Unlike too many Americans, my family has always had access to a basic human right: clean air. 

But, in 2010, an unthinkable announcement threatened the residents of my Massachusetts suburb: a toxic asphalt plant would be moving into town. Within days, flimsy “NO ASPHALT” yard signs sprang up, and fierce legal battles ensued, enough to hamper the asphalt plant’s plans. 

By contrast, until 2019 in the Grays Ferry neighborhood of Philadelphia, a massive 150-year oil refinery “seemed like part of the landscape,” according to one observer. Despite protests from residents, the Philadelphia City Council voted unanimously to develop the refinery. The refinery only closed, a week after those protests, when a major explosion rocked the plant, launching school bus-sized metal slabs across the Schuylkill River. Most importantly, it drew attention to severely high levels of a cancer-causing gas. 

By the time the Philadelphia refinery closed, Kilynn Johnson and Sylvia Bennet, two residents there, had already tallied over 24 sick or dead loved ones due to pollution-induced cancer. Meanwhile, my town continued to enjoy access to clean air.

The reason for these differences? The asphalt plant knew that it’s historically unheard of to dump toxins in predominantly white, middle-class communities, like my town. Unfortunately, it’s customary to place the burdens of air pollution on low-income minorities like Kilyn and Sylvia, who have suffered from years of residential segregation and can’t afford to move. African Americans suffer a 54% higher burden from air pollution than the overall population; those in poverty, 35% higher. This is completely unacceptable.

There is only one way to achieve air pollution equality: enact widespread, targeted environmental justice policies, beginning at the local level. Policymakers can learn from Baltimore, where one ban on new crude oil storage facilities reverses the racist concentration of pollutants, protecting 165,000 minority residents. Policymakers can also learn from Minneapolis, which imposes fees to incentivize emissions reductions within minority communities; in one year, this policy decreased carbon emissions by six million pounds.

Many companies and politicians fear that these policies will hurt the economy; but, according to one study, these policies lead to no net losses in employment. Furthermore, the economic benefits of environmental policies, such as fewer pollution-related healthcare visits, far exceed the costs.

Air pollution is a social justice issue and needs to be treated like one. By voting and holding your elected representatives accountable, this issue is in your hands; it’s urgent that you demand environmental justice policies. One policy can prevent innocent residents from endless suffering and the fear of devastating diagnoses. We must be in the fight against air pollution together, because no one deserves to reap the profits of pollution at the cost of marginalized communities’ wellbeing.