Pollution Concerns Latinos More Than Most Residents, Poll Finds

Latinos are more worried about environmental problems than California residents generally, according to results of a poll released Wednesday.

The survey of environmental attitudes by the Public Policy Institute of California discovered deep concern about environmental issues statewide, a sense that rapid growth will make California a worse place to live 10 years from now, and strong agreement that air pollution poses the state’s biggest environmental threat.

The poll of 2,100 Californians also uncovered geographic distinctions: Bay Area residents showed greater frustration with traffic than those living in Los Angeles County, for example.

Mark Baldassare, survey director of the Public Policy Institute of California and a professor at UC Irvine, said the most startling and significant finding is that concern for environmental issues among Latinos is consistently equal to or greater than that of Californians at large.

He said the results suggest “this will continue to be a state where the environment matters” as Latinos, who now make up about 24% of California’s adult population, become the dominant ethnic group over coming decades.

“These findings suggest that we need to add environmental issues to the list of issues that concern Latinos in California today beyond jobs and housing,” Baldassare said. “There’s also a sense in the state that there are a lot of environmental problems in minority communities that are not getting the attention they deserve from environmental groups as well as government.”

Others aren’t so startled by the findings.

“The common belief is that Latinos don’t care about the environment, they care about jobs and crime and the like,” said Angela Johnson Meszaros, director of the California League of Conservation Voters Education Fund in Los Angeles. But her work with people who suffer smog-induced asthma or breathe chemical fumes in their neighborhoods has convinced her that “communities of color care very much about these issues and frame them as public health issues and impacts on quality of life.”

Baldassare’s poll, she said, reinforces the findings of a survey that her group performed this spring with Latino voters in Los Angeles, which found that 89% of those surveyed consider environmental issues very important or important.

While Latinos generally are worried about pollution, on some questions they are wary of slowing economic development for the sake of environmental protection.

The poll showed that Latinos are less willing then non-Hispanic whites to support local slow-growth initiatives, said Bruce Cain, director of the Institute for Governmental Studies at UC Berkeley and an advisor to the pollsters.

“Latinos are not identical to the rest of California on environmental issues,” Cain said. “You can see the divide on economic issues. . . . The cutting edge is going to be where it affects their livelihood, or their kid’s chance to get a job.”

While there is great variation, demographers say that California Latinos tend generally to be less educated, younger and poorer than non-Hispanic whites or Asians. That means, Cain said, they will weigh trade-offs--such as a new factory that brings both pollution and jobs--differently than more prosperous Californians.

The poll found resounding agreement across all ethnic groups that air pollution is the state’s top environmental problem, with 33% of those polled ranking it as such. Growth ranked a distant second, chosen by 13% of those polled. Pollution and general water pollution followed with 9%. Seven percent of those polled ranked traffic as the state’s worst environmental problem and 6% chose water supply.

Other findings of the poll, which has a 2% margin of error:

* Slightly more than half of those surveyed favor a ban on new oil-drilling platforms off the coast, even if it would mean higher gas prices, and nearly 60% said the habitat of endangered species should be protected even if it raises the prices of new homes.

* In the San Francisco Bay Area, 74% of those surveyed called traffic a big problem, compared to 47% in Los Angeles and 21% in the Central Valley.

* Nearly 60% of those polled said they believe their community has grown rapidly in the last few years. A third agreed that zoning to limit growth could be very effective in improving the quality of life in their regions in the next decade.

* More than 75% of those polled said they regularly recycle bottles, cans and newspapers.

* Half of those interviewed agreed that state government is not doing enough to protect the environment. While 36% say they approve of how Gov. Gray Davis is handling environmental issues, 28% disapprove.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Setting Priorities

Californians gave these responses when asked to name the most important environmental issues facing the state:

*

Air pollution: 33%

Growth, development: 13%

Water, ocean, beach and MTBE pollution: 9%

Pollution in general: 9%

Traffic congestion: 7%

Water supply: 6%

Toxic waste, pesticides, contamination of land: 2%

Loss of wilderness, open space: 1%

Loss of farmland, agriculture: 1%

Logging, loss of redwoods and forests: 1%

Nothing: 1%

Don’t know: 8%

Other: 8%

*

Source: Public Policy Institute of California