Earlier this year, Newport News Mayor Phillip Jones was appointed to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Local Government Advisory Committee.
The group helps the agency “build state and local capacity to deliver environmental services and programs,” the EPA says on its website.
Members from around the country provide recommendations on a range of topics including air pollution, water contamination and resilience to climate impacts.
Jones will serve through January 2026. WHRO spoke with the mayor about his goals for the role.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
WHRO: Heading into this appointment, what do you see as the greatest environmental challenges facing Newport News right now?
Phillip Jones: Number one, there's coal. There's been a combination of things that have led to air pollution in (the Southeast) community for a few decades. Coal is the biggest because it's a giant coal pile, and people can feel the coal on their clothes when they hang it to dry or on their cars. So it's been going on for a long time, but I think people are just starting to get fed up.
Number two, we have flooding. We get calls the most about potholes and flooding. I think that's what every mayor gets phone calls about, and people are just saying, ‘Listen, when I go to my backyard, a little bit of rain and I can't go outside, and now it's in my house, and now it's ruined. What are some things that you can do?’ We're just going to make sure that we can help mitigate not only the coal, but also all that flooding that happens in people's backyards.
WHRO: I understand your involvement with the EPA started when the city applied for a federal grant to address coal dust – tell me about how that came together.
PJ: When you look at some ways that we can capture fugitive coal dust, there's really, studies show us, two ways. We can do a coal dome, which happens in Europe. It's very expensive, and there's a giant dome over the coal which, as you can see, we have a major highway and that's going to just look very, very odd. Or you can have a coal fence. That’s cheaper, you can put that near the water, and that's able to capture 80% to 90% of the coal. All of that is going to require federal funds. We're looking at anywhere between $12 million to $20 million.
So the city, in December of last year, we applied for a $20 million Community Change Grant. That would have been the impetus for us to get started with the plans and the site development, etc. Unfortunately, due to multiple reasons, we were unable to get that grant. But we remain undeterred. We're going to find ways to mitigate that fugitive coal dust. It's going to take a little bit of time.
So when we were going through the grant process, we talked to the EPA officials multiple times. I went to D.C. and met with one of the undersecretaries, and they expressed, ‘Hey, you're really interested in environmental justice, and the EPA we have a commission, and we would love for you to serve.’ It took a little bit of paperwork to go through, but I was excited to be appointed, and I think that, along with a collaboration with the Bloomberg Innovation team, is going to really help us with all EPA-related things in Newport News.
Newport News was recently, last year, selected one of 25 cities in the country to get a Bloomberg I-Team, or innovation team. (Hampton was also chosen.) What that does is it gives us three full-time individuals, not paid from city funds, but paid by Bloomberg Philanthropies. And that is going to allow us to just really focus on coal dust, flood mitigation and project management when it comes to applying for grants.
WHRO: You’ve talked about your commitment to environmental justice. What does that mean to you?
PJ: Whether it's Newport News or Lambert’s Point in Norfolk or things in other southern states or cities, you often see marginalized communities next to pig farms or sewage farms or coal terminals. And that's going to probably have high rates of comorbidities of asthma and the like. And I think we all want a future for our children and our grandkids that has clean air and clean water.
It's all about fairness. Everyone, it does not matter what your political party, what you look like or how much money that you make, everyone deserves for them, their kids and their grandkids to have access to clean water, clean air and be able to just feel safe in their neighborhood. At the end of the day, that's it.
I think sometimes we get politicized and polarized talking about things. It comes down to a fairness standard. Do you want your neighbor to have access to the same things that you have access to? That's it.
WHRO: What do you hope to gain from your participation in the EPA committee?
PJ: The intent of the Local Government Advisory Committee is to help form national policies when it comes to environmental justice and other EPA-related things. What they're realizing is, it doesn't matter if it's a county or a city or tribal community — the people at the ground level, we have an ear to the community, and they know that. So it's really our time to talk directly to EPA officials about what we're seeing.
With the changed administration, it has stalled a little bit, but we look forward to the next meeting and really being able to advocate. Because like I've said, it doesn't matter who's in the White House, I'm going to continue to advocate for all residents of Newport News.
