Environmental Health & Community-Based Participatory Research

Science, technology and research are indispensable tools for creating a safe and sustainable environment. Acting as a bridge between community residents and the scientific community, WE ACT's Environmental Health & Community-Based Research program builds the capacity of communities of color to identify and reduce the disproportionate risks posed to their health by environmental hazards. Driven by locally defined needs and priorities, the program addresses key community health concerns including asthma, childhood lead poisoning prevention and children’s environmental health throughout Northern Manhattan and New York. The program partners with the Columbia Mailman School of Public Health to bridge the gap between activism and academia through cutting-edge initiatives. Our past successes include the following:

• WE ACT exerted leadership within the NYC Coalition to End Lead Poisoning (NYCCELP) to transform the organization from one of predominantly white elites to an all-inclusive group that currently welcomes organizations of color and low-income parents to participate in its deliberations and campaigns. Furthermore, WE ACT worked to organize and train Latino and African-American parents to testify at hearings, meet with their council members, participate in negotiating sessions, and brief the media. This led to the generation of a significant amount of Latino print and television coverage and ultimately, to the passing of Local Law 1 of 2004, a strong lead poisoning prevention bill. 
• WE ACT initiated and helped implement a pilot study of a group of Harlem schoolchildren. The study (1) found that 75% of the children had visible traces of a substance indicating exposure to dangerous diesel fumes in their bodies. Another study (2) found that the level of diesel pollution in the air was directly related to bus traffic, with the highest levels of found around the Manhattanville Bus Depot. This data was used to influence the MTA to invest in clean diesel and pollution controls.
• Through our Environmental Health & Justice Leadership Training (EHJLT) initiative, WE ACT created and implemented an environmental health curriculum that has increased environmental literacy by training over 300 New York City community leaders and parents to understand environmental health issues and to advocate for their concerns to be addressed.

Our current projects include the following:

• Environmental Health & Justice Leadership Training
• Developing a Community-Based Ethical Review Model
• The Human Genome Project – Community Conversations
• Our Housing is Our Health Campaign
  • Northern Manhattan Garbage, Pests & Pesticides Campaign
• Northern Manhattan Food Justice Initiative
• Rosa Parks School Bus Campaign
• New York City Lead Outreach Campaign
• The Northern Manhattan CARE Collaborative

(1) Diesel Exhaust Exposure Among Adolescents in West Harlem” (Principal Investigator: Mary Northride, PhD., MPH)
(2) “Airborne Concentrations of PM2.5 and Diesel Exhaust Particles on Harlem Sidewalks” (Principal Investigator: Patrick L. Kinney, Sc.D.)