Throughout his life, Robert Miranda has served many roles.

Some know him as a motorcyclist. Having been vice president of the Latin American Motorcycle Association’s Milwaukee chapter, Miranda has crossed the country several times on his Harley-Davidson motorcycle.

Others know him as a leader and innovator in the community. Aside from working as executive director of Esperanza Unida, a nonprofit labor organization that served Milwaukee’s South Side for decades, Miranda has also been recognized by the United Migrant Opportunity Services, or UMOS, with a Community Service Award and as Hispanic Man of the Year.

Many more see him as a leader – Miranda served as the first Latino student body president at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, helping establish programs such as U-PASS, in which students can access free transportation on Milwaukee city buses.

But even with a lifetime of accolades and achievements, Miranda prides himself most on fighting for his community, having dedicated himself to causes such as Milwaukee’s decades-old lead contamination problem.

His passion for these issues, Miranda said, stems from a belief that change can happen and that it is worth fighting for.

“We’re all in this together, and we all share the same ground,” Miranda said. “All we can do is to improve things so that we can improve our quality of life.”

‘The importance of community’

Miranda credits his instinct for activism to his upbringing. Growing up in Chicago and attending a Catholic school, Miranda said, cemented many of his views.

“Social issues and social justice were ingrained in me,” he said. “This helped me build an understanding of the importance of community.”

Manny Perez, who formerly served as secretary of the state Department of Workforce Development, has worked with Miranda numerous times over the years.

He described Miranda as dedicated, honorable and forward-thinking.

“Robert, as an individual, has been a true leader,” Perez said. “His primary interest and priority has always been the improvement of conditions for the community at large.”

Serving in the Marines taught him many of his ideals, Miranda said. What he did there “was about protecting the community.”

The Marines provided a cause and a fighting energy, Miranda said. Now he seeks to “fight to improve what is going on in the community.”

Since then, his advocacy has largely featured issues that impact the people and community around him, extending to advocacy for incarcerated people, education and the environment.

“For me, if things in the community improve, my quality of life improves too,” Miranda said. “Safer streets, better schools, clean water – all of this is a part of the quality of life that I can see and that I can enjoy.”

A focus on lead

For nearly a decade, Miranda served as a Marine at Camp Lejeune, a military base in North Carolina. Camp Lejeune, later designated a Superfund site by the Environmental Protection Agency, was found to have dangerous water contamination, exposing an estimated 1 million Marines and their families to chemicals causing cancer and other health conditions.

“From 1980 to 1987, I was on that base drinking that water,” Miranda said. “A lot of people were getting cancer. A lot of people were going home.”

Drinking the contaminated water caused him health problems that live on to this day, he said. But knowing what happened at Camp Lejeune also brought him an awareness of issues with pollution in other parts of his life.

After hearing about lead poisoning issues in cities like Washington, D.C., Miranda started researching and looking into the problem closely.

“It really piqued my interest because of what I was going through,” Miranda said. “I started looking into it and I started seeing a lot of correlations between my experiences.”

Over a decade after Miranda started researching the lead issue, he remains a staunch advocate for clean water and clean-living environments.

Miranda’s work has put him at the front lines, leading efforts with the Freshwater for Life Action Coalition and the Get the Lead Out Coalition.

He has been an outspoken critic of Milwaukee’s abundant lead hazards, having called for lead-free drinking water and living environments years before citywide efforts to address the lead problem.

“He anticipated conditions before his time,” Perez said. “He sees many things before other people.”

Fighting for a clean environment means more to Miranda than himself or his own past.

“It’s about community,” Miranda said. “This is about our babies, our children – the future of this city.”

Future generations

Among the most important aspects of a community are its future generations, Miranda said. Ending lead poisoning is such a focus for him because of how much it could help children and young people.

Miranda cites research studies about lead’s negative effects, especially on the harm that it can bring as a neurotoxin. Eliminating lead, he said, could help improve children’s education and eventually lower violence levels.

In doing this work, Miranda also hopes to lift up others in the community and encourage them to use their own voices.

His advice to the next generation?

“Watch out for yourself, but also watch out for your community.”

Miranda acknowledges that this isn’t always an easy task.

“If you want to make real change, get ready to be challenged,” he said. “You have to stand strong on your own merits and realize that it’s not about you, but it’s about lives in our community and improving things for families, neighborhoods and schools. These are the things that make our city stronger.”

