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2001 UEI Community Grant Program
The UEI Community Grant Program is one of EPA New England’s key actions to support the creation of healthy urban communities through restoration and revitilization, smarter patterns of growth, and improving the quality of life and public health for urban residents.
Application Guidance
2001 UEI Community Grant Program (PDF) (17 pp., 141 KB, about PDF)
GRANTEE SUMMARIES
Boston
Alternatives for Community and Environment,
Inc. (ACE)
Roxbury Environmental Empowerment Project: Developing Tomorrow’s
Leaders $20,000
The goal of the Roxbury Environmental Empowerment Project (REEP) is to support the development of youth leadership and the organization around environmental justice and public health issues in Roxbury, MA. The primary target constituency for this project are diverse, multi-cultural youth from Roxbury, MA ages 10 to 21. Since its inception in 1995, REEP has reached and engaged over 1,500 local urban youth and has renovated two parks and informed and educated local youth and residents about the environmental links to asthma, ambient air quality, and indoor air quality. REEP combines education on environment and public health issues with hands-on community experience. REEP’s program has five components, all of which prepare and encourage youth to organize and advocate for their own and their community’s well being: Environmental Justice Curriculum, In-School Program, Internships, Leadership Training Program, and Community Organizing, Workshops, and Events.
Measures of Success: REEP will engage approximately 300 youth through its In-School Program and additional out-of-school workshops and educate them on the issues of asthma, indoor air quality, ambient air quality, and environmental justice. REEP will work with 4-5 youth through its Internship Program and provide in-depth training on environment and public health issues so these youth can serve as peer leaders and trainers for others. Through educational and organizing activities, REEP’s work will inspire thousands of neighborhood residents (both youth and adult) who attend workshops, events, rallies, and read about the work through media coverage.
Project Partners: Roxbury Elementary Schools and the T Riders Union.
The Food Project
Urban Agriculture and Capacity Building $25,000
The Food Project responds to locally-articulated, high-priority environmental justice issues through its community-based urban agriculture and capacity-building initiatives. The Food Project will train, educate, and employ urban youth from Roxbury and Dorchester to practice sustainable urban agriculture and integrated pest management on its urban vacant lots that have been reclaimed as small farms including the West Cottage Street Lot. The youth, Food Project staff, and community residents will work together to learn about environmental hazards including lead poisoning and pesticide contamination, and will be taught safe and sustainable techniques including integrated pest management and other pesticide-free techniques in urban food production. The goal of the project is to increase community capacity to create a safe, pesticide-free urban food system throughout greater citizen, corporate, and environmental group engagement and action.
Measures of Success: Youth, staff, and residents will work to produce 15,000 pounds of healthy food and make the food available to residents for sale at low-cost neighborhood markets. A Demonstration Day will be held at the West Cottage Street Lot and will educate approximately 100 neighborhood gardeners about safe and sustainable agricultural practices and distribute approximately100 yards of compost.
Project Partners: Dudley Street Neighborhood Initiative
Neighborhood of Affordable Housing
Chelsea Creek Master Planning/Visioning Process & Comparative
Risk
Assessment Action Agenda $30,000
Chelsea Creek is considered the most polluted, least accessible part of the Boston Harbor Watershed. The Creek runs through densely populated, low-income, minority communities, Instead of providing the benefits of a natural resource, most of the Chelsea Creek is zoned a “Designated Port Area” which limits public access by focusing on dedicating the land adjacent to the Creek solely for industrial water-dependent uses. The target audience for this project will be East Boston and Chelsea residents and other interested stakeholders. This project will engage public input to educate, inform, and empower citizens with environment and public health information related to ambient air quality, water quality, open/green space, asthma and respiratory ailments, noise, and traffic. This project will bring residents together with other stakeholders to create a community-based master plan to help improve dialogue with industry about change needed for the Creek; leverage resources from polluting businesses and other entities to develop safe public access and open spaces; prepare residents to participate in the municipal harbor planning process; and impact zoning decisions.
Measures of Success: Identify and prioritize areas for open space and harborwalks along the Chelsea Creek. Educate and empower hundreds of local residents on environment and public health issues. Protect, restore, and maintain urban wetlands and promote a balanced use of the waterfront.
