Sep 28, 2026 · 29 min · 10 segments
In this episode of Flor Unmuted, Flor sits down with Emma De La Rosa, Land Use and Transportation Policy Manager with Leadership Counsel for Justice and Accountability, for a Central Valley-focused…
As somebody that's grown up, lived in a rural area of the Central Valley, I've always been curious about who's checking on death rates for cancer, death rates for chronic illnesses that develop for bad air or things of that sort.
Unfortunately, I think we have some gaps, especially on the health perspective.
We know that in Kern County, for example, we have Very high rates of valley fever, respiratory issues, but they're never often talked about under the context of what's causing that.
However, there is a really helpful tool called CalenBioScreen that identifies pollution burden and other demographic factors.
Characteristics for communities, and it provides a pollution burden score, which considers various intersectional pollution issues, such as, again, lead in the house, maybe proximity to toxic air contaminants or water contaminants, proximity to emission sources.
And this CalEnviroScreen tool does provide a very good snapshot view of the communities that are most, you know, burdened by pollution.
And in Kern County, we have very many, very many communities that are pollution burdened, particularly in the east side of Bakersfield.
For example, we have almost half of the east, sorry, Almost half of Bakersfield is facing pollution burden and are considered, you know, disadvantaged communities.
And on the east side, you can see that on the east of Highway 99, you can see that those communities are most impacted versus other communities on the west side.
And there's Looking at other geographic areas, you can see the disparities, very, very glaring disparities, where communities that are unincorporated especially are facing the vast majority of the pollution burden in our communities.
This might be a loaded question.
We hear often that the Central Valley is one of the biggest economic drivers for the state of California and even the nation.
How did we get here?
Yes, no, that's a really good question and a question that we must ask ourselves to ensure that we're not repeating the same patterns of land use practices and development that has created stark inequalities throughout the rural communities, throughout the rural Central Valley.
But to answer your question a little bit more specifically, again, it has to do with planning.
Historically, you know, redline communities, which were identified to be, you know, communities that were not worth investing into.
And a lot of the communities that we work with are facing the discriminatory impacts from land use decisions.
Like I mentioned, a lot of the communities that we work with are on the front lines of polluting industries.
And one would think, you know, that no one really wants to live next to a recycling center that has a risk of catching on fire, right? But unfortunately, historical land use decisions never really considered the impacts to low-income communities or communities of color.
And so as you're asking this question, you know, I think it's a great question that everyone is to ask themselves, especially if you're in a position where you are able to inform policy development, land use development, I mean, and budgets, because we definitely need to, you know, reverse the years of change.
As somebody that's grown up, lived in a rural area of the Central Valley, I've always been curious about who's checking on death rates for cancer, death rates for chronic illnesses that develop for bad air or things of that sort.
Unfortunately, I think we have some gaps, especially on the health perspective.
We know that in Kern County, for example, we have Very high rates of valley fever, respiratory issues, but they're never often talked about under the context of what's causing that.
However, there is a really helpful tool called CalenBioScreen that identifies pollution burden and other demographic factors.
Characteristics for communities, and it provides a pollution burden score, which considers various intersectional pollution issues, such as, again, lead in the house, maybe proximity to toxic air contaminants or water contaminants, proximity to emission sources.
And this CalEnviroScreen tool does provide a very good snapshot view of the communities that are most, you know, burdened by pollution.
And in Kern County, we have very many, very many communities that are pollution burdened, particularly in the east side of Bakersfield.
For example, we have almost half of the east, sorry, Almost half of Bakersfield is facing pollution burden and are considered, you know, disadvantaged communities.
And on the east side, you can see that on the east of Highway 99, you can see that those communities are most impacted versus other communities on the west side.
And there's Looking at other geographic areas, you can see the disparities, very, very glaring disparities, where communities that are unincorporated especially are facing the vast majority of the pollution burden in our communities.
This might be a loaded question.
We hear often that the Central Valley is one of the biggest economic drivers for the state of California and even the nation.
How did we get here?
Yes, no, that's a really good question and a question that we must ask ourselves to ensure that we're not repeating the same patterns of land use practices and development that has created stark inequalities throughout the rural communities, throughout the rural Central Valley.
But to answer your question a little bit more specifically, again, it has to do with planning.
Historically, you know, redline communities, which were identified to be, you know, communities that were not worth investing into.
And a lot of the communities that we work with are facing the discriminatory impacts from land use decisions.
Like I mentioned, a lot of the communities that we work with are on the front lines of polluting industries.
And one would think, you know, that no one really wants to live next to a recycling center that has a risk of catching on fire, right? But unfortunately, historical land use decisions never really considered the impacts to low-income communities or communities of color.
And so as you're asking this question, you know, I think it's a great question that everyone is to ask themselves, especially if you're in a position where you are able to inform policy development, land use development, I mean, and budgets, because we definitely need to, you know, reverse the years of change.
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