"Five-day marathon to state capitol leaves Reserve, where chemical factory presents greatest risk of cancer to surrounding community"

"Demonstrators in Louisiana stepped off on a five-day march on Thursday, demanding environmental justice for a region besieged by toxic pollution from chemical plants.

The protest began just a few hundred feet from a factory in Reserve, Louisiana, that presents the greatest risk of cancer to the surrounding community of any in the nation, according to government data.

Standing outside an elementary school barely beyond the facility’s fence line, activist and resident Robert Taylor demanded the plant be shut down. “We are demanding not only the saving of our children at this school, we are demanding the salvation of this entire area,” said Taylor, director of a local citizens group, which has been organizing around lowering the plant’s emissions since 2016."

Jamiles Lartey and Oliver Laughland report for the Guardian May 30, 2019. [2]