Improving health on Buffalo's East Side
- Jeff Schober
- 30 minutes ago
- 10 min read
Jackie James, of Citizen Science Community Resources,
works alongside others testing soil for lead contamination
After more than two decades spent battling businesses, governments, and special interests, Jackie James’ experience has taught her that science doesn’t lie. Years spent in public forums have proven that numbers, data, and open communication are the best way to create positive change.
None of it is fast or easy.
“The job is half-scientist and half-community activist,” she said. “How do you cut through the politics and use data for change? Everybody is on one side. Slowly and surely you have to change the tides. You’ve got to get people to believe something else.”
As founder of Citizen Science Community Resources, her current focus is sampling soil on Buffalo’s East Side. Partnering with the University at Buffalo and Open Buffalo, tests have revealed high concentrations of lead in neighborhoods that once housed manufacturing plants.
James, 62, never intended to become a community activist, but geography forced the issue. In the early 2000s, living in Kenmore, she was a mother of young boys and struggling with fibromyalgia, which left her fatigued and chronically unwell. Around this time, she read an article in The Buffalo News about elevated sicknesses and cancers in Tonawanda. That triggered a years-long effort to find out why. For much of her life, she had lived downwind of industrial plants along the Niagara River.
Stopping environmental pollution became her focus. James hopes to write a book chronicling her experiences.
“The story is bigger than me,” she said. “I know that lives were lost, but also that we’ve saved a lot of people from dying.”
This is a tale about perseverance, about acknowledging current inequities and fighting to improve the health of Western New Yorkers — while accepting that change will be incremental.
James and the people around her are playing the long game.
Surrounding industries
Early in this century, when James began asking questions about air pollution in her community, there were many companies nearby — including 3M, Goodyear, Tonawanda Coke, Dupont, and the Niagara Mohawk Power Plant. Most of them released smoke into the air.
“The Department of Health came to town and did a study,” James said. “People were sick, and cancers were elevated. They thought it was caused by uranium.”
James could smell the discharge from her home. She wasn’t alone.
“Adele Henderson was an art professor at the University at Buffalo,” James recalled. “She and her husband lived in Riverside and they had to monitor which way the wind was blowing when they walked their dog, because the stench was so bad. She said, ‘I think there’s something in the air,’ and that’s how we started on this issue.”
James partnered with Henderson and they formed the nonprofit Clean Air Coalition of W.N.Y. to investigate. Along the way, she visited the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation, where she encountered Al Carlacci, an air pollution engineer. His job included conducting factory inspections, granting permits, and air pollution enforcement. When they met, Carlacci already had two decades of experience working for the NYSDEC.
“Because of the close proximity to Lake Erie and Niagara Falls, industries located here because of cheap power,” Carlacci explained. “Most bought in and were guaranteed two cents a kilowatt hour. Everyone else pays 13 cents. Steel plants all used cooling water, so Lake Erie was a tremendous resource.”
Now 69, Carlacci retired in 2018. An Eden resident, he spent his entire 38-year career with the DEC, inspecting industrial plants from the Pennsylvania state line to the Canadian border. His knowledge and passion are evident. Even today, he doesn’t pull punches.
“Picture 1979,” he said, referring to the year he was hired. “Bethlehem Steel was chugging like you can’t believe. There were all kinds of foundries and chemical plants. This was the industrial armpit of the world.”
James brought him results from an air sample bucket that had already been analyzed.
“The data we collected on our own showed high benzine levels,” she said. “Benzine is a known carcinogen that’s really nasty. No one wanted to listen to us. Politicians didn’t want to point the finger at anybody, because there is a tax base, and those companies employed people. We were working against that.”
But James wasn’t about to surrender. She found a willing ally in Carlacci, who advocated a more scientific approach.
“She came to the office to review permits for nearby facilities,” Carlacci said. “I didn’t hold back. She latched onto me because I would tell her the facts. Jackie would call me all the time. ”
Tonawanda Coke
Carlacci was vital to creating change, James declared. Without his expertise, her complaints might have never have been resolved.
“I knew all these plants,” he said. “We came up with a sampling program with the help of people in Albany. Instead of a bucket with a bag, we used Summa canisters. I triangulated the community: upwind, downwind, left and right, knowing the wind direction. That gave us an inventory.”
