LIVING IN "TIGHT-KNIT" ARGENTINE
Editor's Note: This story is the third in a three-part series exploring environmental injustice in Wyandotte County. In part 1, we detail efforts local organizations are taking to improve environmental injustice. In part 2, we explore the history of Hispanic settlement in Kansas City, Kansas.
Amanda Devriese-Sebilla is no stranger to her neighbors in the Argentine community of Kansas City, Kansas. She waves to them from her porch and engages with passersby on the way to the nearby park at Clopper Field with her son.
It’s the community Devriese-Sebilla has known her whole life, one her family has been a part of since 1908, when the house she currently lives in was built. It’s been passed down from her second uncle, to her grandfather, to her father and now, to her.
“I’m very rooted here,” Devriese-Sebilla said.
It’s somewhat of a shared experience among the Argentine community. Devriese-Sebilla says many homes in Argentine are multigenerational, and many have been passed down, just like hers.
But among all the good in the “tight-knit” community, a generational burden has been passed down, as well.
ADVOCACY FOR CLEAN AIR IN WYANDOTTE COUNTY
Railroad expansion in the 1870s attracted Mexican immigrants to the Kansas City, Kansas, area for work, which they heavily settled after Shawnee Indians were forced out. Many resided close to work, which meant living along the pollutant-emitting rail yard.
Today, a third of KCK's population identifies as Hispanic, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, and Argentine is primarily a Hispanic neighborhood. The majority of those who currently live in Argentine and identify as Hispanic live in northern Argentine, closest to the rail yard.
CleanAirNow (CAN), a community-led environmental justice organization in KCK, claims environmental racism is present in Wyandotte County, where health outcomes differ greatly from the eastern third of the county — where communities are predominately of color — to the western half — where communities are predominately white, according to a report by the Community Health Council of Wyandotte County in collaboration with the Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and Ethnicity at The Ohio State University.
In its article with the Union of Concerned Scientists, CleanAirNow cites a 2017 study that found in the United States, race is the greatest predictor of exposure to the transportation-related pollutant nitrogen dioxide. The pollutant forms when coal, oil, methane gas, or diesel is burned at high temperatures, according to the American Lung Association.
“There’s a lot of air pollution that we are receiving from all sides, and in different ways,” Devriese-Sebilla said.
Argentine’s modern-day boundaries reflect its history of railroad development. Argentine is encircled by three highways — Interstate 35 to the south, Interstate 635 to the west and U.S. 69 to the east — and a rail yard to the north. An industrial zone also lies to the north, bringing more transportation activities to the area.
Devriese-Sebilla says she can sometimes smell diesel from nearby traffic while standing on her front porch.
In a 2013 study, CAN found high levels of diesel emissions around the BNSF rail yard that stretches through the Argentine neighborhood.
Devriese-Sebilla’s house sits approximately a block south of the rail yard. Because of her young son, her asthma and her knowledge on pollution, Devriese-Sebilla became involved in community work concerning air pollution years ago, and eventually began advocating for healthy air quality in KCK with CAN.
Devriese-Sebilla discovered eight years ago that she has adult-onset asthma, which she says has gotten worse over the last few years.
“I haven’t really had (a conversation with my doctor about my asthma being environment-related) yet, but what I will say is that, when I was in North Carolina on vacation last week, I didn’t have to use my inhaler at all, and as soon as I came back, I started having to use it again. So, I’m sure there’s probably some correlation,” Devriese-Sebilla said during her interview with KSHB 41 in June.
IS THERE A CORRELATION BETWEEN ASTHMA AND DIESEL POLLUTION IN KCK?
A 2022 study involving Children’s Mercy Kansas City, the University of Missouri - Kansas City, and the Union of Concerned Scientists found that “asthma disproportionately affects the health of BIPOC Kansas City pediatric patients.”
The study, which focused on pediatric patients in Kansas City, further found that historical redlining and racism seemingly correlates with asthma morbidity in the metro area, and specifically found that children living closer to highways, rail yards and TRI (Toxic Release Inventory) facilities have greater risk of asthma exacerbation and/or more often seek acute care for their asthma.
The Kansas Department of Health and Environment’s Director of Bureau of Air Rick Brunetti recognizes the heavy rail and motor vehicle traffic concentrated in KCK. After all, Kansas City is the nation’s second-largest rail hub.
“From the standpoint that there is a lot of rail traffic, a lot of mobile vehicles, and of course a number of people. So, when you have population centers, air is very, very crucial from the standpoint that it is a small area and that area has a tendency to become contaminated, and so those are the areas that in the Clean Air Act are specifically targeted,” Brunetti said when asked why there are specific air quality concerns in the Argentine and Armourdale neighborhoods.
In a 2021 study conducted by CAN, they found 3.46 diesel trucks passed the intersection at Kansas Avenue and U.S. 69 — just two miles from Devriese-Sebilla’s house — per minute, or roughly 415 every two hours. KSHB 41 reproduced the study in July and found nearly the exact same results, with 3.44 diesel trucks passing per minute (413 total).
“(Nearly four trucks passing by per minute) sounds like a lot to me because that’s not my experience in my residential area. For the question that I think you’re asking is, is it enough to affect the health of people living by that intersection? I don’t have a great reference to direct you (to). What I can tell you is that we know these areas that are fence-line to industry and that highway corridor, (they) have higher rates of asthma exacerbation than do other areas,” Dr. Elizabeth Friedman, medical director of environmental health with Children’s Mercy Kansas City, said.
Friedman said while she can’t say whether or not the amount of diesel traffic at that intersection has health effects on nearby residents, she said she doesn’t see that much diesel traffic in her neighborhood.
“Then one of the questions would be, does it matter if it’s not too much because it’s still quite unequal?” she said.
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Reporting on this series was made possible through a collaboration of KSHB 41 Digital Reporter Lily O'Shea Becker and KSHB 41 I-Team anchor Caitlin Knute. The series incorporates months of interviews, tours, site visits and research. You can contact Lily at lilyoshea.becker@kshb.com and Caitlin at caitlin.knute@kshb.com.