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Concerned Citizens 355 for failure to provide adequate health and environmental safeguards in a dense and diverse community that has long suffered from environmental degradation and discrimination.”76 CCSCLA also gave birth to a new generation of young “Toxic Crusaders .” In 2000 Fabiola Tostado (16), Maria Perez (16), and Nevada Dove (19) prevented Jefferson Middle School from opening for a full academic school year when the trio (who worked part-time at CCSCLA) publicized their findings that their school was “built on a toxic land that had once been used for munitions and other manufacturing, land whose emissions might cause illnesses ranging from the minor to the potentially fatal.”77 In many ways, the emergence of this new generation of grassroots environmental activists paralleled Cannon’s politicization within the Black Panther Party. CCSCLA had become a conduit where intergenerational political efficacy could be transmitted. When asked if she believed that CCSCLA was filling the organizational void left by the demise of 1960s and 1970s community organizations, Cannon was unequivocal: When the Panther’s died, black political activism in my community died. CCSCLA is awakening the old and new guard in our community to confront the same issues that plagued our neighborhood in the 1960s and 1970s. But this time, no matter how hard the dominant system tries to get rid of us, we’re [CCSCLA] not going anywhere!78 N o t e s 1. Concerned Citizens of South Central Los Angeles, “Developmental Fact Sheet,” Los Angeles, 2008. See also Concerned Citizens of South Central Los Angeles , “CCSCLA Services: Environmental,” CCSCLA, 2009, http://www.ccscla.org/ environ.htm. 2. Robin Cannon revealed that during the 1960s, she was a volunteer for the Los Angeles chapter of the Black Panther Party’s (BPP) Free Breakfast Program. She also states that CCSCLA’s first official office was located in the former building of the BPP (interview by author, December 6, 2008). 3. Concerned Citizens of South Central Los Angeles, “CCSCLA Services: Environmental .” 4. Connie Koenenn, “South-Central Stops an Incinerator,” Los Angeles Times, December 23, 1991, 4. 5. See Janet Wilson, “California has Largest Number of Minorities Near Hazardous Waste,” Los Angeles Times, April 12, 2007, B1. The article notes that a study 356 Sonya Winton found California to have the highest concentration of minorities living near hazardous waste facilities and that Greater Los Angeles “tops the nation with 1.2 million people living less than two miles from 17 such facilities, and 91 [percent] of them, or 1.1 million, are minorities.” Also see Building a Regional Voice for Environmental Justice Collaborative, “Building a Regional Voice.” 6. Reynolds, “LANCER and the Vernon Incinerator,” 95. 7. By the term “mainstream environmental groups,” I mean environmental groups that disproportionately focus on environmental policies concerning preservation and conservation issues. The leadership positions within these organizations are comprised predominantly of white men from privileged socioeconomic backgrounds and the constituent base is also composed of white citizens who are middle- to upper-middle class. 8. Cronon, Uncommon Ground, 299. 9. Ibid. 10. Robin Cannon states that indigenous institutions such as the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, National Urban League, Southern Christian Leadership Conference, and black churches were resistant to their claims of environmental exploitation and thus refused to provide them with resources in order to aid in the creation of their local community organization (interview by author, December 6, 2008). See Winton, All Things Being Equal. 11. Cronon, Uncommon Ground, 299. 12. Bullard, Dumping in Dixie, 23. 13. See Bullard, Dumping in Dixie; Dowie, Losing Ground; Taylor, “Race, Class, Gender and American Environmentalism”; Bullard, Confronting Environmental Racism; Taylor, “Can the Environmental Movement Attract and Maintain”; and Winton, All Things Being Equal. 14. See Winton, All Things Being Equal. 15. Lester, Allen, and Hill, Environmental Injustice in the United States, 25. 16. See Massey and Denton, American Apartheid. 17. Lester, Allen, and Hill, Environmental Injustice in the United States, 25–26. 18. See Gianessi, Peskin, and Wolff, “The Distributional Effects of Uniform Air Pollution Policy”; Asch and Seneca, “The Incidence of Automobile Pollution Control”; Freeman, “Air Pollution and Property Values.” 19. Cole and Foster, From the Ground Up, 30. 20. President Carter appointed a number of key environmental leaders from leading environmental groups to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the Department of Interior (DOI), and the Justice Department. This inside access consolidated “leading environmental group’s influence over environmental policy making to such a degree that one publicly pronounced, ‘before, we filed lawsuits and...

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