To the editor:

I decided to write when I read the March 1990 editorial, "Rooted in Production."

I congratulate you for this piece. Last weekend I was in Ohio where workers for several factories conducted a Citizen's Hearing. The tales of carnage in the workplace were staggering. I've heard them before, over many years, from many workers. But one never gets accustomed to seeing and hearing the victims of this slaughter. (I should say the first victims, as we all become the next set of victims as the poisons and the "products" leave the factories.)

I wish more people who define themselves as "environmentalists" had been there to hear the stories... I could close my eyes and wouldn't be able to tell I wasn't at a similar hearing of community folks near a dump or an atomic bomb factory or a chemical plant.

How do we encourage "environmentalists" to focus on the source? on the polluters in their role as producers/employers?

Richard Grossman
Somerville, Massachusetts