The Los Angeles Regional Water Quality Control Board will host a community meeting from 6 p.m to 8 p.m. Wednesday, May 16th, at the Enterprise Park Gymnasium, located at 13055 Clovis Avenue in Willowbrook. The purpose of the meeting is to provide an update on the environmental investigation underway at Ujima Village, Magic Johnson Park and the surrounding residential communities. The Water Board will discuss the results of the investigation to date and describe next steps to be taken.
Officials from the State of California’s Department of Toxics Substance Control and the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health also will be there to answer questions from the public.
Click here for Meeting Notice in English.
Click here for Meeting Notice in Spanish.
The Department of Health Services (DHS) recently held an outreach and healthcare enrollment event for former residents of the Ujima Village housing complex in Willowbrook. The evening event was a follow-up to the well-attended community meeting with Supervisor Mark Ridley-Thomas last November. During that meeting, held at the Martin Luther King, Jr. Center for Public Health, some residents asserted that they suffered from ailments and conditions that began during their residency at Ujima Village, but that they lacked the means to obtain medical examinations.
In response to their concerns, the Supervisor arranged to have 450 of the complex’s former residents invited to the public health center, where DHS representatives screened them for eligibility in Los Angeles County’s program for low-income residents, Healthy Way LA.
Healthy Way LA provides access to primary and specialty care, mental health services, prescription medications, and urgent care to residents who meet income guidelines; the chart below outlines eligibility requirements for the program.
About 20 people accepted the invitation and earlier this month received free one-on-one consultations and assistance in applying for health care coverage. Also, clients were screened for other public assistance programs such as CalFresh, the federally-funded nutrition assistance program, and Medi-Cal, California’s Medicaid program. With each Healthy Way LA enrollment, residents receive the health care they need and deserve and the Second District becomes a healthier community. For questions about the program or to enroll, please visit www.ladhs.org/hwla or call 1-877-333-4952.
More than 250 people attended an informational meeting held by Supervisor Mark Ridley-Thomas, to receive an update on the environmental investigation into oil-related contamination at the former Ujima Village apartment complex.
Officials from the Los Angeles Regional Water Board, the Los Angeles Community Development Commission, the Department of Parks and Recreation and the County Assessor’s Office also were on hand at the Martin Luther King, Jr. Center for Public Health in Willowbrook, to provide the standing-room only crowd an overview of the ongoing soil, water and air quality sampling and to answer questions and address concerns. At the meeting’s outset, the Supervisor emphasized that there will be a series of community meetings to follow and that he is focused on relocating Little Honey’s Day Care Center, which is adjacent to the Ujima Village site, as quickly as possible. The meeting was often heated, with audience members expressing strong frustration and anger about the contamination at the complex where many said they had lived for decades. The former village residents asked a variety of questions concerning their health, the longevity of the investigation, and what they individually need to do in order to ensure their statements are included in the investigation.
Among the audience members were parents of children who attend Honey’s Little Angel’s Child Care Center.
Lynwood resident Cindy Alvarado has a four-year-old daughter who attends the day care center and said she came to the meeting to have the rumors set straight. “I’m trying to find out if there are chemicals around the school,” Cindy said, “Some people are saying that its dangerous for kids to attend the daycare, others are not.”
At the meeting, Executive Officer, Samuel Unger of the Water Board said environmental testing determined that contamination was far below ground, and that air quality for the neighborhood was consistent with that of the region.
Director of Environmental Health, Angelo Bellomo of the Department of Public Health said that the contamination does not currently present a threat to human health at the daycare site or at the former site of the village, but most of the audience greeted that assertion with a high degree of skepticism.
Supervisor Ridley-Thomas emphasized that the experts were on hand to provide information to residents — not to tell them what to think.
Click here to download an FAQ from the Los Angeles Water Quality Control Board.
As many of you know, there is an ongoing environmental investigation taking place in Willowbrook related to oil contamination at the former Ujima Village and Magic Johnson Park.
After the old Athens Tank Farm was removed in the 1960s, contaminants were left in the soil. Soil sampling ordered by the Los Angeles Regional Water Board have all indicated that the present levels of chemicals in the soil are not dangerous to human health, but nonetheless I am concerned.
My primary focus right now is to see that the Water Board and ExxonMobile, which once owned the tank farm, come to an agreement to relocate the daycare center, Honey’s Little Angels Day Care, which is still on the grounds. Out of an abundance of caution, I believe it is better to just move the children. My office has found a new location in Willowbrook for the daycare center, and it is my hope that months of negotiations between the County, the Water Board and Exxon, will soon come to fruition.
However, this won’t be over once the children are moved. We must get to the bottom of this investigation and find out the facts.
I am committed to making sure that you stay informed about this process, and will be holding a community meeting at 6 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 30 at the newly opened Martin Luther King Jr. Center for Public Health. It is located on the corner of 119th St. and Wilmington Ave. in Willowbrook.
With me will be officials from the Water Board to give the community an update on the investigation. I will also have officials from the County Department of Public Health and Department of Parks and Recreation there.
Also, if individuals have health-related concerns, we want to know. I have asked the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health to set up a hotline specifically for concerns related to Ujima Village. You may call 211 and your call will be routed appropriately.
Please feel free to visit my website for more information – htttp://ridley-thomas.lacounty.gov. On the website you will also find a chronology and fact sheets related to the investigation.
I look forward to seeing you on November 30th.
Mark Ridley-Thomas
