Latest news with #CommunityWaterCenter
The Guardian
24-07-2025
- Health
- The Guardian
White House rescinds $20m for clean water in pesticide-contaminated rural California
For decades, thousands of residents in California's agricultural heartland couldn't use their wells because the water was too contaminated with pesticides. In December, the Biden administration stepped in with a long-awaited $20m grant to provide clean water, improve municipal sources and relieve the region's financial and health burden. The Trump administration just took the money away. Donald Trump's Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) labeled the grant a 'wasteful DEI program', though advocates say the move is an act of cruelty. Drinking water in some parts of the Monterey county region, which largely produces strawberries, has not been safe for decades because it is contaminated with staggering levels of highly toxic pesticide ingredients that threaten the health of agricultural workers and others. The decision to yank the money was 'unjust', said Maraid Jimenez, a spokesperson for the Community Water Center, which was helping manage the grant's implementation. 'People agree that everyone needs safe drinking water, so to have a grant help fix that for a rural community rescinded – it doesn't make any sense to us,' Jimenez said. 'The drinking water crisis here only gets worse, and, beyond our shock, we're trying to mobilize to find a solution.' The funding, along with California state money, would have improved drinking water quality for about 5,500 people, either through improvements to municipal infrastructure or by connecting contaminated wells to municipal lines. The aquifer in the rural, majority-Spanish-speaking communities in Monterey county, which sits about 50 miles (80km) south of the San Jose, is widely contaminated with 1,2,3-TCP, a pesticide ingredient and carcinogen banned in 40 countries that persists for decades in the soil and groundwater. In many cases, the 1,2,3-TCP levels in wells have been found to far exceed state limits and EPA health guidelines for drinking water. 1,2,3-TCP can also evaporate and create toxic fumes in the shower, and it is linked to liver, kidney and reproductive damage. The wells also often contain high levels of arsenic, hexavalent chromium and nitrates. Each are carcinogens and the latter can cause 'blue baby syndrome', a condition in young children that causes their skin to turn blue when the toxin gets into their bloodstream and restricts oxygen flow. Residents have either had to buy jugs of water or use state assistance to purchase them over the last 30 years. Among them is Marcela, a mother of three who has lived in the region for about 10 years. She and her husband are strawberry pickers, and she declined to provide her last name for fear of retaliation from the federal government. Marcela said the family, which lives near Moss Landing, spends about $450 every three weeks on 5-gallon jugs of water. The well on the property that she rents is broken. She and her landlords, an elderly couple who live at the house and whom she takes care of, don't have enough money to fix it. Even if they could, the water from the well would in all likelihood be too contaminated to use. They learned in late 2024 of the plan to connect their property to a nearby water district within three years, which would have alleviated a major stress and financial burden. Then they learned that the Trump administration had rescinded the funding. 'It is devastating news for us,' Marcela said via a translator. 'We urgently need water.' Marcela's family is protected by the bottled water, but some in the region 'didn't know that they couldn't drink or cook with the tap water, so they would use it', said Mayra Hernandez, community advocacy manager with Community Water Center. What that has meant for their health is unclear. Educating residents about the risks has involved Community Water Center staff knocking on doors. The challenges in getting out the word in the region, where there are a large number of workers who don't speak English and who live in isolation from information sources, highlights how essential it is to hook up properties to clean water. The EPA grant, along with state funding, would have connected more than 1,000 residents with unsafe wells to municipal lines. It also would have provided financial support to municipal systems needed to expand water provision and provide improvements. Sign up to This Week in Trumpland A deep dive into the policies, controversies and oddities surrounding the Trump administration after newsletter promotion In an emailed statement, the EPA said: 'Maybe the Biden-Harris Administration shouldn't have forced their radical agenda of wasteful DEI programs and 'environmental justice' preferencing on the EPA's core mission of protecting human health and the environment.' The cuts are part of the Trump administration's broader attack aimed at killing approximately $2bn for environmental and climate justice initiatives made available through the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) that would reduce pollution and improve communities' resilience to the effects of climate change. Hundreds of projects across the nation have lost funding, and though lawsuits have sought to restore it, Trump's 'big, beautiful bill' eliminated all IRA money that was not yet disbursed. The decision to rescind the funding came at almost the same time that the EPA announced $30m in funding for rural water improvements – a drop in the bucket compared with what was available under the Biden administration. None of the new funding is going to the region around Marcea's home. Jimenez said the EPA's actions 'don't fall in line with their messaging'. 'Drinking water is a human right and it shouldn't be a political topic that's contested,' she said. The Community Water Center is now looking for other sources of funding through the state, but Jimenez added that advocates are determined even if the situation for now remains unclear. 'Just because a grant is being canceled doesn't mean the problem is going away,' Jimenez said.
