The city of Gainesville, Florida, placed a landfill in the backyard of Joseph Williams Elementary School in the 1950s. The dump was closed 60 years ago, but even after other environmental issues were discovered on the site, it was never fully cleaned up. With support from the Fund, Georgia Gee’s yearlong investigation – based on hundreds of public and archival documents, government emails obtained through records requests and interviews with residents – found that years of soil and air testing have revealed substantial evidence of environmental toxins on the property, which sits in a chronically underfunded and predominately Black part of town. The level of one carcinogen detected at the site peaked at 218 times higher than what’s considered safe in residential areas. The school district has cleaned up some soil from the property. But neither the county nor the state has agreed to fully clean up the site or conduct a comprehensive study of the toxins’ impact on students’ health.
Grantee uncovers Florida officials’ inaction addressing toxic soil at elementary school
