In 2021, a Springfield jury noticed something amiss at the Roderick Ireland Courthouse in downtown Springfield, Massachusetts. A strong, musty odor hung in the air. Investigating, workers discovered a fungus silently expanding behind bookcases, carpets, floors, and seats. It was so bad that courthouse officials set up makeshift courtrooms in other locations far from the building’s festering mold, including at Springfield’s Eastfield Mall.
The mold in the courthouse is severe (and still unresolved as of this writing), but it’s a familiar problem for many city residents who go about their daily lives – studying, working, doing chores, or just relaxing – while breathing in bad indoor air. In private homes, public housing, schools, long-term care facilities, daycare centers, and correctional facilities, too many Springfield residents are exposed to toxic air. And when the polluted air indoors is combined with pollution from outside, as it often is in Springfield’s densest areas, the combination creates an existence that is not only foul-smelling but hazardous. It’s a frustrating problem for Springfield’s tight-knit community, where neighbors swap stories at the corner store, organize barbecues at the local park, and watch out for each other when someone gets sick.
“We carry a huge air pollution burden, indoors and outdoors,” says Rusty Polsgrove, associate director of Arise for Social Justice, a Springfield environmental justice organization dedicated to defending the rights of the city’s low-income residents. Polsgrove says that Springfield, with its historic districts, diversity, and easy urban-suburban amenities, has been unfairly saddled with an environmental problem that can overshadow the city’s many positive attributes.
The deck, says Paulina Muratore, CLF’s Director of Transportation Justice and Infrastructure, is especially stacked against Springfield’s low-income and Black and Brown communities, because city planners and government officials have for years allowed environmental assaults to pile up. Smog-choked highways 91, 291, and 391 slash through the city’s downtown. Alongside these highways are utilities and industrial facilities that also emit toxic fumes. They include the Palmer Paving Corporation, the Westover, and Bradley International Airports, and until its closure in 2022, the West Springfield Generating Station. Together, according to a 2023 report, this polluting infrastructure has left Springfield with some of the worst air in Massachusetts.
“It means we have more people who experience respiratory illness,” says Polsgrove. “Whether it’s asthma, or COPD (Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease), or you end up having lung cancer, whatever it is, we have more people experiencing and going to the ER for these illnesses.”
That’s why CLF has been working with our partners on this issue to, among other things, push for the passage of a law in Massachusetts to establish an indoor air pollution task force. It would develop a statutory and regulatory framework to identify, monitor, and improve indoor air pollution and mold contamination in both public and private buildings.
“These are not insurmountable issues,” says Muratore. “These are vibrant, vital communities where residents just want an equal chance to thrive. That Massachusetts has allowed such conditions to continue to exist for so long is unacceptable, and this bill is a bold but necessary step toward air quality justice.”
Toxic Air Inside
The story of the Springfield courthouse is emblematic of the real human costs of toxic indoor air. A reported five people who worked at the Ireland courthouse have died of ALS. Another 60 workers have been diagnosed with cancer. In 2022, an independent study revealed a probable cause: several types of cancer-causing mold species had taken root in the building.
Polsgrove has seen for themselves the toll mold can take. Approximately eight years ago, a woman named Tatiana Cheeks contacted Arise regarding mold in her apartment. A housing court ordered her landlord to install an ozone oxidizer to remove the musty mold odor. However, says Polsgrove, ozone oxidizers themselves are perilous, especially when used for extended periods in poorly ventilated spaces.
“And so, she experienced health problems because of that court order and because of that machine in her home, and she continued to face mold issues,” says Polsgrove. “She came to Arise, and through that was born our activism against mold in the city, because Springfield has some of the oldest housing stock in the nation.’’
A Problem Made Worse by Climate Change
Springfield is an eclectic city with a diverse collection of neighborhoods, including its historic Forest Park Heights, noted for its Victorian Colonial Revival, Queen Anne, and Shingle-style homes. In 2010, the PBS TV show “This Old House” named Forest Park as one of the Northeast’s “Best Old House Neighborhoods.” Even so, Springfield’s housing stock, largely composed of wood-framed housing in a wet four-season climate, makes it prime territory for mold. The problem happens everywhere, but is especially acute in shelters, low-income and public housing, and among older people living on a fixed income or with a disability. In such cases, it can be challenging to find money and resources to address a mold problem. And climate change is making it worse.
