An Intersectional Ecology of Lead Exposure: Complex Environmental Health Vulnerabilities in the Flint Water Crisis

• In Event: 2341 - Environment, Oppressions, and Justice I

Abstract

Prior racial ecology research in the U.S. shows that Black and/or Latinx neighborhood composition are associated with elevated toxic lead exposures. Extant accounts of the Flint Water Crisis (FWC) argue that Flint, Michigan’s majority-Black composition contributed to the city’s exposure to toxic lead levels in its water supply beginning in 2014. Neighborhood-level single-parent family composition rather than racial composition consistently predicts intra-city exposure levels in the FWC. This study uses the case of the FWC to advance an intersectional ecology of lead exposure that builds on prior racial ecology work and focuses on the “intercategorical” predictors of lead exposure with scholarly and practical implications. Geographically weighted regression identifies the heterogeneous spatial contexts wherein the concentration of single-mother White, Black, and Latina families, rather than their single-father counterparts, had significant and positive effects on the extent of block exposure to lead service lines during the FWC.

Authors

• Raoul Salvador Lievanos, University of Oregon

• Clare Rosenfeld Evans, University of Oregon

• Ryan Light, University of Oregon