Project Partners: Chelsea Green Space and Recreation Committee, Chelsea Creek Action Group, Campaign for the Water’s Edge, Greater Boston Urban Resources Partnership, MA Riverways, MA Environmental Trust, The Watershed Institute, MA Executive Office of Environmental Affairs, MIT, and Tufts University.
Trustees of Tufts College
Urban Healthy Communities: Promoting Children’s Health by
Reducing
Asthma and Lead Poisoning $29,996
The interaction of health and environment has become a central focus for urban communities, with lead poisoning and asthma ranking as the most pressing issues according to various surveys. The New England Lead Coordinating Committee (NELCC), the Asthma Regional Council (ARC), and the Urban Environmental Initiative (UEI) are three regional collaboratives made up of community, public and advocacy organizations, and government partners working directly to address the health outcomes while building sustainable urban communities. One task towards this goal is to build off the successes of the past and to start partnerships with communities and organizations across the state just beginning to work on these issues. Bringing new groups into these collaboratives and supporting them is a critical part of this task. Other important components include continuing to evaluate, document, and share the successes of maturing communities/program efforts, and to continue community needs assessment to ensure community, state and local priorities remain the focus of collaborative efforts.
Measures of Success: Host community listening sessions to expand the voices of new groups into the NELCC, ARC, and UEI. Distribute results of previous evaluation efforts through collaboratives. Develop with community partners additional evaluative tools, including surveys, key informant interviews, as well as review of health and environmental outcomes data to identify trends and areas for intervention. Document on-going collaborative and community efforts on asthma and lead with a central coordination point.
Project Partners: New England Lead Coordinating Committee, Asthma Regional Council, and the Urban Environmental Initiative.
New Ecology, Inc.
Green CDCs Initiative $4,400
New Ecology, Inc. is a nonprofit environmental organization that promotes economic development in distressed urban communities throughout New England by using law, planning, education, and advocacy to help implement development projects that are economically viable and socially and environmentally responsible. The Green Community Development Corporations (CDCs) Initiative project seeks to create a results-driven network of “green” community development groups and projects to: (1) Share sustainable development strategies and successes among CDCs and other stakeholders; (2) Establish CDCs as a bona fide environmental constituency, creating new partnerships and coalitions and bridging the divide between environmental protection and community development goals; (3) Provide CDCs access to technical assistance, financial resources and academic programs to advance sustainable development projects; (4) Help develop new policy and financial tools to assist in greening CDCs; and (5) Raise awareness among a larger public about the benefits and advantage of sustainable urban development.
Measures of Success: Green CDC three year work plan focused on green design guidelines, zoning and building, economic development plans, and ways to improve access to public transit facilities. Briefing papers on a series of environment and public health related topics for community residents, environmental groups, and other CDCs. Public workshops on Green Development.
Project Partners: MA Association of Community Development Corporations (MACDC), Tellus Institute, Fenway Community Development Corporation (FCDC), Dudley Street Neighborhood Initiative (DSNI), Dorchester Bay Economic Development Corporation (DBEDC).
Neighborhood Planning Association of
Back Bay
Community Education for Participation in Transportation Planning
(Joint Project with Livable Communities) $40,000
One of the most serious failures of current development planning, in Boston as in most other American municipalities, is a dearth of transportation planing for equitable access to mobility resources and for sustainable development. Members of the Association of Boston Neighborhoods and other residents active in planning issues have conducted research in an effort to provide informed, constructive input to the public process. These community members are a repository of a large body of knowledge and a resource for finding solutions to planning problems. The objective of this project is to bring the knowledge of community members together in a forum of education sessions and reports.
Measures of Success: Identification and interpretation of existing data by public and private agencies. Conducting and compiling primary research. Presentation of research via citizen-produced forums, workshops, and reports on transportation as it relates to environmental and environmental justice impacts.
EPA Partners: Association of Boston Neighborhoods
The Freedom House
Greater Boston Urban Resources Partnership $80,000
The Freedom House and the Greater Boston Urban Resources partnership
have joined forces to spend the next year creating a sustainable
upscale plan to service urban communities throughout the State of
Massachusetts. This effort will build off successes and experiences
of the past and encourage creative solutions to issues impacting
Greater Boston’s urban environment through inter-disciplinary
financial and technical support. Specifically, the objectives of
the partnership are to preserve, promote, and enhance Greater Boston’s
urban environment through community-based projects; address social,
economic, and environmental concerns of low-income neighborhoods
and communities of color through environmental activities across
Massachusetts; and broaden depth and breadth of technical and financial
services on urban environment and public health work in targeted
cities and neighborhoods in urban areas across Massachusetts.
