CityLab Daily: ‘We Can't Get Out of This Area That Is Killing Us’

Keep up with the most pressing, interesting, and important city stories of the day. Sign up for the CityLab Daily newsletter here.

“My district is hot.” These are the words of Summer Lee, who is set to become the first black woman elected as a state House representative in western Pennsylvania. Her district includes Braddock, a city just outside of Pittsburgh that was the primary site for steel manufacturing plants that built the bedrock of American society in the 20th century. Most of those steel mills are now shuttered, and Braddock is the poster child for environmental injustice. Its predominantly black and impoverished population lives in one of the most pollution-burdened cities in America, producing disparate health outcomes ranging from asthma to infant mortality.