Congratulations to businessman Jeff Brown for perhaps the worst answer to a debate question I've heard in a long time. In a question about sending Philadelphia's trash to nearby Chester, one of the most heavily polluted areas in the United States and home to one of the largest incinerators in the country, (and naturally a low-income, 70% Black community), Jeff Brown just doesn't care (although he said he does). That's not his problem.
Source: Philadelphia Inquirer
Mayoral candidate Jeff Brown came under fire from his Democratic rivals during a televised debate Tuesday for a dismissive comment about the city of Chester.
A Fox29 debate moderator asked Brown, a businessman who hasn’t held elected office, how he’d address complaints of pollution and environmental racism in Chester, where some of Philadelphia’s trash is dumped. Philadelphia has long held a waste disposal contract with Covanta, a firm whose trash incinerators in Chester have drawn decades of rebuke from residents and activists and sanctions from environmental regulators.
Asked if he would change the existing contracts with vendors that handle waste removal in the city, Brown — whose campaign slogan is “Pick up the damn trash” — said he wasn’t sure and seemed to dismiss the neighboring city’s fight against pollution.
“Chester is Chester,” he said. “I’m worried about Philadelphians and how their lives are.”
The moderator asked: “So you don’t care about Chester?”
“I do care, but I don’t work for them if I’m the mayor,” Brown said. “I work for Philadelphia, and the trash has to go somewhere, and whoever gets it is going to be unhappy with it.”
