UCLA Fielding-led team supports Altadena fire recovery through free soil testing
The team, led by UCLA Fielding's Dr. Kirsten Schwarz, is made up of students and faculty from across the university and community partners.
A team of UCLA researchers joined with community partners to test soil samples from neighborhoods hit hard by the 2025 Los Angeles County wildfires, including Altadena, Pasadena, and the Crescenta Valley, for lead and other contaminants dispersed by the fires.
“Things like adding clean soil, compost, mulch, keeping your yard planted; all of these techniques can reduce potential risk,” said Dr. Kirsten Schwarz, associate professor in the UCLA Fielding School’s Department of Environmental Health Sciences and a leader of the LA Urban Soil Social Impact Collaborative, a community-university partnership funded by UCLA’s Center for Community Engagement. “They can create a barrier between potentially contaminated soil and people; they can dilute the overall amount of lead, or in some cases they combine the lead into a form that's less (dangerous), so if we are exposed, it's less harmful.”
The January blazes in Los Angeles County, in both the Pacific Palisades-Malibu area adjacent to the Santa Monica Mountains, and the Altadena-Pasadena communities in the foothills of the San Gabriel Mountains (Eaton Canyon), claimed at least 31 lives and damaged or destroyed more than 18,000 structures, according to Los Angeles County officials.
“After the Eaton Fire, so many residents were left wondering what was in their soil - what they were walking on, planting in, and breathing around their homes,” said Kristy Brauch, a master gardener from Pasadena who works with the project. ”There’s a real mix of fear and urgency, but also an incredible desire to understand and take action.”
The Collaborative, which includes researchers from across UCLA and LA-based organizations, including the non-profit TreePeople, have hosted a series of soil testing events, workshops, and remediation projects across the region.
On Dec. 6, a soil testing event was held at Washington Park in Pasadena. The team welcomed almost 70 residents and screened roughly 200 soil samples using portable X-ray fluorescence analyzers to detect heavy metals, including lead, a known cause of significant illness. Overall, the project has tested almost 600 samples for roughly 250 residents.
Participants were able to have as many as three soil samples screened at the event and received personalized consultations on how to improve soil health and safety in their yards and gardens.
"It was great that they are doing this - having information is crucial," said Kevin Bolling, who lost his Altadena home in the fires. "This is probably the third time I've submitted samples, and because it was one-stop and here, we got them right away - but two other samples, I received no test results back, so I have no idea ... my results are not great, but at least I know and knowing is the biggest part."
The Collaborative, co-led by Schwarz, who also teaches at the UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs, and Dr. Jennifer Jay, professor in the UCLA Samueli Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, aims to leverage university research and resources and apply local and Indigenous knowledge to advance equitable access to healthy soils. It includes community-based, tribal, private and academic partners from across Los Angeles.
“Addressing soil pollution in Los Angeles and beyond requires community-engaged approaches that center local knowledge and priorities,” said Monika Shankar, a doctoral candidate in the UCLA Fielding School’s Department of Environmental Health Science and a principal investigator on the project. “Our collaborative serves as a proof of concept that meaningful and impactful research emerges when communities are partners throughout the entire process."
Funding
This project has been made possible with financial support from UCLA’s Center for Community Engagement.
