Environmental Health Leadership Training

The Environmental Health Leadership Training was developed in response to a community environmental focus group survey of Northern Manhattan that identified air pollution, garbage, exhaust from heavy traffic, indoor air quality, and quality-of-live issues as the most pressing environmental concerns for those communities. The Environmental Health Leadership Training aims to provide access to the technical and informational resources to help community members understand and prioritize health risks.

The training program teaches participants about the scientific and regulatory foundation of environmental health issues affecting New Yorkers, and presents basic organizing and advocacy skills to address health disparities in environmentally influenced health outcomes. The training is a 24-credit-hour curriculum designed to remain accessible to people from a variety of educational backgrounds, literacy levels, and ages. The sessions are structured as a combination of small group activities, lectures, and guest lecturers. Upon graduation, participants are given a 200-page manual with extensive written and visual resources on all issues addressed in the training.

The goal of the Environmental Health Leadership Training is to inform and empower the predominately low income people of three urban communities in Northern Manhattan (Central Harlem, West Harlem, and Washington Heights) to improve their capacity to organize for community environmental health and justice in New York City. The long term goal of these efforts is to help intervene and reduce exposure to environmental toxicants which are adversely affecting the health of disadvantaged, medically underserved, predominantly African American and Latino populations in Northern Manhattan.

As of February 2005, 85 leaders had graduated from the training. Many Environmental Health Leadership Training Graduates have gone on to play a significant roles in setting public health policy at the citywide, statewide, and national level. Several graduates have become key leaders in a successful campaign to pass city legislation to better protect children from lead-based paint hazards in the home.