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Committee for Environmental Justice Action (CEJA)
CEJA, a local of SWU, represents families and former workers impacted by the marginalization and deadly contamination of the former Kelly Air Force Base, situated in the southwest part of San Antonio, Texas. Since 1994, residents have struggled to make their concerns about environmental integrity and community health heard and have advocated proactive solutions. Most importantly, the community has consistently demanded open and transparent participation as equals in decisions that affect the lives of their family and their future.
The Kelly Story
The Kelly story is emblematic of the deadly legacy the U.S. military has carved around the world. The communities surrounding the former Kelly AFB are more than 95% low-income and predominantly Mexican-American, with a significant percentage of Spanish-only speaking residents. Over the last 8 decades, the activities of Kelly AFB poisoned the shallow groundwater under tens of thousands of residential homes and left the people and workers burdened with illnesses. First documented publicly in the 1980s, the activities of Kelly AFB caused extensive contamination of air, soil, groundwater and creeks, and created one of the largest groundwater plumes of chlorinated solvents that stretched over four square miles to the San Antonio River. Radioactive materials, Agent Orange, Agent Blue, volatile organic compounds and beryllium are found amongst the contaminants, many of which are known carcinogens.
In 1995, Kelly AFB found itself on the closure list and the final transfer of the deed occurred on July 13, 2001 as the base set to privatize. Despite the façade and public image, the community remains contaminated and sick. A Health Symptom’s Study conducted by SWU-CEJA and the University of Texas Medical School from Galveston in 1996, indicated that 90% of the adults and ¾ of the children in North Kelly Gardens suffer from multiple illnesses. Cancer surveys by CWU-CEJA found that more than 1 in 4 households have one or more family member suffering from cancer. The Purple Cross campaign placed crosses in those family’s yards to remember the victims and provide a visual marker of the deadly impact of the contamination.
Project ReGeneration
Project ReGeneration is a strategy to address and resolve the problems created in the last 80 years by the activities of Kelly AFB. It is a model to empower and educate the impacted residents to speak for themselves and develop alternatives, such as the Plan del Pueblo (People’s Plan). This plan strategically switches the framework of the struggle from being against the contamination to proactively defining the vision and specific demands of the community around health, environmental cleanup and economic revitalization. The Plan del Pueblo is a platform of alternative models and approaches from which the community can leverage support. CEJA has supported a roundtable model where the communities sit at the decision-making table as equals with governmental agencies. The Project also focuses on outreach and education to understand the human cost of the often invisible, yet toxic legacy of the military.
Victories
- CEJA now represents over 400 families in the affected community
- Exposed the Kelly Issue locally, nationally and internationally
- Outreached to and educated 1000s of residents
- KAFB jet fuel storage and transfer station demolished
- Defeated R.E.D. H.O.R.S.E.
- Comprehensive health symptoms survey
- Environmental Health & Wellness Clinic
- Annual Marches, hundreds of actions
- Removal of on-base contaminated soil
- Filed Title VI complaint under the 1964 Civil Rights Act
- Placed warning signs along Leon Creek
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