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Two years after Newsdesk.org first examined high levels of air pollution in West Oakland, progress towards helping this community breathe easier is moving slowly. Thorny projects, including cleanups at the port and a local Superfund site, are hard to k…
After more than a decade of getting approved for U.S. Environmental Protection Agency grants to remediate “brownfields” (contaminated properties), Oakland has been turned down.
This is the first such rejection in a long time – and it will delay both…
Soil polluted with lead has long plagued the South Prescott neighborhood of West Oakland. But cleanup is finally getting underway.This Saturday, June 25, the community is invited to learn more about the new green technology this project will use to cle…
In the last 10 years, 62 journalists have been killed in Mexico, making it the most dangerous country in the world for journos.
It was a sobering moment.
The new director of the University of Iowa’s School of Journalism and Mass Communications, David D. Perlmutter, last December distributed a chart to members of his school’s professional advisory board. It showed that applicants to the school were so flat this past year that practically anybody who applied was approved for admission to the two-year undergraduate program. It begged the question many people in the field are asking, to wit, what’s a journalism school to do?
Victims of domestic and sexual violence are getting left behind by state governments that are slashing funds as the recession forces budget cuts. California led the way, as Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger cut $20.4 million earmarked for domestic violence programs from the state budget, according to news reports. Statewide, the governor’s action is affecting 94 domestic violence centers, and has already caused three to close, according to Camille Hayes of the California Partnership to End Domestic Violence. Hayes told the Redding Record-Searchlight that state funds were “really what kept [the centers’] lights on and doors open.” The U.S. Justice Department gave a last-minute reprieve to six California programs that got $3 million in grants, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.
By Kwan Booth
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Part of the Bay Area Toxic Tour
The long road leading to cleaner air in West Oakland was stretched just a little farther Tuesday night, as Port of Oakland commissioners postponed voting on a controversial new program to control diesel pollution from thousands of trucks serving the port. West Oakland’s high rates of childhood asthma and lifelong illnesses, such as cancer, are linked to exhaust from truck and international ship traffic through the port. Approximately 100 representatives from the trucking, environmentalist and West Oakland communities packed Tuesday’s meeting as the board considered adopting the Comprehensive Truck Management Plan, which aims to reduce diesel emmissions from the port by 85 percent by 2020. The plan requires that all early-model trucks be fitted with new diesel filters by January 1st, 2010. Opponents of the plan expressed cautious optimism at amendments to include a proposed truck registration system as well as a complete ban on pre-1994 trucks, as recommended by the study.