DUARTE, Calif. — Not far from where Ceci Carroll lives, a rock-mining company has polluted the air with dust across the San Gabriel Valley, she said.
Now, as crews clean charred remains from the Los Angeles wildfires, she worries about a new potential source of contamination: a site to process hazardous debris from the Eaton Fire.
“I’m concerned about the community and also the school districts here, where we have children,” said Carroll, a Duarte resident of 23 years and former local school board member.
Carroll is among residents from Duarte, Azusa and nearby cities opposing the Environmental Protection Agency’s use of Lario Park in Irwindale as a temporary site to separate, package and transport potentially hazardous materials from the Eaton Fire.
In ordinary times, people picnic, bike or ride horses on equestrian trails in the federally owned land. They now worry about dangerous waste that could pollute the air or groundwater.
The blazes that began on Jan. 7 charred thousands of buildings, cars and electronics across the Los Angeles area.
The EPA has begun the enormous task of removing potentially hundreds of tons of hazardous materials from the Eaton and Palisades fires. That includes paints, pesticides, solvents, compressed gas cylinders, ammunition and lithium-ion batteries from electric cars that could turn toxic when burned.
“The removal of these materials should not come at the cost of creating a toxic environment for communities already disproportionately impacted by pollution,” Los Angeles County Supervisor Hilda Solis said in a statement.
The mostly Latino communities adjacent to the site are exposed to higher levels of ozone and particulate matter pollution than other areas, according to data from the California Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment.
