(Radio Iowa) – Some residents in western Iowa have purchased monitors with the help of environmental advocates to track air quality conditions. The Iowa Environmental Council published a report last year showing that parts of Sioux City have the highest asthma rates in the state. Organizer Lexi McKee-Hemenway says the group is working with residents to put up monitors that detect particles in the air called P-M two-point-five.

“Some of this P-M two-point-five., they are heavy metals. So when they start to, you know, stack on top of each other, it never leaves your body,” she says. McKee-Hemenway says the monitors are showing that low-income residents of color are living in places with bad air quality.” So it becomes an environmental justice concern, and these monitors have, like, really underscored that that’s an issue,” McKee-Hemenway says.

The Iowa Environmental Council helped cover the cost of six air quality monitors with donations. One monitor costs around 350 dollars. The I-E-C report last year linked Woodbury County’s asthma rates to coal plants.