The state of Ohio filed a lawsuit against rail company Norfolk Southern in federal court on Tuesday over the train derailment in East Palestine and subsequent chemical fallout.

Residents of the small rust belt community continue to suffer weeks after the February 3 disaster. Local and state authorities previously evacuated all citizens within one mile of the derailment site and started a controlled burn of chemicals on the vehicle to decrease the risk of an explosion. The lawsuit, which contended that Norfolk Southern should be held financially liable for the derailment, characterized the incident as “entirely avoidable” and the result of executives neglecting the “welfare of the communities in which Norfolk Southern operates.”

“Ohio shouldn’t have to bear the tremendous financial burden of Norfolk Southern’s glaring negligence,” Attorney General Dave Yost (R-OH) said in a statement. “The fallout from this highly preventable incident may continue for years to come, and there’s still so much we don’t know about the long-term effects on our air, water and soil.”

Vinyl chloride, a known human carcinogen used to manufacture PVC, was emitted during the controlled burn from five train cars in the form of massive plumes of black smoke visible throughout eastern Ohio and western Pennsylvania. Analysts from Texas A&M University and Carnegie Mellon University announced that nine of the 50 chemicals the EPA said were present on the derailed train now have higher concentrations than normal in East Palestine, even after state and federal officials claimed that air and water supplies were safe.

The EPA has additionally directed Norfolk Southern to sample for dioxins, a class of pollutants that can be formed by vinyl chloride combustion and can bind to soil particles for decades.

The lawsuit further noted that accident rates for Norfolk Southern have doubled over the past decade and involved at least 20 chemical releases since 2015. Officials therefore demanded reimbursement for all response costs “incurred and to be incurred” as a result of the disaster.

“The state of Ohio is the owner in trust of public lands, waters, and resources within its political boundaries and has a duty to protect and preserve those natural resources,” the lawsuit continued. “Ohio brings this action to redress the derailment and the resulting contamination of Ohio’s natural resources, which has caused significant damage and poses a significant ongoing threat to Ohio’s natural resources and the citizens of Ohio.”

Norfolk Southern CEO Alan Shaw testified before Congress last week regarding the derailment, but made no specific promises regarding the firm’s commitment to handle economic and health fallout into the future. Another train controlled by Norfolk Southern derailed in Piedmont, Alabama, as Shaw delivered his testimony.

Sen. J.D. Vance (R-OH) and Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-OH) introduced the Railway Safety Act of 2023, which would require rail companies to report hazardous materials present on trains to state authorities, raise inspection requirements, and increase the rigor of defect detection efforts. The bill would meanwhile increase several civil penalties for violations of rail safety regulations tenfold and require that each train must operate with at least two-person crews.

Federal investigators have preliminarily concluded that the derailment was caused by a malfunctioning rail axle. “Surveillance video from a residence showed what appears to be a wheel bearing in the final stage of overheat failure moments before the derailment,” the NTSB said in a press release. “The wheelset from the suspected railcar has been collected as evidence for metallurgical examination.”

Students at a woman-only private liberal arts college in Massachusetts supported a non-binding referendum on Tuesday that would allow women who identify as men and “non-binary” individuals to apply to the institution.

Student body officials at Wellesley College, which includes alumnae Hillary Clinton and Madeleine Albright, voted unanimously last month to advance the Gender Inclusivity Ballot, which would allow students to “express their views” on the 150-year-old institution’s admissions policy while making its language more inclusive to such students. However, school officials said the student vote wouldn’t have any impact on the school’s policies or practices.

The college already accepts transgender-identifying students who were born male, but the controversial referendum expands the application process for women who identify as men.

“We’re just asking the administration to put on paper what’s already true of the student body,” Alexandra Brooks, the student body president, told The New York Times. “Trans men go to Wellesley, nonbinary people go to Wellesley, and they kind of always have.”

Elizabeth Um, a senior and president of the campus’ pro-life group, Wellesley For Life, told the Times that she enrolled at the liberal arts college due to its close proximity to home and its identity as a women’s college.

“If you don’t think you can fit in here, then you have your pick of thousands of other coed colleges in the country or the world,” Um said. “We’re a women’s college. That’s the core identity of the school, and we can’t start watering that down.”

Um did not disclose to the outlet whether she opposed the referendum, noting that it would pass and speaking out against the ballot on campus would be “social suicide.”

Wellesley already admits “cis, trans, and nonbinary students—all who consistently identify as women,” the college’s president, Paula Johnson, wrote in a letter last week on the college website.

Johnson opposed the referendum and warned students that the results would not impact its admissions policy.

“We are not a ‘historically women’s college,’ a term that only applies to women’s colleges that have made the decision to enroll men,” Johnson wrote. “We have chosen a different path, one that aligns with peer institutions, including Barnard, Smith, and Bryn Mawr colleges.”

“In accordance with our admission policy, Wellesley admits applicants who identify and live consistently as women, regardless of the gender they were assigned at birth,” she added.

Roughly 2,500 students attend Wellesley college, which is located in the suburbs of Boston. It is not known how many of those students claim to be the opposite sex or “non-binary.”

“It’s important that all members of this community feel seen. Some transgender male and nonbinary students whose identities have evolved during their time here say they feel excluded by the College’s use of the words ‘women’ and ‘alumnae’ — and feel that their individual identities are not embraced,” Johnson wrote. “At the same time, many students who are committed to Wellesley’s mission as a women’s college and who identify as women have been publicly criticized for their view and have felt pressured to describe Wellesley as a historically women’s college.”

The Wellesley News editorial board disapproved of Johnson’s letter, calling it “the College’s transphobic rhetoric.”

“Transgender and nonbinary students have always belonged and will continue to belong at Wellesley, a historically women’s college,” they wrote in the editorial.