Environmental Advocates of New York and "Effective New York" released two 30-second testimonials Thursday, urging Governor Andrew Cuomo next year to take up a new Environmental Bill of Rights in regards to the Hoosick Falls PFOA contamination.
Hoosick Falls resident Ashlynn Sagendorf, 10, was featured in an advertisement -- more than a year after she and other people in the area first learned they had been drinking water contaminated with the chemical PFOA.
The bill would grant New Yorkers a right to healthy drinking water and clean air.
Sagendorf says the town's water contamination has altered her life and those around her, making it difficult to be a kid. She says it's difficult to see how the last year has affected her mother.
"When I get a turn to speak, I say it's not your fault," Sagendorf said.
"It is not my fault," said Laura Peabody, Sagendorf's mother. "They [government officials] should have spoke up and told us when this first happened, and maybe we wouldn't be where we are, sitting here today."
Another girl in the video is 14-year-old Mikayla Baker.
Both ads direct people to go to NYCleanWater.org to sign a petition in support of the effort to amend the Constitution to include a new Environmental Bill of Rights.