The Guardian
24-07-2025
- Health
- The Guardian
White House rescinds $20m for clean water in pesticide-contaminated rural California
For decades, thousands of residents in California's agricultural heartland couldn't use their wells because the water was too contaminated with pesticides. In December, the Biden administration stepped in with a long-awaited $20m grant to provide clean water, improve municipal sources and relieve the region's financial and health burden. The Trump administration just took the money away. Donald Trump's Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) labeled the grant a 'wasteful DEI program', though advocates say the move is an act of cruelty. Drinking water in some parts of the Monterey county region, which largely produces strawberries, has not been safe for decades because it is contaminated with staggering levels of highly toxic pesticide ingredients that threaten the health of agricultural workers and others. The decision to yank the money was 'unjust', said Maraid Jimenez, a spokesperson for the Community Water Center, which was helping manage the grant's implementation. 'People agree that everyone needs safe drinking water, so to have a grant help fix that for a rural community rescinded – it doesn't make any sense to us,' Jimenez said. 'The drinking water crisis here only gets worse, and, beyond our shock, we're trying to mobilize to find a solution.' The funding, along with California state money, would have improved drinking water quality for about 5,500 people, either through improvements to municipal infrastructure or by connecting contaminated wells to municipal lines. The aquifer in the rural, majority-Spanish-speaking communities in Monterey county, which sits about 50 miles (80km) south of the San Jose, is widely contaminated with 1,2,3-TCP, a pesticide ingredient and carcinogen banned in 40 countries that persists for decades in the soil and groundwater. In many cases, the 1,2,3-TCP levels in wells have been found to far exceed state limits and EPA health guidelines for drinking water. 1,2,3-TCP can also evaporate and create toxic fumes in the shower, and it is linked to liver, kidney and reproductive damage. The wells also often contain high levels of arsenic, hexavalent chromium and nitrates. Each are carcinogens and the latter can cause 'blue baby syndrome', a condition in young children that causes their skin to turn blue when the toxin gets into their bloodstream and restricts oxygen flow. Residents have either had to buy jugs of water or use state assistance to purchase them over the last 30 years. Among them is Marcela, a mother of three who has lived in the region for about 10 years. She and her husband are strawberry pickers, and she declined to provide her last name for fear of retaliation from the federal government. Marcela said the family, which lives near Moss Landing, spends about $450 every three weeks on 5-gallon jugs of water. The well on the property that she rents is broken. She and her landlords, an elderly couple who live at the house and whom she takes care of, don't have enough money to fix it. Even if they could, the water from the well would in all likelihood be too contaminated to use. They learned in late 2024 of the plan to connect their property to a nearby water district within three years, which would have alleviated a major stress and financial burden. Then they learned that the Trump administration had rescinded the funding. 'It is devastating news for us,' Marcela said via a translator. 'We urgently need water.' Marcela's family is protected by the bottled water, but some in the region 'didn't know that they couldn't drink or cook with the tap water, so they would use it', said Mayra Hernandez, community advocacy manager with Community Water Center. What that has meant for their health is unclear. Educating residents about the risks has involved Community Water Center staff knocking on doors. The challenges in getting out the word in the region, where there are a large number of workers who don't speak English and who live in isolation from information sources, highlights how essential it is to hook up properties to clean water. The EPA grant, along with state funding, would have connected more than 1,000 residents with unsafe wells to municipal lines. It also would have provided financial support to municipal systems needed to expand water provision and provide improvements. Sign up to This Week in Trumpland A deep dive into the policies, controversies and oddities surrounding the Trump administration after newsletter promotion In an emailed statement, the EPA said: 'Maybe the Biden-Harris Administration shouldn't have forced their radical agenda of wasteful DEI programs and 'environmental justice' preferencing on the EPA's core mission of protecting human health and the environment.' The cuts are part of the Trump administration's broader attack aimed at killing approximately $2bn for environmental and climate justice initiatives made available through the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) that would reduce pollution and improve communities' resilience to the effects of climate change. Hundreds of projects across the nation have lost funding, and though lawsuits have sought to restore it, Trump's 'big, beautiful bill' eliminated all IRA money that was not yet disbursed. The decision to rescind the funding came at almost the same time that the EPA announced $30m in funding for rural water improvements – a drop in the bucket compared with what was available under the Biden administration. None of the new funding is going to the region around Marcea's home. Jimenez said the EPA's actions 'don't fall in line with their messaging'. 