EPA Awards $60,000 in Environmental Justice Grants to Southern California Projects

EPA Press Release:

EPA Awards $60,000 in Environmental Justice Grants to Southern California ProjectsOrganizations focus on issues in San Bernardino, San Diego; $1.1 Million Awarded to Groups Nationally

LOS ANGELES— The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency today awarded $60,000 in grants to two organizations in San Bernardino and San Diego for projects to address environmental justice issues. The projects will provide training to educate and empower residents of low-income communities, enabling communities to better participate in decision-making on environmental health issues and control and reduce asthma symptoms. The grants will enable the organizations to develop solutions to local health and environmental issues in low-income, minority and tribal communities overburdened by harmful pollution.

“EPA’s Environmental Justice Small Grants are making a visible difference in Southern California,” said Jared Blumenfeld, EPA’s Regional Administrator for the Pacific Southwest. “These grants equip communities with the necessary tools to address environmental challenges in their neighborhoods.”

This year, EPA awarded a total of $1.1 Million in competitive grants to 39 non-profit and tribal organizations working to address environmental justice issues nationwide. This year’s Southern California grants include the following:

Environmental Health Coalition (EHC)
Project: Changing Land Use Policies, Changing Lives—Improving the Health of Environmental Justice Communities
Grant Amount: $30,000
Location: San Diego, Calif.
EHC will educate and empower residents of low-income neighborhoods in the San Diego region, statewide, and nationally to advocate for land use by delivering a Spanish/English training program.  The bilingual program will teach residents to engage and achieve community goals including rerouting truck traffic and separating industrial from residential and commercial uses.

Center for Community Action and Environmental Justice (CCAEJ)
Project: Breath of Life—An Asthma Prevention and Education Program
Grant Amount: $30,000
Location: San Bernardino, Calif.
CCAEJ will promote safe and healthy practices to control and reduce asthma symptoms and related illnesses in San Bernardino and Jurupa Valley communities.  The program will be administered by eight health promoters (promotoras) who will conduct prevention education classes for 45 residents in the affected communities.  The program will educate and train those residents to conduct home assessments and monitor asthma triggers as well as develop social assessments on barriers that may keep families from self management needed to sustain health improvements. 

An additional $60,000 in grants was awarded to two organizations in Northern California.  EPA’s environmental justice efforts aim to ensure equal environmental and health protections for all Americans, regardless of race or socioeconomic status.

Environmental justice is defined as the fair treatment and meaningful involvement of all people, regardless of race or income, in the environmental decision-making process. Since 1994, EPA’s environmental justice small grants program has supported projects to address environmental justice issues in more than 1,400 communities. The grant awards represent EPA’s commitment to promoting community-based actions to address environmental justice issues.

In the fall of 2013, EPA will issue a Request for Proposals for the FY 2014 Collaborative Problem Solving Grants. A schedule of pre-application community stakeholder teleconference calls will be announced at that time.

2013 EJ Small Grant recipients and project descriptions: http://www.epa.gov/environmentaljustice/resources/publications/grants/ej-smgrants-recipients-2013.pdf

More information about EPA’s Environmental Justice Small Grants program: http://www.epa.gov/environmentaljustice/grants/ej-smgrants.html

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