Summa canisters draw air through a flow controller over a specific period to monitor air quality, environmental emissions, or odors, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. Carlacci postulated that Tonawanda Coke was the source of the problems. As a non-union shop, the company had a reputation for flouting regulations. Carlacci and his co-workers knew that operations there were not always above board.
“They didn’t even attempt to do the right thing,” Carlacci said. “They had a blow-off valve vent, but they never permitted it. They made sure it didn’t blow off when a state or federal inspector was on site. They adjusted it by increasing pressure so it wouldn’t go off then.”
His plan to aid James required a longer time commitment.
“We got funding to do samples for a whole year instead of a one-day grab sample,” Carlacci said. “Meantime, we were talking to Tonawanda Coke and telling them they had a problem.”
Carlacci explained matters in scientific terms.
“The data was pretty clear,” he said. “We sampled for all kinds of contaminants. Carbon disulfide was picked up, but it was exactly what I had modeled when I permitted the control equipment for the 3M facility. I knew what was coming out of that stack. Calculations on stack height, flow rate, dispersion characteristics and their impact at ground level from 100 feet to miles away. Sampling confirmed the model, and verified the station’s data integrity. We could confidently say that Tonawanda Coke was the source of benzine levels that were above acceptable health.”
Carlacci testified in federal court for three days. Details are worthy of a book-length study, but the summary results are that Tonawanda Coke Corporation was fined $12 million for violating the Clean Air Act. They began shutting down in 2018, and the following year, the property was sold in bankruptcy court. It is now undergoing cleanup and redevelopment.
It took a long time, with many twists and turns, but this was a win for James and her allies.
“Part of the bigger story is what’s happening to the property now,” James said. “It’s like night and day. Businesses are buying up property and turning green. Investors are hoping to build up the waterfront on either side of River Road.”
Non-profit experience
In the wake of that success, James founded Citizen Science Community Resources, with an office located in Tonawanda. The goal was to draw on her experience to help others.
“I learned a lot about starting non-profits,” she said. “I learned what worked and what not to do again. We’re lean and mean. Sometimes it’s easier to be small versus being huge. If you grow too big, there is infighting and the group breaks apart, and your whole plan is out the window.”
Although there are no employees, James serves as board chairperson, and works with five other members. The group engages with schools and encourages activism.
“Now, elected officials are willing to talk with me. We have an air bucket and a soil bucket for testing, and they are available for anyone who wants to borrow them.”
A few years ago, several East Side residents reached out to James with concerns about lead in their soil. That has sharpened her focus on other environmental challenges facing Buffalo. She has learned history along the way.
“This started a long time ago,” explained Jim Golden, 51, Director of Ecological Justice at Open Buffalo. “At the General Motors plant in the Northland corridor on the East Side, there was a major spill of really nasty stuff in the early 1990s. They leaked 100,000 gallons of old PCBs into the ground.”
PCBs are polychlorinated biphenyls — toxic, man-made, hazardous chemicals that have dangerous effects on the environment, humans, and animal health, according to the United Nations. Due to their stability and non-flammability, PCBs were widely used in electrical equipment, caulk, plastics, and paints. PCBs were banned from being manufactured in the United States in 1979, and internationally by the Stockholm Convention in 2001. But PCBs, often generations old, remain in use.
In the early 2000s, the GM plant was sold to American Axle, but no one ever remediated that PCB spill, according to Golden.
“That area has an old infrastructure,” he said. “Drainage pipes were made of brick and mortar, and toxins leeched through. When GM went bankrupt in 2009, they were able to walk away from their clean-up responsibilities.”
What’s in the ground?
East Side residents were concerned. With so many brownfields and old manufacturing facilities in their neighborhood, had oils and toxins leaked into the ground?
Once two $50,000 grants were secured, testing began, checking for metals, Golden said. Results revealed elevated lead levels.
“That rang a bell, because Buffalo has a problem with lead contamination,” he said. “It’s measured in Elevated Blood Levels, or EBLs. We have one of the highest rates in the nation. Everything gets compared to Flint, Michigan, because of their water issues. The EBLs here are eight times higher than in Flint.”
