Trash Pollution In Los Angeles - Fatima Vega

 The Issue on Trash Pollution in Los Angeles

             Fatima Vega 

               Art 3170 

         October 31, 2020  

 

     

Trash pollution it's been an issue in the past decades because of streets not being clean consistently. Trash has been an issue bringing unhealthy air due to all the garbage seen on the streets of South Los Angeles. Our health and safety should be the number one concern from having unhealthy air and trash affecting people. We need to take care of our community, and other cities are not as involved with so much waste as South Los Angeles. Due to trash flooding, garbage clogging drains, and toxic discharge can poison the trash atmosphere. People that are the most affected by this issue are disadvantaged minorities of Hispanic and African American race. People in poverty that their streets are not clean and are being taken advantage of due to being poor. Even our marine life is being affected by trash pollution because trash goes down drains reaching to rivers and oceans. The most effective trash is plastic it release toxic chemicals into the water, trap and kill marine creatures, pollute beautiful beaches and eventually end up harming us.

According to Cook, 2020, "Animal waste contributes harmful bacteria to neighborhoods, public health risk, and cigarette butts that add 900,000 to a million pieces of trash each month." This is one of the major reasons why there is so many contamination in Los Angeles due to all these batteries that contribute to harming the people. The bacteria from these this trash is hurting our communities and our air quality that we live in today. The possible solutions that have helped in this issue of Los Angeles air quality dramatically improving over the last 30 years because of the 1990 amendments to the Clean Air Act. Year-over-year trends have recently resulted in reductions in L.A. air pollution of 10.6% from 2017 to 2018, and another 11.8% from 2018 to 2019. If this act keeps doing what its purpose is, Los Angeles can have healthier air quality.

According to Künzli, 2003,  “The observation that lung function increased in CHS children who moved to cleaner communities (and decreased in children who moved to more polluted communities)18 strongly suggests that chronic lung function effects are caused by air pollution.” This observation was tested that cleaner communities have helped children be safer from any type of problems in their bodies. That cleaner communities help individuals be healthy and protect the people from harm. The communities with cleaner areas are less likely to be at risk or any contamination and are more likely to be heartier than those individuals that live in areas as South Los Angeles.

Statistics:

Californians are very concerned about a number of threats to their marine environment—including sea level rise, overfishing, and plastic pollution. Overwhelming majorities view plastic and marine debris as a big problem (72%) or somewhat of a problem (18%). Across age, education, income, and racial/ethnic groups, solid majorities say this is a big problem.

The map shown here combines sources of pollution into an intensity map, which shows where pollution is affecting communities most severely. Also, air contamination, the water streams overland is dirtied by tainted water spillover whose sources range from oil and metals from streets to illness, causing microbes. Today the Los Angeles River has been assigned as weakened because of various wellsprings of tainting.

Survey

I created a survey for my community about how they feel about the trash pollution around the area. I came up with questions that may contribute to why this issue matters a lot to my community—the point on trash pollution affecting myself, my family, and my neighborhood. I got over 30 participants to contribute to take my survey, which primarily reflected upon it. I put a few charts of the responses I received back from individuals in my community, and the majority of them have said they live in an unhealthy area. The survey helped me received more feedback and that I'm not the only one that thinks my community does need more help on trash pollution. It's severely affecting many individuals that are disproportionate groups and in poverty. 

Link to survey: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScnPo2Ig0lQXqqsxgs2IARYwiRwdw24nnT3u3nOhqJ0dx5yVg/viewform?vc=0&c=0&w=1&flr=0 

Why is Matters?

I believe that is affecting my community air quality and contamination due to so much trash. Living in South Los Angeles my whole life, I have experience trash being everywhere to the streets, under freeways, and inside bus transportation. Trash pollution has gotten worse through the years tossed anywhere, and it's becoming a more significant issue every year. Trash can travel throughout the world's rivers and oceans, accumulating on beaches and within gyres. This debris harms physical habitats, transports chemical pollutants, threatens aquatic life, and interferes with human uses of the river, marine, and coastal environments. It has proven that wealthy and white people are more advantageous than those living in poverty with cleaner streets. People of color who live in low-income neighborhoods do not get the same equality in having their streets well maintained as wealthier individuals. I grew up in a society where my community is left aside and is not a concern. Many people in my neighborhood are hurting by trash pollution and even myself because I live in this city. Many children affected, including my siblings, from this pollution that is harming. Trash pollution has involved me my whole life, not being able to walk down a sidewalk because so much trash is blocking the sidewalk. I chose this issue because I have lived through this whole life, and no change has occurred since as long as I have been alive. Trash is being accumulative daily, and so many consequences are coming from waste. It affected me because I live in South Los Angeles, one of the most trash pollution and horrible air quality from other cities. It's unbelievable living in such a circumstance, and nothing has been done regarding the situation that affects me but my neighborhood. It has been affecting me for so long and I want for to change to occur. I want my community to have cleaner neighborhoods and for this contamination to come to an end. 

Conclusion:

This investigation shows that inhabitants of Los Angeles County will, in general, hold views of marine water quality that are at odds with information on bacteriological proportions of water quality gathered by nearby disinfection areas (and detailed by not-revenue driven Heal the Bay). Rundown consequences of a study of 400 arbitrarily picked family units in Los Angeles County are given. Respondents received some information about their seashore use and impression of natural quality: waterfront water quality and air quality. The outcomes recommend that the view of waterfront water quality might be affected less and more by the media. Overall trash pollution in Los Angeles needs an action to prevent from our air to be more contaminated and help our communities.

References

A California Dream: Less Plastic in the Ocean. (2019, August 27). Retrieved October 27, 2020, from  

         https://www.ppic.org/blog/a-california-dream-less-plastic-in-the-ocean/

LA River Index. (n.d.). Retrieved October 27, 2020, from http://riverlareports.riverla.org/public-health-

and-social-equity/pollution/

Ho, A., & Cook, D. (n.d.). Retrieved October 10, 2020, from https://dpw.lacounty.gov/prg/stormwater/Page_20.cfm

Pendleton, L., Martin, N., & Webster, D. (2001, November 27). Public Perceptions of Environmental Quality: A Survey Study of Beach Use and Perceptions in Los Angeles County. Retrieved October 30, 2020, from https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0025326X0100131X

Künzli, N., McConnell, R., & Bates, D. (2003). Breathless in Los Angeles: The Exhausting Search for Clean Air. American Journal of Public Health, 93(9), 1494–1499. https://doi-org.mimas.calstatela.edu/10.2105/AJPH.93.9.1494

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