Probably heard all of it before. Joie chen reports on how politicians have turned their back on one town and its battle over Hazardous Waste. Reporter this is the dark cloud in sandy estels home town. This is the vow that brought promise to East Liverpool ohio but instead brought fear. This 1992, desperate for help, the people of East Liverpool turned to the men promising change, bill clinton and al gore, both campaigned here at eastern ohio, and promised that they would be the ones to look out for the little guys. I went to wheeling and actually shook hands with al gore and he signed, autographed a no wtti poster and assured us over and over and over again, if were elected we will put a stop to this. But they at any time. The Hazardous Waste incinerator went online a year later and the group has been fighting ever since. The incinerator which Community Activists says releases lead mercury and other toxic chemicals from its smokestack and which they blame for a host of unexplained illnesses in the community. This isnt normal that we have all these rare cancers here. We are at risk every day that we live here. There have been protests, both in East Liverpool and in washington, even arrests, but nothing has changed. The Waste Industry puts so much money into donating to politicians and their elections that we cant compete with that and their dollars are always going to win. So in the end the people are the losers here. Once president clinton and Vice President al gore broke their promise to us, you know, if you cant if you cant im sorry. If you cant get results from your own president , where is left to turn, you know . That said, we took out for clinton. 87yearold Alonzo Spencer has been fighting the Hazardous Waste incinerate for more than three decades. Shut this facility down. Tear this facility down. And move it out. You know youve probably heard of gore and his running mate promised us that they would shut this plant down. Or it would never go online. They didnt do it. But now the politician he kind of stas kind ofstay away from iy see whats happened in this area and its not a positive thing to run on. Its all negative. The incinerator is worth 100 jobs to this depressed town but spencer and others say its presence has kept other businesses from moving in and caused families from moving out. To move out. I know of seven families not individuals i know of seven families that have left this area because of this facility being here. Reporter the population of East Liverpool has dropped more than half from 26,000 in 1970 to just 11,000 today. This junior high is now closed. An Elementary School was here too. A mere 1,000 feet from the incinerator but the city tore it down. Yet spencer isnt giving up. We hope it will eventually get shut down. And if it isnt were going to keep fighting it and try make sure that they obey the regulations which they are not doing now. My name is amanda keiger, im a Community Organizer for Communities United for responsible energy or cure. First and foremost im a resident of east lever pool. I guess im just fortunate or unfortunate enough to work in my own neighborhood. All these shops were just filled with other mom and pop businesses. There is video going around from the 1980s it was on a saturday afternoon and people were everywhere. We had movie theaters, there was a roller skating rink, you know, it was just booming. There were things to do. You know East Liverpool was the place to go. Now when you look, two out of three store fronts are shut down. We have two used furniture stores. We have a used game shop. You know lots of churches. Even the churches arent doing well. We are definitely, it is a sacrifice zone here. We have high cancer rates. We have low rates of education. Of graduation. You know out of our high school. Dennis dreer is 60 and he lives just down the street from the Hazardous Waste incinerator. Except for a couple of years in the army he has lived here all his life. They call them inversions. Depending what theyre incinerating up there, youll get a fine dust all over everything. It happened three summers ago, it was a really bad one. It got on everything, it was summer, everybody was running their air conditioners. They went around and replaced they said it was not harmful but they replaced everybodys air conditioners, gave everybody vouchers to have it washed off their cars. They were giving everybody produce and everything. It seems like theres an awful lot of cancer down here, an awful lot of it. Within two blocks three people who have serious cancer and how many other people that i dont know about that keep it private. You cant crawl in a hole and cry about it. You just got to deal with it. Its the card youre dealt. Dennis dreer has also been dealt cancer. Colon cancer that he says has spread to his lungs and hes already had two rounds of chemotherapy. That chemo, dont wish that on anybody. Its rough on you. Reporter at the end of the day, dreer says, hes left with one very basic question. Why is it there . This is a neighborhood, thats a Hazardous Waste incinerator. Those two words do not belong together. Reporter they may not belong together but along the ohio river the people of East Liverpool and the Hazardous Waste incinerator have shared this valley with more than 20 years with no end in sight. Joie chen, al jazeera. And save our county with no help from their elected officials is now readying a lawsuit against Heritage Thermal services, thats the current owner of the Hazardous Waste incinerator. The group is planning to file later this month. Up next, state of emergency. The state of michigan takes charge of flints stage. What happened on a country road and why its raised more fears. And hot on america tonights website, its possible to maximize profits while still look out for patients. Is that really possible . Find out more at aljazeera. Com americatonight. And welcome back. More relief is coming to the citizens of flint after living for more than a year with lead tainted water. The governor of