask for a a room on the first floor that opened into parking lot. This way I could

carry my sales rep bags in with little difficulty. On two different occasions within the last several yearsonce In

Houston and once in Odessa, Texas, I was awakened in the
wee hours ofthe night by noxious, toxic gas fumes. Evidently, in Houston a refinery was dumping poison into the air about 4 or 5 a
.m These fumes were so strong they woke me up-and I'm a pretty sound sleeper

.A few years ago, I was in a motel along 

### 1-20 in Odessa. I remember waking up around 3 or 4 in the morning because I sensed my eyes were burning. When I opened them they were really smarting-and there was a horrible strong gas smell in the room. You could literally almost feel the particulants in the air. It was sort of like a barely visible foggy vapor. assumed my room had a faulty air conditioner spewing poisonous fumes and so ran to open the doorto let in fresh a1r. But when I opened my door it was much worse! It was the outside air! So I quickly closed my door and looked around in horror. My eyes were still really burning badly and I was having difficulty inhaling; Ijumped to the phone and called the front desk, but there was no answer. So, alone and afraid in an attempt to not breathe it directly in , I simply got underthe covers and used the sheets and blankets as a face mask. I lay in bed thinking that this must have been what the gas chambers were like in Nazi Germany. It was a totally surreal experience! Ofcourse, there was no getting back to sleep at all. Talk about fumes-1 was fuming mad

. For some reason the EPA didn't come to my mind. Instead, I lay there lamenting the fact that all I had between me and these noxious fumes was Governor Perry

.But knowing how he favors big business over the rest of us, I figured why even botherto call his office, what's the use?
In the morning the front desk lady told me that there was a tire plant up the street that it was the source ofthe problem. People who have homes with bedrooms that don't open up into the parking lot probably don't notice the poison fumes when they're sleeping in the middle of the night--they probably have better insulation or windows and doors.
But my eyes and lungs knew it that night! And they are here to testify to it. It happened-and it happens routinely while we ALL sleep

. It doesn't matterwhether it's a refinery, a tire plant or a cement plant. Any business that abuses
our thin little layer ofair around our planet needs to be stopped

. Of course the people working in them havejobs and families that rely on these plants-but science needs to be applied so thatjobs will be plentiful , and our airwill not be under assault by pollutants. Until these business can solidly prove that they are part ofthe solution and the not the problem, I say they need to be intensely monitoredespecially late at night-bywatchdogs from the EPA

.Let your conscience be your guide. Let the EPA do its job without interference and support them to the fullest. Do it for the people of Dallas

. Do it for the people ofOdessa and Houston for that matter
. Do it so no other sales rep has to hide undertheir covers choking in an attempt to try to breathe. But most ofall , do it for yours and mine and Astronaut John Glenn's miraculous, incredible, life-sustaining little tiny layer ofvulnerable air surrounding planet earth

. Thank you .

. 

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