We all met up early Saturday at Oscar Grant plaza for a day-long tour and discussions about fracking , which is the dangerous process of drilling and injecting water and chemicals into the ground at a high pressure in order to release natural gas and oil.

There were about 35 folks who met up from labor (Unite Here local 2, Unite Here local 2850, AFSME 3299, AFSME Local 444, CWA, CWA Local 9412, SEIU United Service Workers, SEIU local 1000, Inland Boatman’s Union) and some environmental justice and other social justice groups (Movement Generation, Alliance of Nurses for Healthy Environments, US Labor Against the War, Center on Race Poverty & the Environment, Chinese Progressive Association, Center for Biological diversity, Alliance of South Asians Taking Action, Sierra Club, North Bay Jobs With Justice, Center on Environmental Health).

 

In our group, we had Kaiser San Jose RN Puspha Patel, Kaiser Oakland RN Clarita Griffin, Watsonville Community RN Jennifer Holm and Bakersfield Memorial RN Sandra Reding.

On the drive down to the valley, we talked about the intersection of labor and environmental justice and about what a just transition would really mean. The nurses talked about how profit motives of their hospitals are leading to poor patient care and deteriorating working conditions in some of the most environmentally impacted communities.

Our first stop was at the Center on Race Poverty and the Environment (CRPE). We met up with workers and organizers who gave us a briefing on some of the general struggles around pesticide toxins, pollution from oil operations, and other polluting operations concentrated in the valley.

 

After lunch, we headed to UFW 40 Acres site. Standing in front of one of the buildings in which Cesar Chavez fasted, we talked about the work and commitment of workers before us and the importance of remembering all that was sacrificed for what we have today. We talked about the importance of unionizing and collective power. Back in the van the nurses were able to connect more with each other and they others on the tour– they talked about their shared struggles across facilities and the necessity of unity both among nurses and with their communities and other workers.

Our next stop was an oil processing site completely surrounded by olive tree groves as far as the eye can see. If you didn’t know exactly where the oil processing site was, it would be nearly impossible to find– you have to drive through miles of olive tree groves before finding it hidden at the center.

A CRPE organizer said that they were once witnesses to an oil spill at the site. They took photos and reported it to authorities who initially denied any spill had occurred. The refinery eventually treated the spill by burying it. Later, dozens of nearby residents were evacuated from their homes due to lethal toxicity levels in their soil.

 

Our next stop was a site where chemical-filled fracking wastewater meets fresh water. The resulting diluted wastewater, still swirling with toxins, is sold to farmers for watering the plants we consume. Although farmers initially refused to purchase such water for obvious reasons, the current drought has left them no choice. It was extremely disturbing. Jennifer – the nurse from Watsonville – remarked, “nursing 101 is that contaminated plus non-contaminated only leaves you with more contaminated.”

As we left the site, our guides pointed out the many fracking sites around the area — too many to count. We talked about the dangers to communities and especially workers there. Because most of the chemicals used in the fracking process are considered proprietary, they are not disclosed. Nurses spoke to the difficulty of effectively diagnosing and treating a patient when you don’t know what they’ve been exposed to beforehand.

Our last stop was Sequoia Elementary School. The school is in the center of several fracking wells (six wells are within a quarter mile of the school and something like 30 are within 1.5 miles of the school). There are no regulations on how close the fracking sites can be to homes and schools. Despite many students coming down with unusual health problems (headaches, asthma, unexplained seizures, a 10 year old diagnosed with prostate cancer), the city officials, with heavy lobbying from the oil industry, recently voted against a three-month fracking moratorium that would have invested resources into studying the impacts on health. As one CRPE organizer observed, the experiments on health impacts are now currently being conducted on these children instead.

 

After visiting the school, we headed back to CRPE headquarters to debrief. Pushpa, the nurse from Kaiser San Jose, remarked to the group: “I was reminded today of the work and sacrifice of the generation before us and our obligation to fight just as hard for the next generation to come.”

At the beginning of the tour, Jennifer said something that later summed up all of our sentiments at the end of the day: “The more I get involved, the more I know, and the more I know the more I see the need to be even more involved.”

It was a powerful experience.