morethanjustflint-blog

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If you want to learn more about a specific case of environmental racism, read the following posts in the blog to learn about a current issue occurring in the Central Valley region of California!

Environmental Racism Is Nothing New

Race is the most significant predictor of a person living near contaminated air, water, or soil.

Source: The Nation​

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The Water Crisis is Deeper than Flint, Michigan

When mainstream media began mass coverage regarding the water contamination crisis of lead in Flint, Michigan in the beginning of 2016, society followed suit in outrage and shock. 

Another region of the country, however, is facing a similar crisis at a possible higher level of seriousness and there is minimal news coverage to attest to the situation. A recent study published by Reuters found that dozens of communities in Fresno, California are experiencing lead poisoning in children at rates ten times higher than Flint (Schneyer and Pell, 2017). 

This gap in coverage lead me to investigate the issue further, since viewing a retweet on Twitter regarding the study in Fresno. I found, however, that the issue is not limited to Fresno, and there are more contaminants than only lead. Worrying about their water being contaminated is the reality for families across the Central Valley Region of California, the 50-by-400-mile agricultural basin, home to 4 million people, that effectively separates coastal California from the Sierra Nevada. This is a region of the country is strong and has a large agricultural business which essential feeds the plates of the nation in terms of fruits and vegetables (Miller, 2013).

The research suggests that this the public has little information about this environmental issue that is exacerbated by the California drought and is affecting low-income communities, specially Latinx communities at disproportionate rates.

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References

A. Miller, Jeremy. (2013). California farm communities suffer tainted drinking water. Retrieved from http://www.hcn.org/issues/45.11/california-farm-communities-suffer-tainted-drinking-water

B. Schneyer, Joshua and M.B., Pell. (2017). Exclusive: Lead poisoning afflicts neighborhoods across california. Retrieved from http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-lead-california-exclusive-idUSKBN16T18Y 

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Further Examination of the Crisis

As mentioned, many Americans were shocked and outraged following the 2016 mainstream media coverage of the water crisis in Flint, Michigan. However, another region of the country is facing the same crisis with possible increasing rates of seriousness and there has been little media coverage and outcry on the issue. Lead exposure, which was my first information about the crisis, found that one central Fresno zip code tested has 13.6% blood tests conducted on children under six that came back high for lead, which is almost three times higher than the rates of Flint during its recent water contamination crisis in which results were 5% across the city (Schneyer and Pell, 2017). 

According to the Environmental Protection Agency, even low levels of lead in the blood of children can result in behavioral and learning problems, slowed growth, and anemia. In adults, exposed to lead can suffer from cardiovascular effects, decreased kidney function, and reproductive problems. “Hundreds of homes in northeast Fresno have discolored water – and, in some cases, excessive levels of toxic lead – coming from their faucets” (Sheehan, 2016, para. 1). Two factors for lead exposure are high poverty rates and substandard housing, both of which are occurring in Fresno (Sheehan, 2016).

In addition to lead, uranium has been shown in drinking water (Knickmeyer and Scott, 2015). Arsenic has also been found. A reporter from Al Jazeera in 2015 reported that in Arvin, California, residents can not even boil their water due to high levels of arsenic, which become even more concentrated when the water is boiled (El Nasser, 2015). Arsenic has been known to cause cancer, and more than 100 areas with fewer than 10,000 people had arsenic violations.

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References

A. El Nasser, H. (2015). More than 1 million californians don't have reliable access to clean water. Retrieved from http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2015/4/6/more-than-1-million-californians-lack-clean-water.html

B. Knickmeyer, Ellen and Smith, Scott. (2015). Fear at the tap: Uranium contaminates water in the west. Retrieved from http://bigstory.ap.org/article/ce678b95a88c40e2b8e53aed3176c600/fear-tap-uranium-contaminates-water-wes 

C. Schneyer, Joshua and M.B., Pell. (2017). Exclusive: Lead poisoning afflicts neighborhoods across california. Retrieved from http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-lead-california-exclusive-idUSKBN16T18

D. Sheehan, T. (2016). Northeast fresno water issues confound city, state investigators. Retrieved from http://www.fresnobee.com/news/local/article87594712.html

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The Main Contaminant: Nitrates

Nitrates have also been found in other areas of the Central Valley. This is a consequence due to the soil in the San Joaquin Valley being decimated by pollutants because the region is one of the largest producers of the nation’s produce. The reason that nitrates are being found in the drinking water which residents receive from pumps and ground water, is because of the drought the state is experiencing. According to Genoveva Islas, a program director for a non-profit health advocacy organization in the area, “The drought actually causes the pollutants in the soil to be more concentrated and levels of contaminants such as nitrates to rise” (Sager, 2016, para. 12).

