SPRINGFIELD — The Springfield City Council is lending its voice after the Environmental Protection Agency announced the termination of 800 grants across the country, including $20 million in Springfield.
The funding, which was part of the EPA’s Community Change Grants Program, was borne out of former President Joe Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act and aimed to modernize critical infrastructure and improve public health, safety, transportation and environmental resilience in the city of Springfield.
The grant was supposed to go to the city and the Public Health Institute of Western Mass. for a community solar project, complete home rehabilitation projects to remove lead and other pollution hazards; the planting of 1,500 trees throughout the city and for retrofitting 30 one-to-four-unit homes to improve indoor air quality.
Additionally, the money would support a workforce development program for HVAC-R technicians and convert two city-owned buildings to non-grid clean energy sources while expanding their use as community resilience hubs and emergency shelter locations.
Several days after the Trump administration announced the elimination of this grant, the City Council unanimously passed a resolution first sponsored by At-Large City Councilor Brian Santaniello, and eventually co-sponsored by every other councilor, that urges the EPA to restore the grant.
The vote occurred during the council’s regular meeting on May 12.
“This is an easy yes for me,” said At-Large City Councilor Jose Delgado, regarding the resolution. “As somebody who grew up and had childhood asthma, and also my daughter has asthma, when I learned of the federal Trump administration cutting this, I was pretty pissed off.”
The announcement of the $20 million EPA grant termination came on the heels of Trump’s recent decision to take away $1 million from the EPA in asthma prevention support for Western Mass.
According to the state, that funding was intended to support in-home environmental remediations, such as mold removal and improved ventilation, in Chicopee, Holyoke and Springfield.
Nearly $900,000 of the promised $1 million over three years is being withheld by the Trump administration, the state says.
“By canceling these grants for Hampden County, the Trump administration is undermining our efforts to improve the health of the people of Western Massachusetts,” said Gov. Maura Healey at the time of the announcement. “With extreme heat, droughts and wildfires becoming all the more common, it’s essential that we prioritize improving air quality and reducing causes of asthma. This is just their latest attack on the health and wellbeing of communities across our country.”
For public health leaders and local officials, the termination of this money is concerning for a city that was dubbed the “asthma capital of the country” in 2019, according to the Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America, and was named the fourth most challenging place to live with asthma as of 2024.
Additionally, a recent report by the American Lung Association gave Hampden County a “D” for poor air quality, with 5,576 children and 43,484 adults suffering from with disease.
Jesse Lederman, former Springfield City Council president and current regional director for U.S. Sen. Ed Markey, said at the May 12 council meeting that Markey has been conducting extensive oversight of the EPA terminations and working with communities to connect them with legal resources as he attempts to combat the cuts.
A current member of the U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, Markey was an author of much of the original legislation that was incorporated into the Inflation Reduction Act.
“The Trump administration is attempting to steal $20 million from the people of Springfield to fund tax breaks for billionaires,” Markey said in a statement read by Lederman. “These funds were rightfully awarded through rigorous review processes to the Springfield community to help clean up polluted air and ease the burden of asthma that has long strangled children, seniors and people of all ages as a result of generations of concentrated pollution.”
Other councilors outside of Santaniello were similarly incensed by the EPA’s decision to cut these funds, including Ward 6 City Councilor Victor Davila, who called Trump’s decision “heartless.”
“You got to be heartless to go after money and to take out the part of money that will help our children and people with asthma in any part,” Davila said. “This is not the way to affect change in this country.”
Ward 7 City Councilor Tim Allen mentioned the 15-year fight the City Council has had against Palmer Renewable Energy’s attempt to build a biomass power plant in the city. According to the Conservation Law Foundation, Massachusetts Appeals Court recently voted in favor of the company’s attempt to revive the plant using permits that expired over a decade ago.
Allen called that news along with the EPA termination a “gut punch.”
“We need to rise up,” Allen said. “We need to fight for the health of Springfield, Mass.”
Readers can learn more about the EPA’s elimination of the $1 million asthma grant by visiting prior Reminder Publishing coverage: tinyurl.com/yc2vvpnk.
