Community Engagement Core

University Of Arizona, Tucson AZ

Investigators

Linked publications & trials

Abstract

PROJECT SUMMARY (Community Engagement Core; Chief, Field, Maier, Moreno Ramírez) The UA Superfund Research Program (UA SRP) is focused on the health and environmental impacts of hardrock mining. The interface between mining and public health is one with urgent need of innovative solutions at the community level. The UA SRP's Community Engagement Core (CEC) has developed extensive experience working with targeted communities in Arizona and in this renewal will continue our successful work with Hispanic communities and expand our efforts to include Tribal communities that are impacted by mining. The CEC will work to deliver community engaged science-based information to affected community stakeholders so they can become active players in understanding and making informed decisions on health issues related to mining. This will be a multi-directional process wherein the CEC will provide a platform for community stakeholders to influence the science that the UA SRP is conducting so it is relevant to issues they are concerned about. An evaluation component has also been woven throughout our activities to allow quantitative and qualitative measurement of success and lessons-learned to optimize the usefulness of our work. The CEC will fill an existing gap regarding Hispanic and Native American stakeholders and their lack of engagement in hardrock mining issues (particularly environmental justice issues) that impact their communities. Our partners in this effort will include local communities, government agencies, non-profit organizations, and the mining industry. Our CEC objectives are (1) to engage Native American tribes in multi- directional collaborations on environmental and health hazards related to hardrock mining, which will include developing innovative community mitigation strategies to decrease identified health risks; (2) to improve our capacity building capabilities: a) by working with stakeholder partners to implement state-wide trainings and evaluation metrics for our existing successful promotora (Hispanic community health workers) modules, b) by expanding our module concept to include Tribal Community Health Representatives; and c) by expanding our module concept to create educational modules for Tribal Community Colleges on the mining process and related social and environmental impacts; (3) to continue our development of a variety of community engagement tools that will be useful for impacted individuals and groups living adjacent to Superfund and other contaminated sites in Arizona; and (4) to support the administration of two centers initiated by the UA SRP: the Dean Carter Binational Center and the Center for Environmentally Sustainable Mining both of which have components of community training and outreach on issues related to environmentally and socially-responsible mining.