A study from the University of California Davis: Center for Watershed Services found that one in ten residents in two cities in the major agricultural regions pays higher rates for well water that’s laced with nitrates and other pollutants (Harter and Lund, 2012). Derived from hundreds of thousands of tons of synthetic fertilizer and animal wastes applied to crops each year, nitrates pose an especially acute risk to infants; long-term exposure has also been implicated in various forms of cancer, including gastric, esophageal, ovarian and non-Hodgkin's lymphoma (Miller, 2013). Studies have linked high nitrate exposures in adults with miscarriage, digestive disorders, thyroid damage and cancer (Gross, 2012). 

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References

A. Harter, T., & Lund, J. (2012). Addressing nitrate in california's drinking water: With a focus on tulare lake basin and salinas valley groundwater. (Legislature Report). University of California Davis: Center for Watershed Services

B. Gross, L. (2012). Pollution, poverty and people of color: Don't drink the water. Retrieved from https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/pollution-poverty-people-color-dont-drink-water/

C. Sager, R. (2016). Like flint, water in california's central valley unsafe, causing health problems. Retrieved from http://www.foxnews.com/health/2016/03/08/like-flint-water-in-california-central-valley-unsafe-causing-health-problems.html

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Why is this Issue Occurring?

It is really crucial to be able to understand why this issue is occurring. We need to take into account the California drought and what it end up effecting. In a hierarchical manner, the state’s drought makes it so that the farmers have to pump more ground water to keep up with the demands of being an hotspot for food production and provided cheap food to the nation. With that, then the effects of contamination, as well as other hidden effects are seen. The following details the mechanism of how the water becomes contaminated due to the drought specifically. 

In normal (non-drought) years, residents get 30% of their drinking water from underground aquifers. While in droughts,  the reliance on this groundwater source ends up supplying two-thirds of their water needs, which essentially doubles the amount they are pumping (Philpott, 2015). 20% of the groundwater that CA rely on to keep taps flowing carries high concentrations of contaminants, mostly filled with nitrates. Basically, as the water tables levels drop, the contaminants become more concentrated in that area and stay there for a long time. “As groundwater levels drop and the level of contaminants stays the same, the concentration of nitrates in East Orosi’s groundwater supply will likely continue to go up”, said Chad Fisher, a Tulare District engineer for the CA Water Resources Control Board (Meyers, 2015). According to the research team at UC Davis, the farming communities pump from private wells do to being in the rural area and those are not as well regulated (Harter and Lund, 2012). It also takes a while to solve this issue. Once contaminants get into ground water, it’s extremely difficult to remove them because levels can increase when chemicals move downstream or if aquifers drop after a drought (Gross, 2012). 

The San Joaquin Valley,a segment of the Central Valley, is one of the most agriculturally productive regions and also the fastest growing population. This is an issue if there is further depletion of the aquifer expected as farmers rely heavily on groundwater during droughts (Galik, 2015). “California’s $37.5 billion farming industry has led the nation in food production for more than 50 years. The state has known for decades that nitrate contamination has been a cost of that productivity. But now, state officials know the primary sources of contamination, just how extensive it is and who’s shouldering the burden” (Gross, 2012). 

To summarize, the drought makes the need for groundwater pumping increase. The issue is that with pumping increasing and the water levels dropping, the contamination is higher. The hidden costs of this besides exposure to contaminated water will be discussing in the following post. 

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References

A. Galik, Alyssa J., "Water Poverty in California’s Rural Disadvantaged Communities" (2015). Pepperdine University, All Undergraduate Student Research. Paper 91. http://digitalcommons.pepperdine.edu/sturesearch/91 

B.  Gross, L. (2012). Pollution, poverty and people of color: Don't drink the water. Retrieved from https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/pollution-poverty-people-color-dont-drink-water/

C. Harter, T., & Lund, J. (2012). Addressing nitrate in california's drinking water: With a focus on tulare lake basin and salinas valley groundwater. (Legislature Report). University of California Davis: Center for Watershed Services.

D.  Meyers, Z. (2015). How the california drought exacerbates water contamination. Retrieved from http://www.hcn.org/articles/california-drought-east-orosi-central-valley-video-water

E. Philpott, Tom. (2015). California drinking water: Not just vanishing but widely contaminated. Retrieved from http://www.motherjones.com/tom-philpott/2015/07/california-groundwater-not-just-vanishing-also-widely-contaminated

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The Scope of this Crisis

In my research on this topic, the scope of the issue I examined in greater detail was environmental racism. Environmental justice activists have defined environmental racism as the processes that result in low-income and minority communities facing environmental harms in a manner disproportionate to communities who have more resources (Taylor, 2014).

