Late senator's effort may finally pay off

A bipartisan group of senators has won enough support to advance a bill Frank Lautenberg long championed to tighten the oversight of chemicals in everyday products, moving toward a posthumous capstone for the New Jersey Democrat's long Senate career.

His wife, Bonnie Englebardt Lautenberg, joined 10 senators Tuesday outside the Capitol in Washington to highlight the backing and urge quick passage of the bill, now named the Frank R. Lautenberg Chemical Safety for the 21st Century Act.

"Of course this bill is important to me personally, to see Frank's legacy move forward, a final achievement to an almost 30-year Senate career," she said at a news conference. "But more importantly, it's necessary because our country desperately needed to improve" the law.

The bill's supporters say it would overhaul a badly outdated law - signed by President Gerald Ford in 1976 - that has left the Environmental Protection Agency virtually powerless to review chemicals found in many everyday products, from clothing to couches to receipts and much more. Products that come into contact with food, like water bottles, fall under a different review.

The chemical safety law has been so weak that a court ruled that the EPA didn't even have the power to restrict asbestos, according to the Environmental Defense Fund, an advocate for change.

Lautenberg pushed for a change, mostly alone, for seven years before he died in 2013, making it his last of many public safety crusades.

Others took up the cause after his death, and it now has the support of the 60 senators (35 Republicans, 25 Democrats) needed to clear the chamber, though some procedural hurdles remain. Some lawmakers want to attach unrelated amendments that could jam up the process, and the House has its own version.

Some critics argue that the bill is still not strong enough.

Several of the cosponsors who spoke Tuesday told of having their arms twisted by Englebardt Lautenberg.

Sen. Cory A. Booker (D., N.J.), who replaced Lautenberg in the Senate, originally opposed the bill, saying it wasn't tough enough, but won some concessions and signed on. Englebardt Lautenberg, he said, was "burning up my cellphone."

Booker and Englebardt Lautenberg smiled together as they spoke, though she had backed one of his Democratic rivals for Senate and her husband had chastised Booker for coveting his Senate seat.

Several senators lauded both Lautenberg and his widow for their work pushing the issue. Lautenberg had long focused on public safety, writing laws to ban smoking on airplanes, raise the legal drinking age, and lower the threshold for drunken driving.

"Frank's entire career was really making it a healthier world," Englebardt Lautenberg said, blaming toxins for the prevalence of diseases such as cancer and Parkinson's. "There were no regulations for these chemicals, these horrible chemicals that were in our lives."

Philadelphia's Gretchen Dahlkemper brought her 4-year-old daughter, Fiona Alfonso, to the Capitol to support the measure. The mother of three said the flawed law is older than she is.

"My entire generation hasn't been protected. Their entire generation hasn't been protected," said Dahlkemper, national field manager for Mom's Clean Air Force.

Many parents try to be careful about what they buy, but research can be "like reading a foreign language," she said.

"We shouldn't have to read every label," Dahlkemper said. "We should expect that the American government is going to protect our families."

jtamari@phillynews.com

@JonathanTamari

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