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A Toxic Tour of Little Village

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Editor’s Note: The following story was written by a student in our first-ever Eco Youth Reporters program, conducted in conjunction with award-winning journalist Kari Lydersen, Michigan State University’s Knight Center for Environmental Journalism, and Imagine Englewood If, a youth services organization based in that South Side neighborhood. The Eco Youth Reporters program is generously funded by the McCormick Foundation:

On July 13, 2011 we went to Little Village for a “Toxic Tour.” There were five teenagers and one grown woman taking us on a tour to show us the Crawford coal plant, the plastics recycling company MRC Polymers, Meyer Steel Drum and a garden at a school, so they could tell us what environmental issues are going on around Little Village.

The organization is the Little Village Environmental Justice Organization (LVEJO). Our tour guides were Brenda Becerra, 18, Maira Galvan, 17, Viviana Galvan, 19, Daniela Jurado, 19, Hannah Weinstein, 20, and Carolina Macias, 18.

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Little Village Toxic Tour

by  

Editor’s Note: The following story was written by a student in our first-ever Eco Youth Reporters program, conducted in conjunction with award-winning journalist Kari Lydersen, Michigan State University’s Knight Center for Environmental Journalism, and Imagine Englewood If, a youth services organization based in that South Side neighborhood. The Eco Youth Reporters program is generously funded by the McCormick Foundation:

The smoke stacks of the Crawford coal plant in Little Village look like giant chimneys. This is one of many pollution sources in Little Village, a small, mostly Mexican neighborhood on the Southwest Side that is affected by a lot of pollution and where finding a job is very hard.

Eco Youth reporters Makylia Anderson and Tyreshia Black reporting in Little Village. Photo by Kari Lydersen.

During a “Toxic Tour” with the Little Village Environmental Justice Organization (LVEJO), we saw different polluting industries including MRC, a plastics recycling plant that melts down car bumpers and other things. LVEJO has had many meetings about MRC.

Many people report breathing problems and there are also high rates of cancer, according to LVEJO, in the area around MRC and another facility, Meyer Steel Drum.

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Categories: Homepage UYIJP