Concerns have been raised regarding the potential effects on the Houston neighborhood of President Donald Trump’s administration’s federal budget cuts and rumored plans to fire over 1,000 EPA personnel.
The EPA ordered Union Pacific Railroad to start looking into the Fifth Ward and Kashmere Gardens neighborhood in 2023 in order to find any dangerous substances in the soil of surrounding residences and commercial buildings. Researchers from Texas A&M University identified hazardous levels of lead in the groundwater at the location of an old railyard, and they also found creosote, a carcinogen.
According to Robynn Tysver, a spokesman for Union Pacific, 185 residents in that area of Houston have signed access agreements for soil sample on their properties as of November.
On Friday, U.S. Representative Sylvester Turner, a former mayor of Houston, stated, “There is now real fear that the EPA will be forced to stop its investigation into the Greater Fifth Ward Kashmere Gardens cancer clustercaused by an old railyard that has used a toxic wood preservative.” “Dioxin has been found, which has poisoned the soil and caused sickness and death to the people that live there.”
According to NBC News on Tuesday, the Trump Administration has informed over 1,100 EPA employees that they may be fired immediately.
Community organizer Joetta Stevenson shared Turner’s worries, claiming that the Houston neighborhood’s environmental conditions have contributed to the deaths of its people.
Toxic compounds in the soil can range from a safe level to 52 times a safe level to 200 times the safe level, according to Stevenson, who cited a recent discussion with an environmental specialist who has researched the region.
Stevenson stated that she will keep standing up for the people in the community.