Measures of Success: Meeting minutes and attendee lists of meetings with project partners, survey members and recipients. Final vision and work plan for future Massachusetts Urban Resource Partnership.
Providence
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Childhood Lead Action Program |
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Northern Rhode Island Conservation District |
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Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management |
Childhood Lead Action Project
Rhode Island Lead Collaborative $30,000
The Childhood Lead Action Project has been the primary resource for lead poisoning education in Providence. This year, the Project will continue to support the Rhode Island Lead Collaborative which was formed to coordinate the efforts of lead poisoning prevention programs throughout the state. This will include distribution of program information and materials as well as technical assistance and training. The Project will seek to expand the outreach capacity in Newport and Woonsocket, two at-risk communities, by holding training forums for community organizations. Regular bi-monthly meetings will also be held to provide the opportunity for support and collaboration between different groups.
Measure of Success: Attendance at Collaborative meetings and training sessions. Re-contact of workshop participants to determine if training was successful and materials are being distributed. Documentation of any collaborative efforts involving stakeholders.
Project Partners: Childhood Lead Action Project, Rhode Island Housing, Housing Resources Commission, VNA of Rhode Island, Department of Health, Rhode Island Youth Guidance Center, City of Pawtucket.
Northern Rhode Island Conservation District
Do’s and Don’ts for the Woonasquatucket River: Urban
Rivers Team-Health & Education Subcommittee $18,400
The Do’s and Don’ts campaign has worked for three years
to educate the community about the appropriate uses of the Woonasquatucket
River. This project will continue the effort to increase public
awareness of the environmental and public health issues surrounding
the river as well as community involvement and stewardship of the
river and surrounding watershed. Two new programs will be included:
a poster contest for third grade students and a sponsorship campaign
which will involve local businesses. The NRICD will also continue
in-classroom educational presentations and distribution of multi-lingual
brochures.
Measure of Success: Teacher evaluations. Pre and post tests of students to evaluate value of presentations. Evaluation of the poster contest via questionnaires.
Project Partners: Northern Rhode Island Conservation District, Urban Rivers Team: Health and Education Subcommittee, Woonasquatucket River Greenway Project, Socio-Economics for South East Asians, Genesis Center, Paddle Providence, USDA Natural Resources Conservation Services.
Rhode Island Department of Environmental
Management
Smart Growth Training Manual for Urban Areas in Rhode Island (Joint
Project with Livable Communities) $40,000
The goal of the Rhode Island Urban Environmental Design Manual is to promote environmentally responsible urban revitalization and in-fill development by providing guidance to local officials, the development community, community groups, and the public. The manual will provide information on appropriate and cost-effective techniques to address such issues as stormwater runoff, hazardous waste, riparian buffer development, intermodal transportation, and open space protection in an urban setting. The manual will also serve to facilitate brownfields redevelopment by providing tools, including design scenarios and ordinances, promoting urban redevelopment at brownfields and other sites. Additionally, The Urban Environmental Design Manual will complement the South County Design Manual, a manual that focused on creative development in the rural and suburban areas of Rhode Island. The Urban Environmental Design Manual will be available on the internet, presented at public meetings, and incorporated into the curriculum of the Planning Institute.
Measures of Success: Production of the Urban Environmental Design Manual.
Hartford
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Saint Francis Hospital and Medical Center, Hartford Regional Lead Treatment Center |
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Hartford Public Schools |
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Hartford Health Department |
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Connecticut Department of Environmental Protection |
Saint Francis Hospital and Medical Center,
Hartford Regional Lead Treatment Center
Healthy Homes Project Collaboration with School Based Clinic $30,000
The Hartford Regional Lead Treatment Center (HRTLC) provides comprehensive
treatment, education, temporary lead, asthma and injury safe housing,
and housing relocation to regional at risk children and their families.
To date no other organization in Hartford has worked on home visitation
and housing modification or relocation for asthmatic children. Community
outreach staff conduct home assessments, provide home-based education
on environmental triggers and help reduce allergens to promote healthy
homes. Last year HRTLC intensified their lead and asthma education
and outreach component of Healthy Homes with the addition of a nurse
to the project team. Children with lead levels between 10 - 19 ug/dL
were targeted for close follow-up and strict home intervention.
