WASHINGTON, D.C. — A group of lawmakers from Ohio, including Senators Sherrod Brown and J.D. Vance and Representative Marcy Kaptur, have sent a letter to Norfolk Southern CEO Alan Shaw demanding that the company take responsibility and pay immediately for costs to repair damage caused by a train derailment in the City of Sandusky last year.
The derailment occurred on October 8, 2022, and spilled paraffin wax onto the roadway and surrounding area, causing damage to infrastructure for the stormwater sewer system. In addition, the derailment damaged the pavement on Columbus Avenue, electrical systems for lights, traffic control and safety devices, the sidewalk, the pedestrian safety railing, and the retaining walls on the east and west sides of the underpass.
“Norfolk Southern must take responsibility for the damages suffered by the City of Sandusky and its residents,” the lawmakers wrote in the letter. They also demanded that the company acknowledge and fulfill the City’s outstanding requests to commit to paying for all repair and cleanup costs related to the derailment and to make direct payments to the City’s contractor, thereby not requiring the City to expend public funding without assurance of repayment.
According to the letter, the City of Sandusky had sent a comprehensive list of known damaged infrastructure to Norfolk Southern in late November, with a subsequent response from the company on December 20, 2022, stating that “Norfolk Southern has agreed to compensate The City of Sandusky for the damage that occurred during the derailment. Please move forward with necessary repairs associated with the derailment and send us the documentation associated with those repairs…Once we receive that documentation, we will review them and respond as soon as possible.”
However, the City of Sandusky’s memorandum documented three requests that Norfolk Southern has yet to acknowledge and fulfill. These include clarifying that compensation from Norfolk Southern will include both costs for repairs and reconstruction and costs for all relevant cleanup efforts by the City of Sandusky, agreeing to fully reimburse the repair and reconstruction of all items on the comprehensive list provided by the City of Sandusky, and paying Mosser Construction, Inc. directly and without requiring the City of Sandusky to act as a pass-through.
“Ohioans are rightfully concerned about the safety of railroads traveling through their communities. The Norfolk Southern derailments in Ohio have highlighted many known deficiencies in safety practices in the freight rail industry,” wrote the members in the letter.
Brown and Vance led a bipartisan group of senators to introduce the Railway Safety Act of 2023 that will improve rail safety protocols. Brown said in a statement, “By finally standing up to railroad company lobbyists, our commonsense reforms will help keep people across the country safer. Ohioans have seen firsthand the damage that can occur when safety is not taken seriously, and we owe it to them to act.”
Rail unions including the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen (BLET) and the Sheet Metal, Air, Rail and Transportation Workers (SMART-TD) support the legislation and have joined Brown to urge its passage at multiple locations around the state.
The legislation comes after Brown worked with Vance and others to raise concerns to the National Transportation Safety Board about lax rail safety rules that allowed the crash to happen.
The lawmakers say that passage of the Railway Safety Act of 2023 will help restore trust in the safety of our railways and ensure that no community has to deal with what East Palestine and others in Ohio, including residents of Springfield, and Sandusky.