Building Capacity for Advanced Community Air Monitoring in California’s Overburdened Communities

Community air monitoring has expanded rapidly over the past decade in response to persistent environmental injustices and the limitations of regulatory monitoring networks, which often fail to capture localized pollution burdens in overburdened communities. While low-cost particle sensors have improved spatial coverage, communities still lack access to tools capable of measuring the chemical composition of particulate matter and identifying sources of air pollution. This study describes the improvement and community integration of the Toxic-Metal Aerosol Real-Time Analyzer (TARTA), an air quality instrument designed to quantify multiple metal species in near real time. Over several years of field testing, TARTA has been adapted from a laboratory prototype into a field-ready tool that can be safely operated and maintained by trained technicians from community-based organizations (CBOs), with major enhancements to usability, software functionality, and mechanical robustness. Building on this foundation, TARTA was integrated into the Toxic Metals Monitoring Regional Network (ToMMoRW), a collaborative effort between San Diego State University, the University of California, Davis, and CBOs in California. As the initial phase of ToMMoRW, we organized a 3-day, hands-on training workshop to prepare technicians from CBOs to assemble, operate, and troubleshoot TARTAs, emphasizing colearning, confidence building, and shared ownership of monitoring capacity. This study demonstrates how advanced air-monitoring technologies can be made truly community-operable when technical redesign is paired with structured training, streamlined data management, and collaborative field integration. Our approach provides a replicable model for developing community-driven monitoring systems that can support ongoing environmental health protection.