This crisis is a one the yes, is exacerbating by a drought which affects all state residents, but it ends up hurting poor communities of color, specifically Latinx communities who are majority Spanish-only speaking for any health warning messages to them they may not understand. I found several studies which found relationships between these communities and high levels of the contaminants in their drinking water.  According to Susan De Anda, a co-founder of the Community Water Center, “Academic studies show that if you live in Central Valley and you are Latinx as well as low-income, you are going to have higher chances of having polluted water and pay higher rates” (Carpe Diem West, 2014). 

The issue of contaminated drinking water not only affects Central Valley residents, but it is especially an issue for poor residents and most specifically people of color. A Pacific Institute Report found that the nitrate exposure, which severely impacts the health of those exposed to it, falls more on the poor Latinx communities of the Central Valley (Moore and Matalon, 2011).

Results from a 2015 study published in the American Journal of Public Health which used an online screening tool revealed racial disparities in environmental health hazards. Specifically, that Black or Latinx residents in California were six times more likely to live in communities closer proximity to hazardous waste sites, with the impact scores being 75% higher for Latinx people and 67% higher for Black people compared to White residents (Cushing, Faust, August, Cendak, Wieland, and Alexeeff, 2015).

In a study published in the Environmental Health Perspectives journal found that water systems serving higher percentages of Latinos had higher nitrate levels ((Balazs, Morello-Frosch, Hubbard, and Ray, 2011). Another study published in Environmental Health by the same research team, different demographics were analyzed in the San Joaquin Valley in their differences to arsenic exposure in drinking water. Researchers found a negative relationship between homeownership rates and arsenic concentrations, as well as a disproportionate amount of people of color exposed to higher levels of arsenic (Balazs, Morello-Frosch, Hubbard, and Ray, 2012). There was little evidence to be found about how this crisis affect poor, working-class white folks. This would be an interesting direction for the research. 

There are also hidden issues to this oppression. The Central Valley can be characterized as a “food desert”, because they live far away from grocery stores and turn to liquor or convenience stores to buy their food. Also, sugary beverages such as soda are less expensive than drinking water (Sager, 2016). The consequence of this trade off leads to health problems such as obesity. “The consumption of soda vs. water is one of the leading reasons for the severe health problems in the Valley, with the region having big problems with obesity and the highest rate of Type 2 diabetes in the state” (Sager, 2016, para. 16). This is an important aspect to note in this complex issue of water contamination in the Central Valley and how much the ecological environment is connected to the social environment. 

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References

A. Balazs, C. L., Morello-Frosch, R., Hubbard, A. E., & Ray, I. (2012). Environmental justice implications of arsenic contamination in california's san joaquin valley: a cross-sectional, cluster-design examining exposure and compliance in community drinking water systems. Environmental Health: A Global Access Science Source, 11(1), 84-95. doi:10.1186/1476-069X-11-84

B. Balazs, C., Morello-Frosch, R., Hubbard, A., & Ray, I. (2011). Social disparities in nitrate-contaminated drinking water in california's san joaquin valley. Environmental Health Perspectives, 119(9), 1272-1278. doi:10.1289/ehp.1002878 

C. Carpe Diem West. (2014). High rates, toxic water (if you're lucky): Organizing for equity in california's central valley - an interview with susana DeAnda. Retrieved from http://www.carpediemwest.org/high-rates-toxic-water-if-youre-lucky-organizing-for-equity-in-californias-central-valley-an-interview-with-susana-deanda/ 

D. Cushing, L., Faust, J., August, L. M., Cendak, R., Wieland, W., & Alexeeff, G. (2015). Racial/Ethnic disparities in cumulative environmental health impacts in california: Evidence from a statewide environmental justice screening tool (CalEnviroScreen 1.1). American Journal of Public Health, 105(11), 2341-2348. doi:10.2105/AJPH.2015.302643

E. Moore, Eli, and Matalon, Eyal. (2011). The human cost of nitrate-contaminated drinking water in the san joaquin valley." Pacific Institute. Retrieved from http://www.pacinst.org/app/uploads/2013/02/nitrate_contamination3.pdf 

F. Taylor, D. E. (2014). Toxic communities: Environmental racism, industrial pollution, and residential mobility. New York: New York University Press.

