(The following story by David Danelski appeared on The Press-Enterprise website on September 3, 2010.)
SAN BERNARDINO, Calif. — Loma Linda University’s public health school will collaborate with an environmental group to gather health information from people living near the BNSF railway yard in San Bernardino.
A state analysis two years ago found that, of all the rail yards in California, the San Bernardino facility presented the greatest cancer risk to nearby residents.
The School of Public Health study expects to piece together a picture of the community’s health by training people who live in the west San Bernardino neighborhood to go door to door to gather health histories and conduct respiratory tests, said Susanne Montgomery, social epidemiologist and director of the school’s Center for Health Research.
The workers will canvass 900 homes — once starting in January and again a year later — and gather health information from children at two elementary schools in the same area.
Loma Linda will work with the Center for Community Action and Environmental Justice, based in Glen Avon. The environmental group has been helping residents in the San Bernardino neighborhood seek pollution reductions from the busy rail yard and other sources.
The survey will be funded with a grant of about $900,000 from the South Coast Air Quality Management District, including compensation for as many as 10 people who will gather the information, she said.
The workers will be recruited by the environmental group under a contract with Loma Linda.
Lena Kent, a BNSF spokeswoman, said in an e-mail that she was surprised an advocacy group would be involved, “rather than an independent professional.”
“It would be unfortunate for the entire community if such conditions compromised the credulity of the work,” she said in the e-mail.
Montgomery said hiring people from the community to conduct the door-to-door surveys would make it more thorough.
Residents are more to likely to participate and share their medical histories if it is their neighbors knocking on the door.
“They will be rigorously trained,” Montgomery said. “They can’t go out until they are certified.”
Participants will be asked to list illnesses diagnosed by a physician, as well as ailments — such coughs and headaches — for which they may not have sought medical help. Workers also will conduct simple tests to determine lung strength and whether inflammation is present.
Researchers will keep participants’ identities confidential, and only statistical and summary information will be published, Montgomery said. The study’s methods will be vetted by a university ethics panel next week.
Penny Newman, executive director of the community action group, said the study will the give policymakers information they need to make informed decisions.
The busy rail yard is a regional hub where cargo is transferred to and from trains and big-rig trucks.
In June, the California Air Resources Board approved a voluntary agreement with BNSF to reduced diesel emissions from the San Bernardino yard from the 22.4 tons a year estimated in 2005 to 3.4 tons a year by 2020.
Officials with the South Coast air district criticized the plan, because, in 2020, it still would leave the neighborhood with a cancer risk equivalent to 400 cases per million residents.
BNSF has cut emissions at the rail yard in half since 2005, Kent said, “and we continue to make investments to cut emissions even further.”