Rochester Refugee Resettlement Services has received a state grant that could help some of its clients breathe a little easier.
The organization plans to use a $180,271 environmental justice grant from the state Department of Environmental Conservation to monitor kitchen air quality in 100 homes rented by the refugees and asylum seekers it serves. All of them are within the 14613 ZIP code.
Grace Lane, the grant manager of Rochester Refugee Resettlement Services, said housing is at the foundation of the organization's work, and it wants to ensure its clients have homes that are healthy and safe.
"For these refugees, it's been a long and arduous journey of trying to find just simply a place they can call home," Lane said during a recent news conference at the agency's Lexington Avenue offices.
As part of the grant-funded effort, monitoring devices will be placed in the kitchens for one-week periods to collect air quality data. If the measurements show the air is unhealthy, the tenants will be provided with exhaust fans.
Five students from the neighborhood will do the measuring. They come from the Congolese, Burmese, Somali, Afghan, and Venezuelan refugee communities.
So why focus on kitchen air quality? Dr. Jeff Wyatt, a retired professor of comparative medicine at the University of Rochester who is heading up the scientific end of the project, has an answer.
It comes down to smoke — more specifically, the hair follicle-sized particles it’s composed of. Many cooking practices, such as the use of cooking oils, tend to generate smoke.
"What we learned through some of our surveys of indoor kitchens is that the air quality is poor, causing burning eyes, respiratory signs," Wyatt said. "And these risks can be mitigated pretty easily."
Rochester Refugee Resettlement Services was one of 32 organizations statewide that received an Environmental Justice Community Impact Grant from the DEC. The $6 million in awards support projects that help improve the well-being of people and neighborhoods most vulnerable to pollution and the effects of climate change.
"This funding supports the crucial work of people on the ground, people that are delivering real outcomes for their communities, people who are ... working tirelessly to lift up their neighbor and providing a healthier, more sustainable future," state DEC Commissioner Amanda Lefton said during a news conference announcing the local grant.