'Drinking water is a human right and it shouldn't be a political topic that's contested,' she said. The Community Water Center is now looking for other sources of funding through the state, but Jimenez added that advocates are determined even if the situation for now remains unclear. 'Just because a grant is being canceled doesn't mean the problem is going away,' Jimenez said.
Yahoo
08-05-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
'Another broken promise': California environmental groups reel from EPA grant cancellations
After weeks of speculation, the news came down with chilling formality: "Dear EPA Grant Recipient," read the official government email. "Attached is your Termination of Award from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency." That's how hundreds of organizations found out they had officially lost EPA grant funding as part of the many cutbacks to environmental programs demanded by the Trump administration. Among them was the Community Water Center, a nonprofit that works to provide safe, clean drinking water to rural communities in California. Their $20-million award had been earmarked for a major project to consolidate water systems in the low-income Central Coast communities of Pajaro, Sunny Mesa and Springfield, which have long been reliant on domestic wells and small water systems that are riddled with contaminants above legal limits. The project was more than five years in the making, and now sits in limbo as President Trump and EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin slash funding for more than 780 grants geared toward environmental justice that were awarded under President Biden. "It's a huge disappointment — this grant would be funding an infrastructure project to deliver safe drinking water, and I think that everyone would agree that residents across the United States need to have safe drinking water," said Susana De Anda, Community Water Center's executive director. "Safe water is not political." Read more: The EPA plans to cut hundreds of environmental grants. Democrats say it's illegal The notice arrived on May 1, nearly two months after the EPA and the president's unofficial Department of Government Efficiency first announced that they would terminate more than 400 environmental grants totaling $1.7 billion in what Zeldin described as an effort to "rein in wasteful federal spending." A leaked list reviewed by The Times revealed at least 62 California grants were on the chopping block. However, court documents filed last week indicate that the actual number of environmental grant cancellations in the U.S. is closer to 800. The finding is part of a lawsuit from nonprofit groups challenging the administration's efforts to freeze funds awarded awarded under Biden's Inflation Reduction Act and Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, as first reported by the Washington Post. A legal declaration filed by the EPA says 377 grantees have already received formal notices of termination, and approximately 404 more will be noticed soon. It is not immediately clear how many California organizations will lose federal funding. EPA officials declined to provide a list of affected groups and said the agency does not comment on pending legislation. But a handful of groups in the state have confirmed they are on the list of cuts. Among them is the Los Angeles Neighborhood Trust, which said it lost a $500,000 grant intended to help plan equitable development projects along the L.A. River, and the Food Bank of Contra Costa and Solano, which said it lost a $155,000 grant for a project to provide food to communities in need in Vallejo. Cade Cannedy, director of programs with the Palo Alto-based nonprofit Climate Resilient Communities, said the group lost a $500,000 grant that would have provided air purifiers to children with asthma and seniors with disabilities in East Palo Alto. The community suffers from high rates of respiratory issues as a result of decades of redlining, segregation and zoning practices that have concentrated polluting activities in the area, including hazardous waste processing facilities and vehicle emissions from nearby highways, Cannedy said. "It's a huge loss for our communities, but I think the other thing that's really almost sadder is that for these communities, this is just another broken promise in a decades-long string of broken promises," he said. The termination email was the first communication the group has received from the EPA since Trump took office, he said. It represents a significant blow for the small nonprofit, which had already hired two new employees to help implement the project and deliver air purifiers to about 400 families and potentially some schools and senior centers. "At small community-based