The Guardian worked with academics to analyze air pollution in the contiguous US at a neighborhood level and created a top 10 ranking of local areas breathing the worst air. And a new interactive map allows Americans to see the estimated pollution levels in their neighborhoods at an unprecedented level of detail.
The analysis, based on a model created by a team of researchers at institutions including the University of Washington, shows that the more people of color who live in a neighborhood, the higher the fine particulate air pollution levels are likely to be…
The Guardian’s map is based on a cutting-edge model developed by Center for Air, Climate and Energy Solutions (CACES), a multi-university research center partnered with the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). The model estimates fine particulate air pollution, or PM2.5, at a far more local level than would otherwise be possible.
Redlining was pervasive in American cities from the 1930s through the late 1960s. Maps were drawn specifically to ensure that Black people were denied mortgages. These discriminatory practices created a lasting legacy of economic and racial inequality which persists today.
Less obvious is how redlining has shaped nature and the urban ecosystem. A recent study found that previously redlined neighborhoods in Baltimore have fewer big old trees and lower tree diversity than other parts of the city. These findings are part of the Baltimore Ecosystem Study, a collaborative research project which has tracked the city’s changing urban environment for the past 25 years.
Minority neighborhoods are often clustered around industrial sites, ports, truck routes, and military bases — all of which can be sources of toxic exposure. This phenomenon, part of a broader problem called environmental racism, is also impacting black active-duty service members.
The Justice Department will appoint a third-party manager as part of its oversight of Jackson, Miss., following the city’s water crisis earlier in the year.
The manager, who has not been named, would be responsible for stabilizing the drinking water system for the city, which saw its second crisis in as many years this August.
The department said in a federal court filing Tuesday that the city and the Mississippi State Department of Health have agreed to the terms of the proposal.
About 20 houses in South Jamaica are prone to sewer backups every few months, say homeowners, some of whom have dealt with the issue for more than a decade. But because the sewer line is on private property, the residents are left to contend with the problem on their own.
Yolanda, 61, owns a home in the predominantly Black 7th Ward neighborhood in New Orleans.
To fix her leaking roof in 2020, she had to borrow money.
“It’s one of them credit card loans,” she said. “Like interest of 30% and all that, you know. I was kind of backed up against the wall, so I just went on and made the loan, a high-interest loan.”
As a sociologist who has spent the past 10 years studying housing conditions in the U.S., I led a research team that conducted interviews with homeowners who are struggling with basic maintenance such as rotting wood siding and floors, mold, crumbling brickwork, outdated plumbing and leaking ceilings. Our first paper from this project is currently under peer review.
Like Yolanda, our interviewees – whom we gave pseudonyms to protect their privacy – were almost all Black women over the age of 60 who lived in old buildings in neighborhoods that have borne the brunt of discrimination – such as redlining and inequitable land use decisions – and disinvestment.
Once a lively district of Black businesses and homes, the 7th Ward has become an area of high poverty since the I-10 expressway was built during the 1960s directly through its heart.
Yolanda had already been living there for a decade before the highway was built.
Though brightly painted, Yolanda’s home is separated from I-10 only by an empty lot, and the constant noise and higher rates of pollution make it hard to imagine Yolanda would be able to sell her home for a profit or use its declining value as equity.
Did Yolanda take out a high-interest loan for nothing?
Was she throwing good money after bad?
These are not easy questions to answer.
Like other Black female homeowners whom we interviewed, Yolanda had to choose between debt and disrepair.
As she explained, she was “backed up against a wall.”
The racist and sexist history of disrepair
According to a 2022 analysis of federal census data by Harvard’s Joint Center for Housing Studies, nearly a third of homeowners who earn less than US$32,000 – about 4.8 million people – spent nothing on maintenance or improvements.
I have noticed worrying trends in the circumstances of those who live in housing in disrepair.
In my book, “Stacked Decks,” I explore the connections between urban housing, race, gender and income inequality.
Unaddressed repairs such as leaky roofs or broken pipes frequently result in code violations and court cases, which prompt liens, foreclosures and the possibility of homelessness.
The situation is worse for Black women, who have much less wealth, on average, than their white or male counterparts. Without money to pay for repairs, female homeowners face incurring more debt if they make repairs.
Doris, a homeowner in Chicago, told us in 2021 about her old and leaking roof and the flooding in her basement. She explained that the flooding was partially due to the overflowing of nearby city-owned drainage pipes.
“Every time it rains, the water comes in,” she said. “By the sewer not being clean … so much water came in my basement that my washer and dryer was floating up on the water.” An insurance claim covered some of the costs of this repair for Doris, and the city is experimenting with new ways to tackle floodwater, but water still gets in when it rains hard.
Buildings naturally deteriorate over time, because of the combination of aging construction materials and weather. At some point, all homes need repairs and preventive maintenance.
Chicagoan Kimberly cares for her grandson almost full time and told us about her concerns about the rotted wood that has made her back porch dangerous to stand on.
“We don’t go out of the back door at all,” Kimberly said. “We have not used that in years. Four years now. Four years we have not used the back porch at all.”
Disrepair and environmental injustice
Disrepair is an issue of environmental injustice. The government has a responsibility to help with repairs because of its role in the housing discrimination that has created such racial disparities in housing conditions.
But, like disaster relief, assistance to homeowners is uneven and hard to obtain.
Although all homes need repair work over time, disrepair disproportionately affects people with the fewest resources, because maintenance is expensive. Disrepair also causes health and safety issues, as do other environmental injustices, such as the placement of highways and location of polluting factories.
Disrepair can also force people to leave their homes because they cannot afford repairs.
But making repairs can exacerbate debt.
What all this means is that owning a home, or even paying off a mortgage, does not guarantee that homes remain affordable, an asset or a safe shelter.
Recognizing disrepair as environmental racism could be one step in ensuring homes are all these things.
The Environmental Protection Agency wrote in a letter Thursday that it is opening a civil rights investigation into the state of Mississippi’s role in the breakdown of Jackson’s water system.
The letter is in response to a complaint the NAACP filed on Sept. 27 under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The complaint alleges Mississippi has discriminated against the city on the basis of race, and that the state has “deprived” Jackson of federal funds intended for maintaining safe drinking water systems.
Mississippi, which has no Black statewide elected officials, is 38% Black and 59% white. Jackson is 83% Black and 16% white.
The EPA specified in the letter that it will investigate whether the Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality and the Mississippi State Department of Health discriminated against Jackson in their funding of water programs. It will also investigate whether the two state agencies have safeguards and policies to protect against discrimination as required by Title VI.
Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s administration is negotiating with President Joe Biden’s housing officials over potential city reforms after federal investigators accused Chicago of environmental racist zoning and land-use practices.
The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development has held off on making an official declaration of next steps in an almost two-year civil rights investigation. The agency could force the city to make significant and permanent changes to its planning processes or risk losing millions in federal dollars.
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