michigan has declared a state of emergency for citizens affected by the contaminated water. This paves the way for muni more Financial Aid for the cash strapped city. America tonights Lori Jane Gliha looks back at what caused the issues. Flints water approximate started when the city under control of a manager, opted out of getting the water from the city of detroit. That meant that the city would save upwards of 3 million but it also meant that flint would no longer source its water from lake huron but would use the flint river. Three two one. At the time the officials integrated the swish. Soon after, there were problems with discolored water and eventually, news of lead. A year and a half later, flint switched back to detroit water water. Mark edwards is an environmental engineer who specializes in Water Treatment. His team has independently tested water samples at hundreds of homes throughout the city. When we first got the results we just didnt believe it. It was Hazardous Waste levels of lead coming out of this persons tap. Two and a half times Hazardous Waste levels of lead in her water. Turns out the flint river water was so corrosive even after going through the Water Treatment plant, that it started to eat away at peoples pipes causing lead from some of those pipes to leech into the drinking water. Even though flint river is no longer being used as a water source, edwards says people in flint are still at risk. We know from history this can cause death, it can cause miscarriages, it can cause elevated blood lead, all kinds of health febts. Yoeffects. We have no idea the enormity of these effects so we are assuming every child has been exposed. Dr. Mona is director of the pediatric facility in flint. The water switch caused a lead spike in the blood of flint children she confirmed. The impact of lead pois poisg we see later. In five years, we will need Early Intervention and in ten years there will be more kids with adhd diagnoses, we dont see the effects now. And america tonights loirnlingsz eLori Jane Gliha joinlorijane gliha joins us now. The governor of michigan finally declared a state of emergency. This has been going on for so long. What took him this long . Nobody took responsibility, not the state, not the county, not the city. So what happened in early december is the city finally did declare a state of emergency which is mainly a ceremonial act but that paved the way for other actions to occur. And during this interim period of time the task force gave their findings, the state bears a lot of responsibility, the governor apologized to the residents of flint and the county declared a state of emergency which then paved the way for the state to do so as well. That is a lot of bureaucratic red tape and in the meantime people are living with these conditions. Im wondering you have the state of emergency which obviously means more funding comes in to help this situation. But what else besides money . Well now they will have the resources of the state. The city and the county are trying to handle all the stuff and theres so much infrastructure and things that need to be replaced. The governor has opened up all the resources everything from the state Emergency Operations center to the Michigan State police. There were calls early on that the National Guard should have gone out the National Guard . People were calling for them originally, saying hey they should have gone door to door, should have delivered water, should have made sure every resident knew what was going on. There were some who werent using filters on their water. It is not unheard of that there could be Emergency Response that is happening this much later. Is that because people dont have the information that they know this is going on out there or people are being lack days lackadaisical about using filters . Not everybody has the internet, not everybody has a computer, not everybody has a car. This stuff just missioned people and they were not able to go. But this opens the door that the governorren could ask the federal government for some aid which could then contribute to their repairing some of the damage. All right america tonights Lori Jane Gliha, thanks. Coming up stone wall mississippi. The latest flash point after the death of an unarmed man at the hands of police. And tomorrow hurry on the job. Workplace injuries and how one man says the accident that cost him his legs was bound to happen. Thats tomorrow on america tonight. The list just keeps growing. Ferguson, staten island, cleveland, all communities with growing suspicion of law enforcement, in mississippi, another story of a young black man killed by police. The District Attorney will present its case to a grand jury, the deliberations are expected to last a couple of days. America tonights sarah hoye recently sat down with the victims mother. I want the truth to come out actually what was done to him to cause him to take his last breath. The death of a black man at the hands of White Police Officers has become an all too familiar story in america, and july 8th it happened again, this time in the rural town of stonewall massachusetts. Stonewall mississippi. Although there are conflicting stories of what happened that night, those who knew Jonathan Sanders say, a good man is now gone. I lost the best son in a the world. Stonewall is named after a general of the old south, stolen wall jackson. To escape the blazing son, jonathan would exercise his horses at night. The horse trainer had planned on competing in the harness races at the local county fair later that month. However, jonathan would never make it to the races. While out riding his horse through town on that july event, the 39yearold father of two ran into a friend who teased jonathan about his slow moving horse. As the two made their way down the road chatting, 25yearold Police OfficerKevin Harrington september jonathans friend of drunk driving and pulled him over near this gas station. Even though jonathan continued riding along it would not be the last he