Environmental Racism Report Overview
Full Report Available Here.
Black Saint Louisans are disproportionately affected by air pollution. Saint Louis as a whole has consistently registered failing grades for Ozone. If you live in a majority Black neighborhood you are much more likely to live near polluters and highways and much more likely to live near with building demolitions which stir harmful particulate matter into the air. This helps explain why members of the Black community are more likely to suffer from conditions exacerbated by air pollution such as lung disease, hypertension, and stroke.
Residents of the St. Louis region have long experienced high asthma rates. Within the region, the asthma burden is felt most heavily in the City of St. Louis. And within the City, the burden falls most heavily on Black residents. In 2015, Black children in St. Louis made 10.8 times more emergency room visits for asthma than did white children.
Black residents of St. Louis are almost twice as likely to have limited access to healthy food as white residents—11.9% of black residents compared to 6.3% of white residents. Food justice advocates have termed this phenomenon “food apartheid” to reflect the role of systemic racism in engineering this result.
Home energy costs refer to utilities like gas and electric, and home energy burden is the percentage of household income the utility bills take up. The burden of high home energy costs is felt disproportionately by low income and Black St. Louisans, as nearly 52% of low-income households and 48% of black households in St. Louis face energy burdens that are more than twice the citywide median. This energy burden is often created by inefficient housing and appliances. In rental properties, landlords have little incentive to make their properties more energy efficient because the cost is borne by the renter who pays the utility bills. Inability to pay utility bills can lead to housing insecurity and eviction. Further, high home energy bills may force people to keep their homes at unsafe temperatures or resort to dangerous measures to heat or cool their homes.
Illegal trash dumping poses health risks to communities due to the presence of harmful chemicals, sharp materials causing cuts and infections, the attraction of disease-carrying animals and insects, and trash, such as syringes, that may spread disease. In 2017, 22,000 tons of trash were illegally dumped on City streets and in alleys—compared to 9,000 tons of trash dropped off by individuals at the City’s two transfer stations. All six neighborhoods with the most illegal dumping complaints in 2017 were majority-black: Baden, Dutchtown, Greater Ville, Penrose, Walnut Park East, and Wells Goodfellow.
Childhood lead poisoning can cause permanent damage to the brain and nervous system, slowed growth and development, learning disabilities, behavioral and emotional problems, and aggression. Children in the City of St. Louis are twice as likely to have lead poisoning as children statewide in Missouri, and Black children are 2.4 times more likely than white children to test positive for lead in their blood. These disproportionate lead poisoning rates, chiefly resulting from exposure to lead paint and lead water pipes, are caused by building age, inadequate building maintenance, and other unsafe housing conditions.
In 2011 Saint Louis was the 6th worst city in the United States for those sensitive to mold, a statistic which can be largely attributed to conditions in majority Black neighborhoods. Nearly three quarters of wards with six or more interior mold complaints were majority Black. Mold is difficult to deal with because of the high costs of testing and remediation, especially because these costs often fall on the tenant due to lax landlord-tenant laws which allow landlords to skirt responsibility. In many cases, attempting to hold a landlord responsible will result in a lengthy legal battle with an uncertain outcome which is a prohibitively costly gamble for many Saint Louis residents.
Vacancy refers to property that is not occupied. Vacancy exposes communities to unsafe structures, illegal dumping, and an increased amount of pollutants. Vacancy also reduces property values of surrounding homes, drains taxpayer dollars, and is demoralizing to neighborhood residents. In St. Louis, more than 40% of the City's census tracts have at least 10% vacant properties, which makes St. Louis one of the worst “hypervacant cities” in the United States. The burdens of vacancy are felt most by Black communities in St. Louis, as 90% of vacant properties are in majority-Black neighborhoods.
The issues covered in this report are interconnected and are the result of generations of institutional racism and profiteering off the backs of the poor. A long and ongoing history of discrimination has left many black St. Louisans with limited access to quality housing, adequate public transit, and healthy food. The housing that is available exposes many residents to lead and mold. Inadequate insulation, leaky windows and doors, and inefficient appliances result in needlessly high energy bills that force too many tenants to choose between living in unsafe conditions or cutting back on necessities such as food and medicine.
ER Tool Kit