Jennifer Holden didn’t develop adult onset asthma until she lived in South Sacramento’s Mangan Park neighborhood for seven years.
Every family she knows who has called the neighborhood home for more than a decade has at least one member with respiratory problems.
With a state-funded air quality program expanding this summer, Holden said she hopes to find answers on what’s causing the health problems and how to improve conditions. She wants to find out the impact of airplanes flying in and out of the Sacramento Executive Airport and whether any remaining lead contamination at the former gun range or industrial businesses could be pollution sources.
“We’d really like some high quality, long-term monitoring that would tell us just what the particulates are here that are making people sick,” said Holden, who leads the Mangan Park Neighborhood Association.
A plane flies above Mangan Pool toward the Sacramento Executive Airport on Aug. 8, 2024.Kristin Lam/CapRadio
The initiative, formally called the South Sacramento-Florin Community Air Protection Protection Program, began monitoring air quality in 2019. But it left out neighborhoods such as Mangan Park. Holden is one of about 350,000 people living in the monitoring area that expanded this summer.
Previous boundaries limited the program to a smaller area with a population of 153,000 people. The California Air Resources Board selected South Sacramento in 2018 for an Assembly Bill 617 program with the goal of eventually reducing air pollution in marginalized communities. Late this July, the board approved the community to begin drafting an emission reduction plan in the larger area.
The air monitoring program is led by a community committee and the Sacramento Metropolitan Air Quality Management District.
The committee and district plan to collect air quality data in newly added neighborhoods. The demographic makeup of the area is 31% Latino, 29% Asian, 23% white,14% Black and 2% Pacific Islander, according to an analysis by the nonprofit United Latinos.
Vince Valdez, the co-lead of the community committee and chair of United Latino’s environmental justice green team, said they plan to replicate culturally competent outreach strategies used within the initial boundaries. Inviting community members to design flyers to hand out at a Dia de Los Muertos event, for example, helped generate interest and involvement.
“I'm excited because not only did we expand our boundaries, we expanded the amount of residents and businesses or organizations that could be on our committee,” Valdez said. “And with that is brought new ideas, new insight on some of the health issues and risks associated with poor air quality.”
Sacramento Metropolitan Air Quality Management District runs a mobile air quality monitoring lab outside Fern Bacon Middle School in Sacramento on Aug. 9, 2024.Kristin Lam/CapRadio
Janice Lam Snyder, the district’s director of community air protection, said the decision to expand the boundaries was a response to community requests, though it also stretches limited resources. As of the end of June, the district had spent $6.6 million of the $13.9 million it received from the state to implement the program, district spokesperson Emily Allshouse said in an email.
Data collected so far shows cars and heavy trucks significantly contribute to pollution in South Sacramento, especially with traffic from Highway 99 and I-5, Lam Snyder said. The two major freeways run through the heart of South Sacramento. Other pollution sources include manufacturing and industrial businesses as well wood smoke from fireplaces and stoves. Monitors have found higher levels of fine particulate matter during the winter, Lam Snyder added.
The committee and air district have two years to send an emissions reduction plan to the California Air Resources Board. Lam Snyder said that plan could propose solutions including incentives for businesses to transition to cleaner technology. It might also encourage people to take public transit and partner with the city and county on tree planting initiatives, she predicted.
Rhonda Henderson, a member of the committee and president of the North Laguna Creek Valley Hi Community Association, said regulators, developers, businesses and residents all need to do their part. Planning commissions could set rules requiring green spaces and home owners could retrofit gas appliances.
“There should be some incentives that would allow us to afford it,” Henderson said. “Rebates, but big enough to make it worth our while because a lot of us are on fixed incomes.”
Rhonda Henderson at North Laguna Creek Park in Sacramento on Aug. 9, 2024. Henderson serves on the committee for the South Sacramento-Florin Community Air Protection Program.Kristin Lam/CapRadio
The emissions reduction plan could also cover wellness programs such as asthma management and respiratory care, Henderson said. She added such programs should prioritize areas with the highest pollutant levels and most vulnerable populations.
Other advocates say they don’t want the district to give Community Air Protection funding to multinational companies. The district receives a separate budget for incentives and the state has allocated $44.8 million so far, according to a presentation.
Herman Barahona is the lead community organizer for the Sacramento Environmental Justice Coalition. He said the district shouldn’t have given $2.2 million to PepsiCo for electric trucks and chargers between 2017 and 2019.
“While we appreciate that we have cleaner trucks out there delivering diabetes to South Sacramento, we would have appreciated some consultation to figure out where we need those investments to reduce greenhouse gasses,” Barahona said.
He added the district should instead invest directly into South Sacramento communities, but the district said in a newsletter that the project at PepsiCo’s Reese Road facility lowers residents’ exposure to diesel emissions. The district estimated the project reduces annual greenhouse gas emissions by about 1,400 metric tons.
Air Quality Specialist Nicolas Gonzalez shows equipment inside a mobile air monitoring lab outside Fern Bacon Middle School in Sacramento on Aug. 9, 2024.Kristin Lam/CapRadio
Community members say they’re realistic about how long it will take to see health improvements from the expanded air quality program. But they hope it makes conditions healthier for future generations.
“If we can change the environment of the air in such a way where we have more times where we can enjoy the outdoors and feel better, that’s what I’d like to see,” Henderson said. “It’s not going to be done overnight, but we need to look to the future because we’ve got kids, grandkids. We’ve got to do something.”
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