saw of sister harrington. Officer harrington. Around 9 30, jonathan encountered officer harrington again this time a mile away on a quiet residential street. Here is where accounts of what happened dramatically differ. His Attorney Says officer harrington seen here at the local news at his Police Academy graduation in 2013 approached jonathan because he suspected him of having drugs. According to the sanders family attorneys, witnesses say officer harrington drove up behind jonathan and flashed his blue lights, making his horse rear. When he got up to retrieve his horse, officer harrington dragged jonathan to the ground. He choked jonathan for about 20 minutes or so. Officer harrington instructed his wife who was riding with him to take his gun from the holster and put it in the car. A point of contention that is central to the case. After the weapon was finally placed in the squad car, the choke hold continued about. The guillotine choke hold, the last words weve ever heard him stating was i cant breathe i cant breathe twice. Meanwhile jonathans mother frances was settling in for the evening. She had just returned from choir practice when she received two strange phone calls about her son. When the second one came in, the second phone call came in telling me had got shot at this point im you know, i dont know what to think. You know im hearing sirens. So im really losing it. Im really, im really losing it. Reporter after waiting nearly an hour at the local hospital, frances was finally told jonathan had died. And that the coroner had taken his body. She had yet to see her son. The preliminary autopsy report concluded jonathan died from manual asphyxiation. In short he was choked to death. Every question that was going through my flame that night, none of them have been answered. I dont even know exactly what happened to my son. I dont even know what all they did to my son that night. I dont know anything really. Reporter is that the hardest part the not knowing . The hardest point really is that hes gone and i know ill never see him again. Thats the hardest part for me. Because he was in my life for 39 years. We need to take a break okay. Reporter we wanted to seek with officer harrington. He declined. Bill reedy, junior is his attorney. It was determined by the officer based on the information he developed from the stop and what he offend tha observed thad have been a drug transaction trying to take place on 513. Based on your experience how does that escalate from the pat down to the run to now we have somebody who is dead . As ive said to anyone and everyone that has asked, it was an unfortunate accident, that came about as a result of mr. Sanders breaking to run and then grabbing officer harrington, getting in a wrestling match and actually getting possession of the officers weapon. As for that weapon, witnesses say the gun was safely holstered and that the officer called his wife to come get it. Kevin harrington stated that mr. Sanders went for his gun. Went for his gun. And thats a story that we hear so often. With regard to this, but by all witness accounts, that never happened. When he tries to run what happens . When he grabbed mr. Sanders, mr. Sanders spun around and grabbed officer harrington, and the wrestling match was on and mr. Sanders was attempting to and in fact did finally get officer harringtons gun out of his holster. So you are saying he was able to take the officers weapon . From out of the officers holster, yes, he was not able to hold onto it and the sisters weapon fell to the ground and was knocked to the ground and mr. Sanders and officer harrington were in the wrestling match right there where the weapon was. The officer involved deaths of black men such as the shooting death of mike brown or the choke hold death of eric garner have put a spotlight on the issue and in stonewall Frances Sanders says it matters. The talk. Have you ever had the talk, how you speak to people, what do you do if you are ever stopped . Is that something you had to discuss . I think every black in stonewall is still indicating to their children because of the way we had to live in the town. Knowing that you would be treated differently. Than whites. Tell me what there is that indicates this is a racial motivated killing . All i see is a white sister and a black man with an unfortunate, unfortunate outcome. According to state prison records, Jonathan Sanders was sentenced to five years for selling cocaine in 2003. He was arrested again in april for allegedly possessing cocaine. A record some are using against him. However, officer harrington had his own runins with local authorities including a family dispute and traffic violation. The second that a blacked man, an unarmed black man who is riding a horse, riding a horse, riding a horse, is killed, they try assassinate his character. In some way, in some skewed way he becomes more of a threat than an officer who is stalking behind him with his lights off and who chokes him to death. What could you do so bad to make a person choke you for at least 20 minutes . What could you do so bad to make somebody choke you that long . Do you think youll ever be able to forgive the officer . I cant even answer that question. Im being honest. I know i should. And the laws i cite but im not at that point right now where i say i forgive him and he done take my son away from me. My son is dead. You know, they have killed him. And he cant talk for his self, he cant fight for his self. And i will fight for him. I will speak for him. I will do whatever it takes until i get justice for him, until i cant breathe. Sarah hoye, al jazeera, stonewall, mississippi. And well certainly keep you updated on that case. Thats it for us here at america tonight. Be sure to tell us what you think at aljazeera. Com americatonight. You can also talk to us on twitter or facebook and be sure to come back because well have modifier america tonight, more ever america tonight of t here tomorrow. 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