The Center for Community Action and Environmental Justice (CCAEJ) will host  The People's Hearing against Pollution: a Call for Justice, Wednesday, June 27, 2007 at 6:00 p.m. in the auditorium of the San Bernardino County Building, 850 East Foothill Ave, Rialto, CA, 92376. The People's Hearing will help to define the Perchlorate debate; outline the latest health information and provide an opportunity for the people of Rialto, those directly affected by the pollution, to voice their concerns and demand justice through the only acceptable solution, "no delays, cleanup now!"

Joining the people in demanding justice will be Dolores Huerta, co-founder of the United Farm  Workers with Cesar Chavez. An icon for demanding justice for all people, Dolores will head the panel of jurists to hear testimony from the people.

Perchlorate is the main ingredient in rocket fuel. At very low doses it can impair the thyroid's function. Perchlorate primarily affects the thyroid gland, which controls growth, mental development and metabolism.

Dolores was born Dolores Clara Fernandez on April 10, 1930 in the mining town of Dawson, in northern New Mexico.  Her father, Juan Fernandez, was a seasonal farm worker, miner, union activist and later a State Assemblyman.   Her parents divorced when she was three years old and her mother, Alicia Chavez, relocated Dolores and her two brothers to Stockton, California in the predominantly agricultural San Joaquin Valley.

In recognizing the needs of farm workers while working for the CSO, Dolores organized and founded the Agricultural Workers Association ("AWA") in 1960.  She became a fearless lobbyist in Sacramento, at the age of twenty-five (25), a time where few women, not to mention women of color, dared to enter the State Capital and National Capital to lobby legislators.  Her efforts paid off in 1961 when she succeeded in obtaining the removal of citizenship requirements from pension and public assistance programs for legal residents of the United States and California State disability insurance for farm workers.  

She was also instrumental in passage of legislation allowing the right to vote in Spanish, and the right of individuals to take the drivers license examination in their native language.