Several hundred people -- many holding protest signs, some with face masks and one in a full biohazard suit complete with gas mask -- turned out Tuesday evening for an emotional town hall meeting about the Chevron refinery fire in the Bay Area city of Richmond, filling every seat on the floor of the Richmond Memorial Auditorium and crowding the back of the cavernous room.
They booed refinery General Manager Nigel Hearne when he again apologized for Monday's incident. They shouted down Randall Sawyer, Contra Costa County director of hazardous materials. And they spoke out over Katherine Hearn of the county’s Community Awareness and Emergency Response Department, who tried to talk about the region’s warning system.
“It didn’t work in my neighborhood,” one woman yelled out over the soft-spoken Hearn.
During protests before the meeting, members of a group called Urban Tilth, which runs 11 community gardens here, tossed armloads of their fresh-grown produce into trash cans, ruing that there is no way to know how badly the refinery fire “poisoned it.”
“That toxic plume went over every one of our gardens,” said Doria Robinson, Urban Tilth executive director. “We might have to pull out all of the food we’ve been growing because of what happened yesterday.”
Inside the auditorium, dozens of the group's members and supporters brought the meeting to a brief standstill. They dumped their wilted produce on the stage where the local and Chevron officials sat in folding chairs.
And they chanted, call and response style:
"We demand that you, Chevron!"
"We demand that you, Chevron!"
"Be accountable!"
"Be accountable!"
"Become good neighbors!"
"Become good neighbors!"
"Stop poisoning our homes!"
"Stop poisoning our homes!"
"We are Richmond!"
"We are Richmond!"
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