WHAT IS THE LEPC & WHY WAS IT CREATED? 

History of the LEPC

The LEPC is a product of federal legislation passed in the wake of the Bhopal disaster in India, where thousands of people died because of an accident involving hazardous chemicals.  To prevent similar occurrences in our communities, Congress passed the Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know Act (EPCRA), also known as Title III of the Superfund Amendments and Reauthorization Act (SARA), in 1986. 

EPCRA establishes requirements for businesses and for federal, state, and local governments regarding emergency planning and community right-to-know (CRTK) reporting for hazardous chemicals.  The CRTK provision in EPCRA helped increase awareness about the presence of chemicals in their communities and releases of these chemicals into the environment.  Many State legislatures also enacted CRTK laws that are consistent with federal law.  As a result, States and communities, working with industry, are better able to protect public health and the environment.  Congress enacted the EPCRA regulations to benefit communities. 

Two of the main goals of this law are to:

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Provide a basis for each community to develop and tailor a chemical emergency planning and response program to suit the community needs, and

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Provide the public with a right-to-know attitude to identify, quantify, locate, and determine the physical and chemical properties of hazardous substances in the community.

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Bell County March     

       The Bell County March was written by Baylor Female College music professor Julien Paul Blitz (Belgian) in 1907.  Blitz was a music professor from 1906-08.  The piano solo was dedicated to Bell County Sheriff D. C. Burkes.  The Bell County March is a Collection of the Bell County Museum.  It was a gift of Dewitt J. Lorenz, Noema Dahlke, and Catherine Jean Duncan, grandchildren of D. C. Burkes in 1997.   To play the original 4 1/2 minute version of the Bell County March click here.  (Note:  this file may take several minutes to load due to the size - 1.3 MB.  It may play intermittently until fully down-loaded.)