News

This page features excerpts from news about environmental justice advocacy in the San Joaquin Valley and links to their original sources. Use the features on the right to sort by topic, news source, date, key word or author. You may also subscribe to receive the news by e-mail or through an rss reader. Please note that links to original sources may expire over time.

On The Toxic Trail Demonstration at Cal/EPA

100 community members and environmental justice activists from across the state united and protested in front of the Department of Toxic Substances Control/Cal EPA yesterday to demand DTSC protect people and not polluters.

Chanting “We are all Kettleman City/Todos Somos Kettleman City” and “Justicia Ahora/Justice Now,” community members spoke out in front of a bed decorated with pictures of Governor Brown, DTSC Director Raphael, a caricature of a toxic polluter holding bags of money, and logos of giant polluters that get friendly treatment by DTSC. – and demanded that our government officials get out of bed with polluters…

Protesters blast state toxics department’s handling of hazardous waste

About 100 demonstrators from across the state rallied in Sacramento on Wednesday to protest the state Department of Toxic Substances Control’s handling of hazardous waste in their communities.

Complaining that California was “in bed with polluters,” protesters set up an air mattress in front of the department’s headquarters and decorated it with pictures of Gov. Jerry Brown and department chief Debbie Raphael, as well as logos of companies such as Chevron and Exide and fake dollar bills…

Town hall planned to talk about small-town drinking water

The public is invited to a town hall meeting about drinking water problems in small San Joaquin Valley communities where thousands of people have waited years for solutions.

The free event is scheduled from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 16, at  Fresno Convention Center, 2nd Floor, 848 M St. Latino USA on National Public Radio and Radio Bilingue are putting on the town hall.

Maria Hinojosa,  journalist and Latino USA executive producer, will moderate. Spanish translation will be available.

The town hall will feature a discussion of Lanare, a small Fresno County town with a history of water problems. Organizers say the discussion will focus on ways to speed up the process of getting healthy drinking water…

Hunger in the Valley of Plenty

California’s San Joaquin Valley is the country’s most productive farm belt: its fertile orchards and fields generate most of the nation’s fresh fruit and nuts. Yet for the people who work and live near these farms, access to healthy and fresh food can be a daily struggle…

Kettleman City is a rural, majority Latino and farmworker community halfway between Los Angeles and San Francisco. It is home to the largest hazardous waste dump this side of the Mississippi and to shockingly high rates of childhood cancer, birth defects and miscarriages – two facts residents believe to be connected. WATCH THE FOLLOWING VIDEO EXPOSÉ…

EPA Gives Factory Farms Air Pollution Exemption

A group of San Joaquin Valley residents called Association for Irritated Residents (AIR) has challenged the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) over its decision to allow new and expanding industrial-style farms that confine animals in tightly packed facilities to avoid air pollution limits…

New law will provide renewable energy to renters, small business

“SB 43 will not only help California meet its renewable energy goals, it will bring much-needed clean energy into areas of the state that need it most,” said Strela Cervas with the California Environmental Justice Alliance. “The communities I work in suffer alarming rates of premature death, asthma, lost work days, and respiratory related absences. This program begins to address this green divide by directing more local renewable energy into low-income communities of color that are impacted first and worst from climate change, while creating sustainable long-term clean energy careers in these communities”…

Trastornos congénitos en Kettleman City, California

Uno de los vertederos tóxicos más grandes del país podría estar relacionado con los trastornos que afectan a esta comunidad hispana de bajos recursos.

Governor Brown signs two more bills to make California Greener! Good for planet, people and pockets!

This bill would enact the Green Tariff Shared Renewables Program. The program would require a participating utility, defined as being an electrical corporation with 100,000 or more customers in California, to file with the commission an application requesting approval of a green tariff shared renewables program to implement a program enabling ratepayers to participate directly in offsite electrical generation facilities that use eligible renewable energy resources, consistent with certain legislative findings and statements of intent…

State water regulators have adopted an order for farmers to monitor and clean up groundwater in California’s Central Valley, home to some of America’s most contaminated aquifers.

The order, adopted by the Central Valley Regional Water Quality Control Board on Thursday, affects about 10,700 growers in the Tulare Lake basin — including parts of Fresno, Tulare, Kings and Kern counties — who farm on about 3 million acres of irrigated farmland…