She stated, “People don’t think about what they breathe every single day.”
Johnson hopes to transform a vacant school in her Altgeld Gardens neighborhood of Chicago’s Far South Side, into a training center for environmental workers.
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She stated that she doesn’t have the workforce necessary to clean up the community that has been poisoned over so many years.
It’s only one of many projects designed to improve the health and environment of the community. Recently, PCR held a health fair in the housing community.
Their other priorities include conducting air-quality tests and making sure South Side residents have access to clean energy.
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Johnson’s mother Hazel Johnson, founded PCR. Hazel Johnson faced resistance when she began speaking out for environmental justice in 1970s.
Johnson stated, “She being black, being widowed, living in public housing was more like strikes against her, but that didn’t bother her.”
Her mother’s fight to combat industrial pollutants brought her face-to face with local, state and presidential elected officials. Her efforts earned her the title of “The Mother of the Environmental Justice Movement”.
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After seeing so many people in her community suffering from skin, lung, and cancer, Hazel felt compelled to take action. Hazel Johnson lost her husband, Cheryl, to lung cancer at the age of 41.
“She did her own research. Johnson stated that Johnson was able to discover that there are 50 landfills in the area and over 250 underground storage tanks.
Johnson warned that the community faces many environmental challenges. However, Johnson said that environmental racism is less prevalent now than it was before Johnson’s mother’s hard work.
Johnson’s mother passed on the torch to Johnson to continue her environmental work. She knows that the time will come when she will need to do the same.
“In ten years, I hope to see this building up and running, that Hazel Johnson’s Environmental Sustainable Institute would be up, and that we’re all working together. She stated that she wanted to fulfill her mother’s dream.
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