Houston Port coalition has Earth Day event on local plastic pollution

Bouncy castles, a child-sized mock train and Mexican folk dancers filled the East End’s historic Hidalgo Park with color on Sunday, drawing hundreds of locals to an Earth Day festival connecting communities near the Ship Channel to information on the growing plastics industry on their doorstep .

The festivities were modest compared to Houston’s annual Earth Day celebration Saturday on Discovery Green downtown. Still, the first-of-its-kind effort by the Healthy Port Communities Coalition brought the year’s international theme of plastic pollution to a local audience it said was particularly affected by it.

Earth Day, celebrated globally each year on April 22, christened its 54th anniversary as a holiday about “Planet vs. Plastics.” The organization that runs EarthDay.org said it is using 2024 to demand a 60% reduction of all plastic production by 2040 — just as several of Houston’s major petrochemical facilities expand their operations.

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An online fact sheet produced by EarthDay.org for the occasion said 9.1 billion tons of plastic have been produced since the 1950s, of which 79% sits in landfills or elsewhere in the environment.

“When plastics end up in landfills, they aren’t harmless,” it said. “They break down into tiny toxic particles that contaminate the soil and waterways and enter the food chain.”

Local festival organizers echoed this message in English and Spanish to attendees who had flocked to the event in the heart of one of Houston’s oldest Latino neighborhoods, Magnolia Park.

“Microplastics, resulting from plastic breakdown, is a health risk. Humans ingest over 800 microplastics daily, found in blood, lungs and breast milk,” said Brandy Deason, who coordinates Air Alliance Houston’s work on plastic pollution. She added that nanoplastics were recently found in bottled water, and that single-use plastics contain PFAS — also known as “forever chemicals” — linked to cancer and low birth rates, among other issues.

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“Most plastics are made with fossil fuels,” Deason said, “and petrochemical facilities producing plastics are often located in low-income communities and communities of color,” including many on the Houston Ship Channel, from which materials are sent around the continent by train as well as on ships and long-haul trucks.

Leticia Gutierrez, a colleague of Deason’s who directs Air Alliance’s community outreach, spent most of the event at a booth surrounded by other coalition organizations, including Texas Health and Environment Alliance and Bayou City Waterkeeper. Zero Waste Houston came to promote and receive compostables, explaining why most plastics did not qualify. The composting group had just finished a successful showing at Discovery Green’s Earth Day where it collected 2,192 pounds of compost and 1,304 pounds of recycling — diverting over 91% of the event’s trash, according to Zero Waste owner Leo Brito.

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In spite of the event’s serious content, its soundtrack of laughing children and blasting music kept the mood exuberant. Many eye-catching additions were brought in by Texas Children’s Hospital, whose booth explaining its health plan sat next to a face-painting station and a bubble-blowing unicorn named Rosie.

Alejandra Lima, a marketing event planner for the hospital health plan, said Earth Day was important for her group because environmental quality fed back into the childhood illnesses they were trying to prevent. “If it’s a good environment where you can breathe easier, you won’t have asthma, you can do more exercise, you can be active. So it all ties together,” she said.

One sixth-grade attendee, who gave the event an enthusiastic endorsement — “it’s fun!” — convinced her mother, Latasha King-Crump, to bring the family after she learned about nature and health connections in school. Besides an earful on plastic waste and fresh Hello Kitty face paint, she left with one of 60 magnolia trees donated by immigrant rights group Raices Collective and a plan to plant the neighborhood namesake in her backyard.