“As climate change progresses, it’s getting warmer and it’s getting wetter,” says Polsgrove.
Arise has responded by offering free HEPA air purifiers to anyone experiencing mold issues. Polsgrove’s advocacy for indoor air quality led them to the Massachusetts Environmental Justice Legislative Table, a statewide coalition of environmental justice groups. There, they joined forces with other advocates seeking legislative solutions to indoor air quality problems. At the same time, the Massachusetts Attorney General’s Office prevailed upon the Department of Public Health to add mold and moisture to the state sanitary code. Polsgrove says the task now is to make sure these new codes are properly enforced.
“We are still trying to hold our own [Springfield’s] code enforcement responsible and make sure they get trained to deal with persistent moisture,” they say.
Inside: More than Just Mold
As if mold weren’t bad enough, many old Springfield structures grapple with asbestos. This year, the Massachusetts State Attorney General announced a settlement in a case against a construction company that illegally removed and stored asbestos-contaminated demolition debris next to a playground and classroom while performing asbestos abatement work at the former Springfield YMCA. Many old structures in Springfield and across Massachusetts were built using asbestos. These types of legacy construction issues, combined with other common sources of indoor pollution, including toxic fumes and off-gases from objects laden with toxic forever chemicals and seepage from polluted air outside, create a hazardous environment for far too many families. Seepage is especially a problem in environmental justice communities surrounded by highways, power plants, and industrial facilities. The seepage problem highlights how the dire effects of pollution accumulate and compound, resulting in cumulative impacts that can last for generations.
How ‘Cumulative Impacts’ Build Up
It’s not easy living in a home with dangerous, musty air. And what if stepping outside is equally unhealthy? That is indeed the case in many neighborhoods in Springfield and across Massachusetts, where polluting infrastructure has been so thickly concentrated it makes it hard to breathe – literally.
“Communities that have more time and more resources to fight these types of projects don’t have them happen in their community,” says Polsgrove. “Communities where there may be people who don’t have the time or resources to fight on behalf of their neighborhood and say, ‘we don’t want something toxic and polluting in our backyard,’ they face a harder fight. Not only because they’re under-resourced, but also because some of these development companies think they can get away with it.”
While that has certainly been the case in the past, it doesn’t have to be the future. More communities are standing up, refusing to be the status quo dumping ground for polluting projects. One example of this is the new cumulative impact analysis requirement in energy infrastructure permitting, which will help level the playing field. Ongoing work continues to reframe thinking around cumulative impacts.
Unfair Burden Only Some Carry
“These victories will not be complete until the benefits from cleaner air are shared among all of our communities and are reflected in our public health outcomes,” says Muratore.
Polsgrove, who is waiting to receive an air quality monitor for their own home from the Healthy Air Network, a collaborative advocating for healthier air in environmental justice communities, concurs.
“We need to have developers consider the unfair burden put on environmental justice populations,” says Polsgrove. “Springfield and other low-income, Black and Brown communities in our Commonwealth bear an unfair burden of infrastructure damage. And I’ll tell you, East Boston and Chelsea are facing the same air pollution issues that we are. It’s the same story. The same diseases. It’s COPD, it’s lung cancer, and it’s people who never smoked. And I don’t think it’s a coincidence that these things are happening after highways like 93 and 91 were developed.”
Real-World Consequences at the Courthouse
As Springfield communities continue to grapple with indoor air quality and the cumulative effects of polluting infrastructure on outdoor air, the plans for a new courthouse are still unfolding. The state is now planning to solicit proposals from developers to build a new courthouse that the state will lease. Questions remain about what to do with the old, moldy courthouse.
Meanwhile, many Springfield families are finding ways to cope with the poor air quality in their own homes. For them, the resources often aren’t available to simply pick up and move, as the state plans to do. Most remain in the homes and neighborhoods they’ve always called home while looking for ways to lessen the effects of toxic air.
Polsgrove is especially worried about children growing up in homes and schools with mold problems. Children exposed to mold before the age of 7 are much more likely to develop asthma, a burden they will carry for life.
And for communities, the consequences, if left unaddressed, are dire.
“The consequence is death,” they say. “Especially as climate change gets worse and we’re having more acute heat events. People are dying of asthma attacks, which feels [unbelievable] to me. These are things that are preventable.”