LAT: Youth's vigor makes a strong impression in environmental hearings

15-year-old Otana Jakpor, left, and Carla Truax
measure airborne pollutants near County-USC
Medical Center. Otana has won many awards for
her work. One of her studies found that air
purifiers reduce asthmatics' lung capacity.

August 26, 2009

15-year-old Otana Jakpor has attended dozens of air-quality meetings and EPA hearings, presenting data from her experiments and advocating for tighter restrictions to improve public health.

Among her many accomplishments, Otana Jakpor, 15, has managed to break up the monotonous atmosphere of air-quality hearings. It's no easy task.

Typically, environmentalists spout acronyms and percentages, while industry lobbyists predict the economy will collapse under new rules.

Then the 5-foot-6 African American high school senior steps forward in defense of clean air.

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"I urge the EPA to set the best possible standards based on public health considerations, and not succumb to industry pressure to set weaker standards," she concluded. "Remember, the economic costs of asthma exacerbations are enormous."

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After watching her present her study, representatives from both the American Lung Assn. and USC's Southern California Environmental Health Sciences Center recruited Otana. She is now a volunteer spokeswoman for the association and an intern at the center, getting up at 5 every morning to catch the train from Riverside to Los Angeles.

Speaking at a conference in Los Angeles earlier this summer, Otana drew laughs with a story about how the former EPA chief said he would appoint her to take his place.

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