13 hours Ago By Dominic Anthony Walsh
As President Donald Trump's administration slashes federal spending deemed wasteful, the Environmental Protection Agency cancelled $1.5 million in funding for a project to build out a solar energy farm, create a resilience hub and plant trees in Houston's long-polluted Fifth Ward neighborhood. The grants included $500,000 for nonprofit Black United Fund of Texas and $1 million for the Houston Health Department.
They would have funded the first two stages of the " Fifth Ward: Vulnerable to Vibrant " project intended to train community members on solar energy installation, establish a solar-powered resiliency hub for use during extreme weather and reduce heat, flooding and pollution by planting native trees. On its website, the Houston Health Department said it's "exploring other avenues that can potentially be pursued to fulfill the activities." Houston City Council last year accepted an additional $20 million from the EPA for the project's third stage, intended to fund "the final stepping-stone in establishing a community solar farm" and "provide free or reduced-price electricity plans" for residents who have been affected by underground, cancer-causing contamination linked to a site owned by the Union Pacific Railroad.
“The purpose of that project is to uplift communities that have been challenged by environmental injustices,” Loren Hopkins, chief environmental science officer for the Houston Health Department, told Houston Public Media at the time. The Houston Chronicle reported the $20 million grant was " suspended ." A spokesperson for the city's health department told Houston Public Media the grant "has not been cancelled.
" Asked whether the funds were frozen, the spokesperson said the department "does not have any further comment at this time." A spokesperson for the EPA didn't directly answer questions about the grant, writing "the agency is reviewing its awarded grants to ensure each is an appropriate use of taxpayer dollars and to understand how those programs align with Administration priorities." "The agency's review is ongoing," the EPA spokesperson said.
The city's health department confirmed in early April that it lost $42 million in federal funding , including $12 million in personnel costs, representing about a quarter of its $170 million annual budget. A spokesperson declined to say if the $1 million grant for the Fifth Ward project was part of the $42 million in cuts. The EPA also paused $3 million in funding for a program run by Air Alliance Houston, which in 2022 began notifying community members in Harris County of companies seeking pollution permits in their areas.
The automated program sent postcards to homes around polluting facilities about upcoming permit hearings with the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, and it included an online map of pollution permits. The grant would've expanded the program to cover 10 Gulf Coast counties over the next three years. "There is a need for this work in the community," Air Alliance Houston Executive Director Jennifer Hadayia said.
"There’s a need for people to know what pollution is happening in their community. There’s a need for people to know how they can get involved. And now that these funds are frozen, we are not able to implement that program to meet those needs.
" Hadayia said the canceled grants, coupled with the expected rollback of rules and regulations tied to the Clean Air Act, create "a perfect storm for our air quality to be worse and for ultimately the health of our population to be worse." The EPA in March described its actions , including the reconsideration of rules regulating air toxicity standards and pollution from oil and gas production facilities, as "the greatest and most consequential day of deregulation in U.S.
history.".
