Environmental Justice, Sylvania Heights and WE Combs Community

Sylvania Heights and WE Combs, a designated Front Porch Florida Community, Brownfield area, and Opportunity Zone.The designations are a community revitalization and development initiative used as a means to rebuild distressed and underserved communities. Located immediately adjacent to the residential neighborhood are an industrial park and several manufacturing and waste management sites. Because

the community suffers from nonexistent or inadequate stormwater facilities, heavy floodwaters wash through adjacent contaminated industrial areas and carry pollutants through residential neighborhoods, where floodwaters ultimately collect and settle. The lack of an adequate stormwater system also causes severe flooding of the bordering Gap Creek which, when it overflows, presents a threat to both the health and property of the Lovejoy residents. It has become obvious in the Lovejoy community that a whole host of environmental issues exist, some of which have not been fully discovered or investigated. Some of those issues include alleged former dumpsites being used as stormwater retention ponds, former contaminated landfills further polluting stormwater runoff and perhaps the residential community, and neighboring sites known to have leaked petroleum or other harmful chemicals into the neighborhood and stormwater system. In addition to these very substantial environmental issues, the community also faces abandoned or substandard housing and other problems.Under a grant and partnership with Florida A&M University, the GSHFP and WildLaw initiated a community health assessment study working with an intern from FAMU who has a public health education and background. The purpose of this assessment was to assist in determining the specific health and environmental issues facing the community. As evidenced by these and other surveys, the community is suffering from an alarmingly high cancer rate, and other very serious health problems.