Environmental History
EPA has a long history of environmental injustice and disinvestment, but also of powerful community efforts that have helped build the community we have today. This story starts from the long history of the Ramaytush Ohlone peoples in the area and continues through the present day. See below for more information on different parts of EPA’s environmental history.
Pollution and toxic sites
EPA has long had many toxic industrial facilities which have polluted the city for decades. From early in the 20th century, the area was the site of many factories which handled hazardous and toxic materials. One of the major sites was the county dump, located at what is now Cooley Landing, which burned trash from all across the county until 1963.
As the only predominantly Black and low-income community in the peninsula in the 20th century, many polluting factories inserted themselves into the area, exploiting the fact that the city had not incorporated yet and could do little to stop them. These facilities often operated irresponsibly and contaminated the soil, air, and water of the city with carcinogens, arsenic, and toxic “forever chemicals” all across the city. Only through the efforts of community organizing from groups including Youth United for Community Action have the worst polluters been shut down.
However, work continues on healing the polluted land to keep residents safe and put it to use for the community. The City is working with the US Environmental Protection Agency (the other EPA) to remove toxins from some sites, but more work remains. The City is also working to redevelop many former industrial sites along the bay as part of the Ravenswood Business District project which will include affordable housing and a new public park while helping to remediate polluted land.
Air pollution
The city has long faced much higher air pollution than surrounding areas. In addition to industrial facilities (see above), major highways such as the 101, University Ave, and Willow Rd are major sources of air pollution in the city.
In the early 20th century, the 101 was routed directly through EPA, despite resident requests that it be located along the bay. This cut the city in two and separated it from the surround area, especially since an overcrossing wasn’t installed for decades (leading to many fatal collisions). It was expanded in the 1950s, demolishing over 50 local businesses and increasing traffic on the highway leading to more air pollution in the city. When the state wanted to expand road access to the Dumbarton Bridge, surrounding cities blocked proposed routes through their land resulting in the expansion of University and Willow which increased both traffic and pollution in the city.
To this day, East Palo Alto has significantly higher asthma and respiratory disease rates than surrounding cities. Both the City and the state are working to improve air quality by expanding clean vehicles, reducing the amount of highly polluting trucks in the city, and planting trees along major highways to absorb some of the pollution.
Water access
The city has had a long string of challenges in getting enough water for its residents. When the City incorporated in 1983, Menlo Park blocked them from forming their own water district, and the City wasn’t able to gain control of its own water until 2000. The San Francisco Public Utilities Commission (SFPUC), from which nearly all bay area cities get their water, set maximum water use amounts for different cities and allocated 1.96 million gallons per day to the city. However, they didn’t account for the growth of the city and refused to redistribute the allocations despite the fact that the neighboring cities of Menlo Park and Palo Alto respectively received 2x and 3x as much water per person as EPA.
In 2016, the City was forced to place a ban on all new developments simply because there wasn’t any water left to supply them with. This blocked many important community projects including a 136-unit affordable housing project, a health clinic, a tuition-free school, and two major office building complexes. Together with developers, the City was forced to buy more water supply from Mountain View and Palo Alto at a price of $5 million. Even now that the moratorium has been lifted, many projects have been significantly delayed and of the projects mentioned above, only the affordable housing project (Colibrí Commons) has begun construction as of early 2024.
An added layer to this is the City’s water and sewer pipe system. Because maintenance was often neglected before the City incorporated in 1983, the City has a long backlog of old pipes that need to be upgraded or replaced, adding to issues with water reliability and costs.
