SR0679 95TH GENERAL ASSEMBLY

SR0679 LRB095 20713 KXB 49126 r

SENATE RESOLUTION

WHEREAS, Chemistry is essential to human life, through applications such as agriculture, the protection of public health, and innovative technologies that save energy and improve quality of life; and

WHEREAS, The products of chemistry can pose risks that, if improperly controlled or regulated, can threaten human health or the environment; and

WHEREAS, The Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA) of 1976 was enacted by Congress to give the United States Environmental Protection Agency the authority to require testing and to impose restrictions on industrial chemicals produced or imported into the United States; and

WHEREAS, Under its TSCA authority the U.S. EPA has required testing of chemicals that may pose a risk to the environment or to human-health, requires reporting of substantial risks to human health and the environment from chemicals, and can ban the manufacture and import of those chemicals that pose such risks; and

WHEREAS, Advances in technology now allow the detection of chemicals at very low levels in the environment and the human body, at levels that until recently were unable to be detected; and

WHEREAS, Analytical testing has become so sophisticated that a National Academy of Sciences/National Research Council Committee on Human Biomonitoring has declared that tremendous challenges surround the use of biomonitoring information because the ability to detect chemicals in the body far exceeds the ability to determine what such data means to public health; and

WHEREAS, The U.S. Centers for Disease Control has cautioned that the mere presence of a chemical in the human body is not an indication that the chemical causes disease; that toxicity of a chemical is related to its dose or concentration in addition to a person's individual susceptibility; and

WHEREAS, Regulations on the production and import of chemicals is best addressed at the federal level to avoid disruptions in trade and commerce; and

WHEREAS, TSCA provides U.S. EPA the authority and flexibility to adapt regulatory controls on chemicals as the science of detection and risk evolves; therefore, be it

RESOLVED, BY THE SENATE OF THE NINETY-FIFTH GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS, that the U.S. EPA and the Congress of the United States ensure that the Toxic Substances Control Act of 1976 provides the necessary statutory and regulatory controls necessary to protect human health and the environment from the risks of industrial chemicals; and be it further

RESOLVED, That a suitable copy of this resolution be presented to the Majority Leader of the United States Senate, the Minority Leader of the United States Senate, the Speaker of the United States House of Representatives, the Minority Leader of the United States House of Representatives, and to each member of the Illinois Congressional delegation.