UES waste station foes target front-runners on eve of primary

Group sends out 80K mailings that claim truck fumes will cause asthma, lung cancer

From left: Bill de Blasio, Christine Quinn, the site of the proposed station at East 91st Street
From left: Bill de Blasio, Christine Quinn, the site of the proposed station at East 91st Street

Opponents of the hot-button Upper East Side waste transfer station are sending out 80,000 direct mailings on the eve of Tuesday’s primary that blasts Democratic mayoral candidates Christine Quinn and Bill de Blasio for their support of the project. Pledge 2 Protect, a coalition of groups against the planned station at East 91st Street, is distributing the mailers mostly in the East Harlem and Yorkville neighborhoods. 

“How is this environmental justice when tugboats and 500 garbage trucks a day will spew carcinogenic diesel fumes, raising asthma and lung cancer rates for children and New Yorkers?,” according to the mailer, seen by DNAinfo.

Quinn and de Blasio, their names outlined in red, are labeled with the words: “WON’T stop the dump,” according to the website; the names of Bill Thompson and Anthony Weiner are outlined in green and labeled with: “WILL stop the dump.”

Sign Up for the undefined Newsletter

Neither Quinn nor de Blasio could be reached for comment by the site.

The goals are “to educate New Yorkers on the dangers of this unnecessary garbage dump, to inform New Yorkers as to where NYC’s next leaders stand on the issue and to urge them to make their voices heard,” a Pledge spokesman told DNAinfo. [DNAinfo]Hiten Samtani