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“Sometimes we don’t realize we need water until we’re there. We need water for everything. To make Kool-Aid, Iced Tea, coffee, etc.”, says Margaret Muro, an East Orosi resident. 

This video highlights the residents of East Orosi in Tulare Country. They explain how the drought and further, not being able to drink water from their tap. The explanation for why nitrate contamination occurs is explained in this video in depth. 

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My daughter and I were watching a movie and she saw somebody in the movie go to the sink and pour themselves a glass of water. And she was so concerned that he was drinking from the sink, because she has never lived in a place where you could actually drink from the sink.

A quote from Maricela Mares Alatorre, a resident of Kettleman City in the Central Valley. 

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Fracking may also play a role in the water contamination in California. According to a Huffington Post report, nearly 3 billion gallons of oil industry wastewater were dumped illegally into Central California’s aquifer supplying drinking water and irrigation to farmers (Halter, 2014). The wastewater from hydraulic fracturing of oil and gas wells in California is heavily contaminated with a toxic stew of chemicals known to cause cancer or reproductive harm, an analysis by Environmental Working Group shows (Stoiber, 2015). 

Documents obtained by The Center for Biological Diversity performed by the Central Valley Water Board found high levels of arsenic and nitrates in water supply wells hydraulic fracking wastewater disposal operations. Tainting the fresh water contravenes both California’s state law and the federal Safe Water Drinking Act, which protects aquifers (Halter, 2014). 

This extraction technique for natural gas is celebrated by some as it allows us to maintain our cheap oil economy, however the consequences of contaminated water and air end up occurring. The findings from the Environmental Working Group underscore the gravity of recent revelations that the state tolerated illegal injection of billions of gallons of drilling wastewater into thousands of disposal wells that pour into aquifers that potentially could be tapped for drinking water or irrigation (Stoiber, 2015).

Future research should look into the stake that the fracking industry has on residents, as well as the drought. 

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References

A. Halter, Reese. (2014). Fracking poisons California's drinking water. Retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dr-reese-halter/fracking-poisons-californ_b_5986758.html 

B. Stoiber, Tasha. (2015). Toxic stew: what’s in fracking wastewater. Retrieved from http://www.ewg.org/research/toxic-stew 

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Who are the stakeholders involved in this issue? 

Several stakeholders and actors involved in this issue. First and foremost, the residents of small, rural, poor communities are most affected. 

A key actor in this issue is the Central Valley Regional Water Quality Control Boards who are responsible for monitoring the levels of contaminants and have been aiming for change to be made, but they are limited in the action that can be taken. The state level and national Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) have a stake in enforcing policy to better manage and regulate these water systems. Also, since treatment costs so much, poor communities can’t afford to get those systems.In many situations, the EPA waits for the state to enforce state and federal environmental laws (Conner, 2016). Overall the stakeholders include legislators because they have the power to make changes in helping relieve this problem, rather it be short-term by giving residents water, as well as long-term solutions to get at the root of the contamination problems to improve public health. Jerry Brown, the Governor of California also plays a role in this. In November of 2015, the Associated Press reported that Brown had taken the unusual step of directing state regulators to research the “potential for future oil and gas activity” on his private land. His role in the fracking industry shows that he may not also be keeping the best interests of the residents affected to heart and is more interested in capital gain. 

Because there is not much public information about how much of a stake the government has or has not taken action on this, a main group has been the non-governmental organizations and those engaging in advocacy work. NGOs have been aiming for a light to be shed on this issue, pointing out how activists have not been paying attention to this and work so they have clean water, which is a human right. They urge another actor to take action: the media.  

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References

A. Conner, A. (2016). Water activists, your white privilege is showing. Retrieved from

http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/36325-water-activists-your-white-privilege-is-showing

  B. Knickmeyer, Ellen. (2015). Brown had state workers research oil on ranch. Retrieved from http://bigstory.ap.org/article/7780d1a9b1fd436284a40a1f6d6bd969/ap-exclusive-brown-had-state-workers-research-oil-ranch  

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What does the future of the water contamination crisis in the Central Valley hold? What are the possible solutions?

The large, institutional systems mentioned in the stakeholders post such as the state government, federal government, and the EPA will make large decisions. These decisions will impact the future of this issue in regards to regulations and policy, as well as immediate help in providing forms of water to the residents. 

There are small things people can do are to research this issue, look into other cases of environmental racism and its impact on public health, and donate water to the NGOs working with residents. Making a statement on social media or in conversation can help to raise consciousness on this issue, even if we don’t feel that those small steps are making a direct impact. 

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