CONTACT: Laura Baker

(661) 720-9140

lbaker@CRPE-EJ.org

Residents Reveal Valley Ozone Plan as a Rouse

Residents in the country’s worst ozone polluted air basin speak out, urging EPA to deny approval of the San Joaquin Valley Air Pollution Control District’s proposed ozone plan. Members of various Kern county community groups, including the Committee for a Better Arvin (CBA), the Association of Irritated Residents (AIR), and the Comité Residentes Organizados al Servicio del Ambiente Sano (ROSAS), will gather in Arvin – the most ozone polluted city in the United States – on Monday, October 17, 2011 at 11:30 AM to voice their opposition to EPA’s proposed approval of an ozone clean-up plan that will fail to deliver clean air to Arvin and the rest of the Valley as required by the Clean Air Act, their frustration with the Air District’s recent illegal relocation of a local air monitor, and their commitment to seeking justice through independent air quality monitoring.

WHO: The Committee for a Better Arvin will host the press conference. CBA President, Salvador Partida, AIR President, Tom Frantz, and Laura Baker attorney at the Center on Race, Poverty & the Environment (CRPE), the organization representing the groups, will speak at the event.

WHEN: October 17, 2011 at 11:30 AM.

WHERE: Di Giorgio County Park, 601 Meyer Street, in Arvin, CA.

WHY: Sick of living in unhealthy ozone pollution, Valley residents want the truth revealed. The Valley Air District’s and California Air Resource Board’s (ARB’s) recent proposal to the U.S. EPA to attain the 8-hour ozone standard, the minimum level of ozone deemed to be healthy, fails to cure this public health crisis and violates the Clean Air Act. Rather than allowing the air district, ARB, and U.S. EPA to sweep this problem under the rug, yet again, residents are demanding real solutions, speaking out against the recent relocation of the Arvin air monitor, and committing to start their own monitoring project with the help of Global Community Monitor. For more information on the Bucket Brigade project, contact Ruth Breech, 510-233-1870, at Global Community Monitor.

THE CENTER ON RACE, POVERTY & THE ENVIRONMENT is America’s oldest and largest environmental justice legal organization. The Center has been providing legal and technical assistance to the grassroots movement for environmental justice for 20 years. For more information, please call 415-346-4179 and visit our website at www.CRPE-EJ.ORG.

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