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They’re in stain resistant carpets and clothing, cookware, some cosmetics, outdoor gear, and even dental floss. You may know them as Teflon®, or Scotchguard®. You have them in your body and they’ve been detected in 455 California drinking water sources thus far. I’m talking about a class of fluorinated chemicals, called PFAS, and they threaten California’s water and its people. Why haven’t we done more about them?

PFAS are a family of approximately 4,700 human-made chemicals that are incredibly effective at combating oil fires as well as repelling grease, water, and stains. Original PFAS

Imagine over 600,000 acres of wilderness. You are surrounded by blue sky, mountains, rock formations and a cornucopia of plants including creosote, palo verde, cacti, and ocotillo. As you walk around, you have the opportunity to see bighorn sheep, mountain lions, kit foxes, mule deer, coyotes, greater roadrunners, golden eagles, black-tailed jackrabbits, ground squirrels, kangaroo rats, quail, prairie falcons, desert iguanas, chuckwallas, and red diamond rattlesnakes.

The place in question is Anza Borrego Desert State Park. The park is also a storied place that was inhabited for thousands of

Last month, the Comité Lost Hills En Accion, a group of community members that I work with to advocate for public health and community wellbeing measures in Lost Hills, invited representatives from Caltrans to do a presentation on the expansion of Highway 46. Highway 46, which runs through the Lost Hills community, is also known as a "Blood Alley" for the high number of motor-related deaths that take place on it. The current Caltrans proposal is to expand the highway from 2 lanes to 4 lanes. Throughout the week that preceded the meeting with Caltrans, core comité members and I business to