Diane Eber is an environmentalist with Citizens for Alternatives to Chemical Contamination in Midland, Michigan, home of Dow Chemicals. Eber states that because Dow incinerates a lot of their waste there are high levels of dioxin in her city. She cites health problems such as soft tissue sarcoma and birth defects as evidence of dioxin contamination. Dow provides significant funding for the community and actively campaigns to discredit any claims of a health risk, thus public outcry has been weak. Tracey Easthope of the Ann Arbor Ecology Center believes Dow is responsible for contaminating the entire Great Lakes Basin. Both women recently attended an environmental conference in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, entitled “Time for Action: The Third Citizens’ Conference on Dioxin”.