organizations like ours, we never have excellent cash flow — it's not like we're sitting on half a million dollars at any point in time," Cannedy said. "We're dependent on these grants and the reimbursement process to make things work." Read more: Trump makes sweeping move to undercut state climate laws, including California's The grant cancellations are the latest in a string of actions from the Trump administration that advocates say are harmful to the environment, including loosening air and water quality regulations; laying off scientists and researchers; ramping up coal production; opening national forests for industrial logging; narrowing protections for endangered species and dismissing hundreds of scientists working a major national climate report, among many others. Democratic lawmakers, including California Sen. Adam Schiff and Sen. Alex Padilla, have condemned the administration's grant cancellations, which they say is an illegal clawing back of congressionally appropriated funds. "EPA's unlawful, arbitrary, and capricious terminations of [environmental justice] grant programs eliminate commonsense, nonpartisan federal programs that clean the air and water and protect Americans from natural disasters," the senators wrote in a March letter to Zeldin, along with seven other Democratic members of the U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works. The EPA is potentially facing tighter purse strings. Trump's proposed budget for the 2026 fiscal year would slash $5 billion from the agency tasked with protecting the nation's health and environment — by far the largest cut in the EPA's history, representing approximately 55% of its 2025 budget. Meeting the reduction will require mass layoffs and would effectively cripple the EPA's core functions, according to the nonprofit Environmental Protection Network, a D.C.-based watchdog group composed of more than 600 former EPA workers. "This is a reckless and short-sighted proposal that will lead to higher levels of toxic pollution in the air we breathe and water we drink across the nation," read a statement from Michelle Roos, the EPN's executive director. "This is a wrecking-ball approach that would gut America's front-line defense for protecting people's health and environment." Indeed, the loss of grant funding will have lasting real-world effects, according to José Franco García, executive director of the San Diego County-based nonprofit the Environmental Health Coalition. The group lost a $500,000 grant intended for a number of initiatives in the Barrio Logan neighborhood, a predominantly low-income community that suffers from pollution, poor air quality and other environmental problems due to its proximity to the port, industrial facilities and an interstate highway, he said. The projects included the creation of a long-awaited park along Boston Avenue, a green shuttle bus system, and efforts to improve area homes with electrification, solar power and lead abatement, García said. He said the grant was also going to fund air filters in homes of children with asthma. "These are the exact things that EPA money should be going to," García said. "And what the current version of the EPA is doing is not what it was meant to do, what it was meant to be able to protect, and what it was meant to be able to serve." García noted that the grant cancellations are also costing nonprofits time and potentially jobs as they scramble keep up with rapidly changing conditions. The grant was approved last summer and the group had spent months preparing to start the work. "Just as we are expected to meet the terms of any contract, we thought that the federal government would be as well," he said. Read more: 'It's a huge loss': Trump administration dismisses scientists preparing climate report De Anda, of the Community Water Center, was similarly concerned about the public health implications of the grant terminations. The Monterey County communities Pajaro, Sunny Mesa and Springfield have struggled with water quality issues for years, with 81% of domestic wells there testing positive for one or more dangerous contaminants including nitrate, 123-TCP, arsenic and chromium 6, she said. The chemicals can contribute to serious adverse health effects such as reproductive issues, infant blood conditions and cancer, according to the EPA. The Community Water Center's $20-million grant would have funded the first phase of critical infrastructure work, including constructing pipelines to physically consolidate the communities into a single water system owned and operated by Pajaro/Sunny Mesa Community Services District, which would serve about 5,500 people and an elementary school. Community Water Center is exploring all avenues to keep the work moving forward, De Anda said, and she hopes state officials will step in to fill the void left by the EPA. "Our community deserves to have reliable infrastructure that delivers safe drinking water," she said. "Stopping the project is not an option." One of the area's residents, 49-year-old Maria Angelica Rodriguez, said she currently has to rely on bottled water for drinking, cooking and other basic needs. Every Thursday, a regional bottled water program delivers 5 gallons for each of the three members of her household, which include Rodriguez, her mother and her sister. But she also worries about her 7-month-old grandson whom she babysits throughout the week, whom she fears could get sick from the area's tainted water. Speaking through an interpreter, Rodriguez said she would like Trump to stop and think about the children and also farm workers in the area who need to drink the water. The project brought hope to the community, she said, and its cancellation has made her very sad. "El agua es vida," she said. "Water is life." This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
