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Toxic neighbor: health problems persist for Latinos living near coal plants in and around Chicago, despite the state's efforts to promote clean air.

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From the friendly confines of Dvorak Park in Pilsen, Maria Chavez hopped on her bike and rode along the weedy sidewalks across busy Cermak Avenue just to marvel at the jet black piles of coal stacked outside the Fisk coal-burning power plant. The coal was stacked alongside a boxy, red brick building puffing dirty smoke from a tall smokestack with blinking red lights on top. She enjoyed the solitude and the strange sight of the coal next to the murky waters of the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal.

No one ever talked about what went on there. But even as a kid, Chavez was concerned. In the mid-1990s, in her 30s and still living nearby with a young daughter, Chavez called the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency with questions and to complain about emissions from the smokestacks. Various people she was transferred to said they'd take a message or get back to her. But no one did.

In 2004, a grassroots environmental group formed--the Pilsen Environmental Rights and Reform Organization, or PERRO. Chavez, now 43, began doing research with the group and confirmed her fears: Archaic coal-burning power plants like Fisk, owned by Midwest Generation, are believed to be responsible for causing or exacerbating asthma attacks and other respiratory problems in local residents.

By burning coal, companies produce energy for homes throughout the region. But these toxic plants were often built in rural areas where they couldn't impact the health of nearby residents. When Fisk was built in 1903 it was on the outskirts of the city, but Chicago has since expanded.

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There are now six operational coal-burning plants in the Chicago area. Fisk and Crawford are five miles apart and within the Chicago city limits. There are also plants in Joliet, Waukegan, Romeoville and just across the border in Hammond, Ind.

Despite national efforts to curb toxic emissions from coal plants through legislation and oversight, these plants continue to operate with impunity. All six were built in the first half of the past century and therefore grandfathered in under the Clean Air Act. That means they don't have to meet the harsher standards newer facilities have.

Officials at Dominion, which owns the Indiana facility, did not follow up on interview requests. But in 2007, the Hammond, Ind., facility was among the nation's 50 worst emitters of mercury and nitrogen oxide in proportion to energy output, according to a report by the Environmental Integrity Project. Midwest Generation's five Chicago area plants did not make that list, but have been cited by the EPA for violating opacity regulations for more than 500 hours.

Local and state officials have led several efforts to force companies--particularly Midwest Generation, which owns five of the six area plants--to clean up their act. But many attempts have failed. The...

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