Families with children that have severe or poorly controlled asthma
received home based medical support and consultation. This year,
HRTLC will partner with the Betances Elementary School an urban
public school in Hartford, CT. Children attending this elementary
school are largely from families who are economically disadvantaged.
(97% of the children qualify for the federal free lunch program.)
The school nurse estimates that 1 in 4 children in the school has
been diagnosed with asthma.
HRLTC will work with school staff to enhance the home-based management
of asthma and lead exposure and ultimately decrease school absenteeism
and hospital emergencies.
Measures of Success: Identify at risk Betances school children and refer them to Healthy Homes; conduct home visits to assess asthma triggers and/or lead exposure; provide recommendations for remediation measures in home; document the extent to which “Healthy Homes” contributes to asthma control and decreased school absenteeism; and document the extent to which lead poisoning prevention education and intervention results in lowered blood lead levels.
EPA Partners: Hartford Regional Lead Treatment Center, Connecticut Children’s Medical Center; Betances Elementary School; Connecticut Citizen’s Research Group.
Hartford Public Schools
Indoor Air Quality in Hartford Schools: A Model to Incorporate Tools
For Schools $30,000
Hartford is an urban community whose population is 38% Hispanic, 37% Black, and 22% non-Hispanic Caucasian. Hartford’s public schools are located in the poorest neighborhoods within Hartford, one of the poorest cities in the United States. A compilation of data collected by school nurses indicates that the prevalence of asthma and other respiratory illness among Hartford children ranges from 6 - 22% within the public schools. Through training of school based Health Safety Teams and implementation of Tools for Schools, this project over the next two years will evaluate and provide a vehicle to change the indoor air quality conditions in participating schools.
Measures of Success: Institutionalization of the Tools for Schools (TfS) process into the normal operational process of the Hartford Public Schools; integration of an environmental assessment component to the health services system; implementation of TfS train-the-trainer sessions; documentation of building conditions and remediation efforts to serve as a model for other school districts.
EPA Partners: University of Connecticut Health Center, Division of Occupational and Environmental Medicine, CT Department of Public Health, Environmental Epidemiology and Occupational Health, CT School Indoor Environments Resource Team.
Hartford Health Department
Public Awareness in Asthma Outreach Campaign $30,000
The Hartford Health Department has expanded its scope in pursuit of a more comprehensive objective which is to ensure that the residents of Hartford are healthy and free from disease and health risks. The Department is deeply committed to developing public health standards, providing preventative care, gathering and evaluating outcomes data, and collaborating with other agencies and academe. Through this project, the HHD will respond to the City of Hartford’s declaration of an Asthma Emergency in the City of Hartford. HHD in partnership with the Hartford Environmental Justice Network, will initiate a grassroots citywide public awareness campaign and comprehensive asthma outreach effort.
Measures of Success: Implementation of a mass public awareness campaign on asthma, launch a multimedia education campaign, develop a curriculum and community based speaker’s bureau.
EPA Partners: Hartford Environmental Justice Network, Asthma Call to Action task Force, Connecticut Coalition to End Homelessness, Building Parent Power, and Council of City Churches.
Connecticut Department of Environmental
Protection
Smart Growth Training for Neighborhood, Business & Community
Leaders
(Joint Project with Livable Communities) $40,000
Connecticut DEP, in partnership with Hartford 2000 and the Neighborhood Training Institute, will develop and implement a model smart growth training program for Hartford communities and business leaders active in strategic planning for their urban environmental justice communities. The Smart Growth-Hartford 2000 training program will begin to improve the environment and/or public health in Hartford by addressing both the opportunities and obstacles to smart growth initiatives in the neighborhoods, particularly in the areas of transportation, zoning, open space, urban runoff, river pollution and green/healthy housing. Training products developed through this program will be transferred to other urban communities.
Measures of Success: Thirty-five to fifty grassroots leaders trained in smart growth, inclusion of smart growth principles in neighborhood strategic plans, and/or implementation plans, examples of proposed revitalization, and proposals for new or reclaimed housing that is environmentally healthy and/or energy conserving.
EPA Partners: Hartford 2000, Hartford Neighborhood Environmental Project, and the Neighborhood Training Institute