Tax Breaks Mean More Plastic Pollution for Black Folks

By Willy Blackmore | Word In Black (WIB) – If Formosa Plastics, the Taiwanese chemical company, is ever able to open its hotly contested plastic plant slated for St. James Parish, it will have an enviable property tax bill: $0.  As part of the incentive package — both the state and local governments offered Formosa to locate its $9.4 billion factory just south of Baton Rouge — Formosa’s property taxes will be waived completely for a decade, to the tune of about $1.4 billion. The factory, which will be about a mile from a local elementary school with a 99% Black student body, is permitted to emit 800 tons of toxic air pollution annually, but won’t contribute at all to the local education system or public infrastructure thanks to the tax break.  RELATED:& Mass Plastic Recycling Is a Fantasy, and That’s Bad News for Black Folks According to a new report published last week by the& Environmental Integrity Project, the boom in American plastics manufacturing that has occurred in recent years is more often than not driven by similar tax breaks, making it so factories can operate in often Black and brown communities with little to no tax burden. The...