Los Angeles Times
08-05-2025
- Politics
- Los Angeles Times
‘Another broken promise': California environmental groups reel from EPA grant cancellations
After weeks of speculation, the news came down with chilling formality: 'Dear EPA Grant Recipient,' read the official government email. 'Attached is your Termination of Award from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.' That's how hundreds of organizations found out they had officially lost EPA grant funding as part of the many cutbacks to environmental programs demanded by the Trump administration. Among them was the Community Water Center, a nonprofit that works to provide safe, clean drinking water to rural communities in California. Their $20-million award had been earmarked for a major project to consolidate water systems in the low-income Central Coast communities of Pajaro, Sunny Mesa and Springfield, which have long been reliant on domestic wells and small water systems that are riddled with contaminants above legal limits. The project was more than five years in the making, and now sits in limbo as President Trump and EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin slash funding for more than 780 grants geared toward environmental justice that were awarded under President Biden. 'It's a huge disappointment — this grant would be funding an infrastructure project to deliver safe drinking water, and I think that everyone would agree that residents across the United States need to have safe drinking water,' said Susana De Anda, Community Water Center's executive director. 'Safe water is not political.' The notice arrived on May 1, nearly two months after the EPA and the president's unofficial Department of Government Efficiency first announced that they would terminate more than 400 environmental grants totaling $1.7 billion in what Zeldin described as an effort to 'rein in wasteful federal spending.' A leaked list reviewed by The Times revealed at least 62 California grants were on the chopping block. However, court documents filed last week indicate that the actual number of environmental grant cancellations in the U.S. is closer to 800. The finding is part of a lawsuit from nonprofit groups challenging the administration's efforts to freeze funds awarded awarded under Biden's Inflation Reduction Act and Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, as first reported by the Washington Post. A legal declaration filed by the EPA says 377 grantees have already received formal notices of termination, and approximately 404 more will be noticed soon. It is not immediately clear how many California organizations will lose federal funding. EPA officials declined to provide a list of affected groups and said the agency does not comment on pending legislation. But a handful of groups in the state have confirmed they are on the list of cuts. Among them is the Los Angeles Neighborhood Trust, which said it lost a $500,000 grant intended to help plan equitable development projects along the L.A. River, and the Food Bank of Contra Costa and Solano, which said it lost a $155,000 grant for a project to provide food to communities in need in Vallejo. Cade Cannedy, director of programs with the Palo Alto-based nonprofit Climate Resilient Communities, said the group lost a $500,000 grant that would have provided air purifiers to children with asthma and seniors with disabilities in East Palo Alto. The community suffers from high rates of respiratory issues as a result of decades of redlining, segregation and zoning practices that have concentrated polluting activities in the area, including hazardous waste processing facilities and vehicle emissions from nearby highways, Cannedy said. 'It's a huge loss for our communities, but I think the other thing that's really almost sadder is that for these communities, this is just another broken promise in a decades-long string of broken promises,' he said. The termination email was the first communication the group has received from the EPA since Trump took office, he said. It represents a significant blow for the small nonprofit, which had already hired two new employees to help implement the project and deliver air purifiers to about 400 families and potentially some schools and senior centers. 'At small community-based organizations like ours, we never have excellent cash flow — it's not like we're sitting on half a million dollars at any point in time,' Cannedy said. 