Shelter Island Reporter Letters to the Editor: March 14, 2026

NINE MORE MONTHS

To the Editor:

Finally, winter has receded and the “Snow-Drops” (Galanthus) are looking beautiful popping up through frost-free ground. The weather is now warm enough to open your windows and get some wonderfully delightful fresh air.

However, prepare yourselves, because in order to enjoy  the fresh air  you’ll need to put on your head phones or ear plugs to block out the sounds of the power blowers down the street.

The good news; only nine months till winter.

Happy Spring!

ANGELO PICCOZZI,, Shelter Island

NO BREATHING EASY

To the Editor:

Twenty-five years ago, I founded the nonprofit Community Health and Environment Coalition (CHEC) to confront Long Island’s unusually high cancer rates and investigate possible environmental causes. 

Working with the New York State Department of Health, the Suffolk County Health Department, medical professionals, and residents, we relied on science and public-health data. Yet it was not until the cancer diagnoses among 9/11 first responders that the public fully grasped the delayed and devastating effects of toxic chemical exposure.

The recent rollback of key Clean Air Act protections announced by EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin is unacceptable. By rescinding the 2009 Greenhouse Gas “Endangerment Finding,” the EPA is discarding the scientific and legal basis for regulating dangerous greenhouse-gas pollution and weakening safeguards against one of the largest sources of air pollution: vehicle exhaust.

History has repeatedly shown that government action on toxic exposure often comes too late, as seen with Agent Orange, asbestos, PFAS, heavy metals, and microplastics. The public often pays the price long after exposure to toxic pollution has occurred. 

Pollution is not an abstract issue. It is a documented health threat linked to asthma attacks, emergency-room visits, missed school days, chronic disease, and cancer. The EPA argues that weakening these protections could save businesses money, but has it accounted for the cost of increased illness, medical care, and lost productivity?

Protecting clean air is not just an environmental issue. It is a public-health responsibility and, ultimately, a moral obligation. When those protections are weakened, it is the public, not polluters, who pay the price.

SARAH ANKER, Former Suffolk County Legislator, Mt. Sinai