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By Xenia Hernandez, Daniella Montes and Samantha Gonzalez
It has been 17 years since Romic Environmental Technologies closed its doors for business in East Palo Alto, only after our organization, Youth United for Community Action (YUCA), mounted a 10+ year long campaign to Shut Romic Down! Today, the former Romic site sits mostly empty and, unfortunately, still contaminated by the chemical toxins that were once pumped into our water, soil and air without any accountability or regard for life in East Palo Alto. Residents neighboring the site continue to be negatively impacted by the aftermath of the chemical waste and yet there is no urgency from Romic, or pressure from the city, to make the clean up properly happen.
East Palo Alto is a low-income community that has historically and is continuously being gentrified and displaced. However, the city was once a thriving hub for green infrastructure, urban agriculture and diversity.
Along Bay Road, within the area currently outlined as our Ravenswood Business District (RBD), that was adopted in 2013, noticeable improvements have been made to the road and sidewalk. However, community members who we’ve spoken to have many unanswered questions and concerns about what is supposed to happen with the final open stretch of land of the former Romic site.
After YUCA’s landmark victory of shutting down the Romic toxic waste facility in 2007, our work transformed into helping inform the city planning process to decide what would be built in this area in the future. Our priority was to prevent any future environmental racism from occurring by ensuring that there would never be another facility poisoning our community and that whatever is built at the former Romic site in the future, truly serves the people of East Palo Alto. Working closely with our community coalition, Envision-Transform-Build East Palo Alto (ETB-EPA), a diverse group of ordinary residents, renters, youth, elders, faith-based groups, and more, we pushed the city of EPA to produce the Ravenswood Business District Specific Plan.
As our community continues to struggle with severe gentrification, the RBD plan was reopened by the City Council for revision in 2018 due to pressure from developers who want to build office space in this area. In our opinion, it is critical that ordinary residents, especially those of us who are not usually at the decision-making table, understand what is happening in the RBD area, ask hard questions about impacts to our community, and make our voice heard for what kind of things we want to see happen there.
Between the months of March and June of 2022, we took it upon ourselves to go out into the community and gather data around the RBD.
EPA has historically struggled in the past with developers trying to build too much office space despite these projects not always benefiting the community. For example, there have been instances in the past when developers want to bring in jobs that require degrees which the majority of EPA residents don’t have. The majority of jobs the RBD would generate right now are for class A office space. We are working to ensure that the jobs being offered are targeted for the community and the skillsets of our residents. This is why youth are so adamant about making sure what is being proposed is beneficial for our community and not merely the profit of outside business. After collecting and sorting the data from the surveys taken, the top three most desired community benefits are: affordable housing, jobs and neighborhood retail.
Even though the Specific Plan can bring prosperity, it has also started to generate some major concerns.
In January 2024 YUCA youth interviewed community members and asked them what their concerns were. Edwin Magaña said, “Ultimately my biggest fear is that the profits that these companies stand to earn from this project will not be seen by this community but the one they put on top of us. Right now it just looks like an attempt to put a Band-Aid on a severe wound that they are planning to cause.” Magaña’s concern shows that EPA community members are aware of the damage the RBD plan may cause.
Another apprehension came from Laura Rubio who said, “My concern is that these developments will displace existing families in EPA.” Displacement is a huge issue that’s been happening in EPA for years, so residents want to ensure it won’t be perpetuated by the RBD Specific Plan.
With groundwater on the rise, flooding has become more of a risk to residents. Though the ROMIC toxic waste facility was successfully shut down, the toxic chemicals are still under the ground, steeped in our soil. YUCA continues to put pressure on ROMIC to ensure that the remediation process is going smoothly. ROMIC has yet to give a date for when the soil will finally become nontoxic. The RBD plan can seem very complicated but at the end of the day all we want to see is an equitable and safe development plan that will benefit our community.
EPA changes slowly but surely every year, and it is our collective responsibility to be aware and participate in the city processes that determine this change.
Xenia Hernandez, Daniella Montes and Samantha Gonzalez are members of the nonprofit YUCA.
