East Palestine, One-Year Later
One year ago, on February 3, 2023, a Norfolk Southern train derailed and caught fire in the village of East Palestine in Columbiana County. The horrific crash and aftermath caused widespread destruction, toxified the air, and turned the lives of the community upside down. Members of the Ohio Senate set out to find answers as to why this catastrophic derailment happened and how to best support the members of East Palestine.
Senator Michael Rulli, who represents the community, reflected on the past year saying the following:
"This was a devastating accident that uprooted and changed the lives of an entire community forever. Myself and many others from the state visited and helped the people of East Palestine but the Biden Administration failed to do its job."
On February 24, 2023 the Ohio Senate formed the Senate Select Committee on Rail Safety, led by Senator Bill Reineke. This committee was tasked with investigating and understanding how the train derailed, evaluating recovering efforts, and issuing recommendations on recovery, prevention and response should another tragedy occur in our state.
Chair Reineke reflected on the work the committee accomplished:
"Our report and recommendations are the culmination of our members' collaborative work. We have found the primary problems and developed potential next steps. There is more work to be done, but the committee has laid the groundwork for us to succeed. I'm grateful for all the members' input and the numerous hours they spent hearing testimony and in East Palestine to understand how we can help this community.”
As a part of this committee, members of the Senate visited the derailment site last spring. You can learn more about their visit here.
Provisions were added into House Bill 23, the state’s transportation budget, to ensure safe passageway for freight rail in Ohio. These updates to Ohio law include:
• Requiring wayside detectors to be installed between 10-15 miles apart and requires ODOT and PUCO to oversee proper installation and,
• Requiring the PUCO to examine best practices for hot boxes, hot bearing detectors, acoustic bearing detectors, and cameras installed on or near railroad track.
Chair of the Senate Transportation Committee, Senator Stephanie Kunze said, “I am grateful for the work that my colleagues and I completed over the last several months in order to gain a better understanding of the devastating accident in East Palestine. Our work is not over but this report serves as a springboard of what we can continue to advocate for in order to have safe passageway for freight rail in the Buckeye State.”
The Senate has provided crucial funds for East Palestine in the state operating budget, House Bill 33, in order to keep the community moving forward:
• $10M for the Ohio Wayside Detector Expansion Program: Provides competitive grants to railroad companies doing business in Ohio to install wayside detector systems.
• $100M for Rail Safety Crossings: To make improvements to hazardous rail crossings across the state.
• $1M for the Orphan Rail Crossing Program: Which will help repair abandoned and unowned railroad crossings around the state.
This community is still healing and has many concerns about their health and safety. Members of the Ohio Senate remain steadfast in their commitment to keeping the residents of East Palestine safe.
Click here to see the progress report video we filed three months after the fiery train derailment, as the Ohio Senate's Select Committee on Rail Safety followed up on cleanup efforts and the drive to return life to normal for town residents.