As I did research around my neighborhood for an article about the Avanti Superfund Remedial Site, I was shocked at how few people knew about the large cleanup of lead contamination that happened just a few blocks away.
The cleanup happened in the 1990s. Dozens of families were tested for lead contamination. The soil from hundreds of homes was removed and replaced with clean soil. It was a major undertaking.
But most of the people that lived near where it happened died or moved away. Only a few people there remember what happened.
West Indianapolis isn’t alone in facing contamination. Indianapolis’ industrial past has left its mark on neighborhoods all around the city, exposing people to the harmful effects of lead, coal ash, heavy metals, raw sewage and other contaminants.
I’ll be speaking about my experience reporting on the environment at a traveling exhibition that investigates the city’s polluted past. Called Indy Toxic Heritage: Pollution, Place and Power, it’s 5-7 p.m. Sept. 26 at Riverside Park Family Center. Photographer and community advocate Wildstyle Paschall also will speak.
The exhibition combines storytelling and historical research to show the citywide exposure to pollutants and what people are trying to do to help.
If you go
The Indy Toxic Heritage: Pollution, Place and Power exhibition will be 5-7 p.m. Sept. 26 at the Riverside Park Family Center, 2420 E Riverside Dr.Mirror Indy reporter Enrique Saenz covers west Indianapolis. Contact him at 317-983-4203 or enrique.saenz@mirrorindy.org. Follow him on X @heyEnriqueSaenz.
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