This story was originally published by Capital B and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration.
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story → publish → collaboration
As a child in the 1950s and ’60s, Regina Martin became so used to the oil pumpjacks near her home that she assumed every child lived beside them.
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child → become → them
Everyone was made “sick to [their] tummy” by the sulfurous, rotten-egg smell that never seemed to leave, she thought.
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she → make → smell
Only until she was grown did she begin to see a possible connection between growing up on top of the nation’s largest urban oil drilling field and her own sickness and the asthma that affected her sister.
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that → grow → sister
For over a century in Los Angeles and across the nation, Black people have been disproportionately likely to live near oil wells, the machinery that draws oil from deep underground.
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that → live → oil
The pollution from these drilling sites are connected to birth complications, child development issues, respiratory illnesses, and cancer.
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pollution → connect → complications
Now, a new California state law moves to turn that lived experience into a broader public-policy question: What does a state owe communities exposed to pollution for generations?
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state → move → generations
And what happens when you can’t offer support to every family that has struggled through the harm?
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that → happen → harm
California lawmakers have passed AB 1661, which would steer $5 million collected from penalized oil wells in Inglewood into direct cash aid for 1,000 nearby households with qualifying respiratory or reproductive health impacts.
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which → pass → impacts
Some of LA’s Blackest suburbs and city neighborhoods, including Inglewood, Ladera Heights, and Baldwin Hills, surround the oil field.
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Some → include → field
The legislation, introduced by Assemblymember Isaac G. Bryan, is expected to be signed into law by Gov. Gavin Newsom by October.
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legislation → introduce → October
It sets aside enough money for payments of up to $5,000 for 1,000 impacted households under its initial structure.
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It → set → structure
The money would come from the state’s community repair and reinvestment fund for people living nearest the oil field.
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money → come → field
For Black communities living nearest to refineries, highways, landfills, and oil wells, this fund may signal something larger than one oil field or payment.
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fund → live → field
It asks whether money can begin to repair harms accumulated across generations: lives cut short by illness, household wealth drained by medical bills and depressed property values, and the anxiety of raising children amid pollution.
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money → ask → pollution
Bryan and other supporters are calling it environmental reparations and say it is a model that could be replicated to make industrial companies help repair the damage borne by people living closest to polluting sites.
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companies → call → sites
To Tianna Shaw-Wakeman, the environmental justice program director with Black Women for Wellness in LA, the law could provide a national organizing model.
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law → provide → model
“My hope has always come at the community level, at the grassroots level,” she said.
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she → come → level
“I see how grassroots organizing has created long-term change in our local communities, and I see that that can be and is being replicated all over the country.”
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that → see → country
For Bryan, who represents the communities surrounding the Inglewood Oil Field, the cash-assistance program is part of a longer fight over the field’s legacy.
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program → represent → legacy
Bryan, the first Black legislator to chair the California Assembly’s Natural Resources Committee, said his constituents have faced lower life expectancies and higher rates of asthma and heart conditions for decades.
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constituents → chair → decades
“The company has essentially just been extracting from the community with no investments in the community, no care in the community and what feels like no regard at times for the broader community,” Bryan told Capital B.
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Bryan → extract → community
The measure builds on Bryan’s earlier legislation, AB 2716, which Newsom signed in 2024.
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Newsom → build → 2024
That law requires the Inglewood Oil Field to close by 2030 and establish a penalty structure for low-producing wells.
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law → require → wells
Low-producing wells can leak methane and other harmful gases into the air and water.
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wells → produce → air
To push operators to curb that pollution and clean up their sites, regulators imposed a penalty on companies that keep such wells operating.
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that → push → wells
Bryan said operators are charged $10,000 per well each month, with the revenue directed into a community repair fund restricted to investments within 2.5 miles of the field.
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revenue → say → field
The fund could eventually support affordable housing, urban greening, park infrastructure, and other community priorities, Bryan said.
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Bryan → support → housing
He described the cash program as a pilot that could help determine whether direct payments are the form of repair residents most want.
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residents → describe → repair
“We know people are struggling,” he said.
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he → know → ?
“We know one of the biggest tools against an increasingly unaffordable society is to just put more money in people’s pockets.”
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one → know → pockets
As communities nationwide press for stronger environmental protections, California’s experiment could test whether government and industry are willing to move beyond preventing future harm and toward compensating people who have already lived with its costs.
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who → press → costs
“Community members who have been deeply impacted, whose health have been deeply impacted, have never gotten restitution for that in any sort of way.
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health → impact → way
We deserve more than we have been getting,” Shaw-Wakeman said.
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Wakeman → deserve → more
“And as we transition our city, as we transition our county, part of that story has to be addressing past harms.”
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part → transition → harms
At the same time, California has passed a law that would shield reparation payments from taxation.
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that → pass → taxation
“California is actively preparing for the implementation of reparations programs,” said state Assemblymember Tina McKinnor, who introduced the legislation.
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who → prepare → legislation
“We must ensure that recipients receive the full benefit of these efforts.”
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recipients → ensure → efforts
Three dozen community groups came together in support of the environmental reparations legislation.
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groups → come → legislation
The legislation would not close the oil field or resolve the long-running fight over drilling in Los Angeles County.
Under the proposal, eligible households within 2.5 miles of the field could seek aid if a resident has experienced respiratory or reproductive health impacts.
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resident → close → impacts
…and 12 more, not listed.
The Aporia