'We're dependent on these grants and the reimbursement process to make things work.' The grant cancellations are the latest in a string of actions from the Trump administration that advocates say are harmful to the environment, including loosening air and water quality regulations; laying off scientists and researchers; ramping up coal production; opening national forests for industrial logging; narrowing protections for endangered species and dismissing hundreds of scientists working a major national climate report, among many others. Democratic lawmakers, including California Sen. Adam Schiff and Sen. Alex Padilla, have condemned the administration's grant cancellations, which they say is an illegal clawing back of congressionally appropriated funds. 'EPA's unlawful, arbitrary, and capricious terminations of [environmental justice] grant programs eliminate commonsense, nonpartisan federal programs that clean the air and water and protect Americans from natural disasters,' the senators wrote in a March letter to Zeldin, along with seven other Democratic members of the U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works. The EPA is potentially facing tighter purse strings. Trump's proposed budget for the 2026 fiscal year would slash $5 billion from the agency tasked with protecting the nation's health and environment — by far the largest cut in the EPA's history, representing approximately 55% of its 2025 budget. Meeting the reduction will require mass layoffs and would effectively cripple the EPA's core functions, according to the nonprofit Environmental Protection Network, a D.C.-based watchdog group composed of more than 600 former EPA workers. 'This is a reckless and short-sighted proposal that will lead to higher levels of toxic pollution in the air we breathe and water we drink across the nation,' read a statement from Michelle Roos, the EPN's executive director. 'This is a wrecking-ball approach that would gut America's front-line defense for protecting people's health and environment.' Indeed, the loss of grant funding will have lasting real-world effects, according to José Franco García, executive director of the San Diego County-based nonprofit the Environmental Health Coalition. The group lost a $500,000 grant intended for a number of initiatives in the Barrio Logan neighborhood, a predominantly low-income community that suffers from pollution, poor air quality and other environmental problems due to its proximity to the port, industrial facilities and an interstate highway, he said. The projects included the creation of a long-awaited park along Boston Avenue, a green shuttle bus system, and efforts to improve area homes with electrification, solar power and lead abatement, García said. He said the grant was also going to fund air filters in homes of children with asthma. 'These are the exact things that EPA money should be going to,' García said. 'And what the current version of the EPA is doing is not what it was meant to do, what it was meant to be able to protect, and what it was meant to be able to serve.' García noted that the grant cancellations are also costing nonprofits time and potentially jobs as they scramble keep up with rapidly changing conditions. The grant was approved last summer and the group had spent months preparing to start the work. 'Just as we are expected to meet the terms of any contract, we thought that the federal government would be as well,' he said. De Anda, of the Community Water Center, was similarly concerned about the public health implications of the grant terminations. The Monterey County communities Pajaro, Sunny Mesa and Springfield have struggled with water quality issues for years, with 81% of domestic wells there testing positive for one or more dangerous contaminants including nitrate, 123-TCP, arsenic and chromium 6, she said. The chemicals can contribute to serious adverse health effects such as reproductive issues, infant blood conditions and cancer, according to the EPA. The Community Water Center's $20-million grant would have funded the first phase of critical infrastructure work, including constructing pipelines to physically consolidate the communities into a single water system owned and operated by Pajaro/Sunny Mesa Community Services District, which would serve about 5,500 people and an elementary school. Community Water Center is exploring all avenues to keep the work moving forward, De Anda said, and she hopes state officials will step in to fill the void left by the EPA. 'Our community deserves to have reliable infrastructure that delivers safe drinking water,' she said. 'Stopping the project is not an option.' One of the area's residents, 49-year-old Maria Angelica Rodriguez, said she currently has to rely on bottled water for drinking, cooking and other basic needs. Every Thursday, a regional bottled water program delivers 5 gallons for each of the three members of her household, which include Rodriguez, her mother and her sister. But she also worries about her 7-month-old grandson whom she babysits throughout the week, whom she fears could get sick from the area's tainted water. Speaking through an interpreter, Rodriguez said she would like Trump to stop and think about the children and also farm workers in the area who need to drink the water. The project brought hope to the community, she said, and its cancellation has made her very sad. 'El agua es vida,' she said. 'Water is life.'