James understands the severity of such issues.
“We know lead in soil can cause serious health implications, especially for children,” she said. “It affects people’s autoimmune system, leaving them with lower IQs, creating long term damage. If it’s caused by lead, we’re concerned about it. What if kids are playing in the dirt? What if people are gardening? I was approached because I have experience testing soil.”
Golden explained the testing process, which began in 2024.
“We did it systematically, canvassing neighborhoods and going street by street. We visited 3500 houses and collected 240 soil samples. The average reading was three times higher than what is safe.”
Lead exposure can happen a number of ways, Golden said. Water was carried into homes in pipes made of lead. Paint was once lead-based, and may still exist in some buildings. Public schools have shut down water fountains after testing high for lead contamination.
“The threshold for soil is 100 parts per million,” Golden said. “At least half the samples had 200 parts per million, and in two hot spots, clusters were as high as 16,000.”
The numbers are alarming.
“A lot of this gets mired in academia,” Golden admitted. “There is a need to get this information out, and the citizens’ science part of it is what Jackie brings. She’s really a champion of getting into the community and helping people address the issues.”
Is there a way to solve the East Side’s lead problem?
“You have to consider what gives the most bang for your buck,” Golden said. “You can use existing organic material to build up barriers between lead and contaminated soil. You can’t garden there, but at least kids playing outside won’t be breathing in dust. Airborne dust gets into skin, into houses, and then residents are ingesting it. We can try to mitigate, more than solve the problem. There are small things we can do. Certain plants can be grown to draw lead out of soil, like sunflowers, mushrooms, and hemp. But that takes a long time.”
Easy fixes are not part of the equation.
‘Don’t give up’
“The aim of the soil sample is make sure people on the East Side can live in peace, without worrying about pollution,” said Greg Glover, an Ecological Justice Specialist with Open Buffalo and East Side resident. “People should be able to walk in their grass, and children should be able to play there. If you own a property, you should be able to sell it. Basically, anything people can do in the suburbs.”
Glover, 56, lives on Northumberland Avenue in a neighborhood where soil is affected. For him, the issues are personal. He accepts that the fight for justice is a long term goal.
“As I’ve gotten older, the reality set in,” he reflected. “I have to recognize the world we live in. I don’t know if we’ll be free of fossil fuels in my lifetime. It may be two or three generations after me. There is a great deal of financial profit in fossil fuels. The collateral damage to people and the environment may matter to some, and may not to others. Those things have a 400 or 500 year start, since the dawn of the industrial revolution. I try to create balance and symmetry.”
Glover is grateful for his professional relationship with James.
“Did you ever talk to somebody who knows what they’re doing?” he asked. “She is matter-of-fact and assertive. She’s given me a lot of tidbits along our journey and has made herself available whenever I needed or wanted her. She’s done great work in city and state. My favorite thing about her is that she does’t get caught up in her accolades.”
The battle against Tonawanda Coke was an important victory, but there is more work to be done.
“I get chills knowing how far we’ve come,” James reflected. “I get verklempt. The guy that owned Tonawanda Coke was an old timer who didn’t believe in regulations. I think of all the lives he touched, and not in a good way.”
Taking on businesses and governments can be challenging, but James believes in the importance of such work.
“Don’t give up,” she said. “Be in it for the long haul. Sometimes I wonder if it was all worth it, because it was stressful, but honestly, I can’t even imagine not doing what we did. It took over my whole life.”
text © 2026 by Jeff Schober
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Jeff Schober has a journalism degree from Bowling Green State University and a master’s degree in English and History from the University at Buffalo. He retired from teaching English and Journalism at Frontier High School and is the best-selling author of ten books, including the true crime book Bike Path Rapist with Det. Dennis Delano, and the Buffalo Crime Fiction Quartet. Visit his website at www.jeffschober.com.
Steve Desmond is an award-winning photographer. With his son, Francis, he is the author of A Life With A Purpose which raises money for Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy research. To view more of Steve's work, search Facebook under "Steve Desmond" and "Desmond's PrimeFocus Photography," or on Instagram at "Stevedesmond9."
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