Milwaukee’s Robert Miranda on a life of activism, community and doing what’s right is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.

In Milwaukee, lead poisoning is one of the most serious health threats facing young children, according to the City of Milwaukee Health Department.

From 2018 to 2021, nearly 6.25% of children younger than 6 in Milwaukee County tested for lead were considered lead-poisoned, with percentages of children poisoned in some Milwaukee neighborhoods nearing 25%, according to data from the Wisconsin Department of Health Services.

Lead hazards in paint, water and soil are common throughout many of Milwaukee’s older homes and buildings, contributing to the widespread issue of lead poisoning. Here are some ways that you can identify and manage lead hazards.

Lead hazards in buildings

After lead poisoning cases were linked to an abundance of lead hazards in two Milwaukee Public Schools facilities, Sean Kane, senior director for facilities and maintenance services at Milwaukee Public Schools, said that the district “assumes that there is lead in a building that’s been constructed before 1978.”

One reason why is because lead paint, identified as a leading cause of lead poisoning by the health department, was used often in homes and buildings before it was outlawed in 1978.

“You should always assume that a building has lead paint if it’s older than 1978,” said Michael Mannan, home environmental health director at the health department.

Lead also can be found in a building’s water – Milwaukee mandated the use of lead service lines in 1872 and outlawed the practice in 1962. A citywide lead service line replacement program seeks to replace an estimated 65,000 lead service lines. (You can check to see if your building has lead pipes here.)

But lead contamination in water can extend beyond the city’s water mains and service lines. Plumbing materials like pipes and faucets inside the building can still contain lead.

Before 1986, interior plumbing materials like pipes and faucets could be made entirely of lead, and plumbing materials made before 2014 may contain higher levels of lead.

Soil is another common source of lead contamination. Paint chips and dust from the exterior of homes built before 1978 can result in high lead levels in soil, and deposits from leaded gasoline and industrial activity also can contaminate soil.

What can you do?

“Make sure that your child gets screened for lead,” Mannan said.

The health department recommends testing all children for lead poisoning at the ages of 12, 18 and 24 months and then once every year until the age of 6.

More information about lead poisoning and free testing resources is available here.

The health department Lead-Safe Registry also lists properties that have been inspected and verified to be lead-safe. However, at the time of this story, only 18 properties in the city have participated in the registry program.

Milwaukee’s land management system also lists important information about a property, such as past lead orders or permits that would indicate that lead abatement has been completed.

But this only provides information for one point in time, Mannan said. Even if a home has undergone lead abatement in the past, new renovations and construction or further deterioration may introduce lead hazards.

Property owners also are required to disclose any past lead abatement to a tenant at the time of lease. A lead disclosure is also required to be provided to tenants at any building built before 1978.

“If you’re not receiving those documents, that should be a concern,” Mannan said.

Lead-safe practices

It is also important to maintain lead-safe practices, especially if you live in a building built before 1978.

The first step, Mannan said, is to check for flaking or chipping paint, especially around high-movement areas such as windowsills, which can cause toxic lead dust to gather. Areas with deteriorated paint can be a risk and will require professional remediation and repair efforts, such as repainting or sealing an area.

If you see any serious paint hazards, there are a few interim controls you can make to an area before completing more permanent repairs. Before cleaning lead dust, make sure that children are not present.

Mannan recommends using wet cleaning methods, like wiping or mopping, to clean off lead dust, and to make sure to dispose of a mophead or paper towel after wiping an area clean. A HEPA vacuum, which has additional filtration over a typical vacuum, also can be used to clean up lead dust. Free HEPA vacuum rentals from the health department are available to property owners during cleaning or renovation projects.

Covering a paint hazard with tape can help in especially deteriorated areas, but removing the tape afterward can cause more damage to the paint.

While these practices are helpful, “these are just intermediate controls until you can really rectify the paint hazard,” Mannan said.

It also is important to use cold filtered water for drinking and cooking. Using hot water from the tap can cause lead to dissolve more quickly, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.

Not all filters remove lead, however. Look for a point-of-use filter, such as a pitcher or faucet-mounted filter with the NSF/ANSI 42 and 53 designations, for lead certification. More information is available here.

In some situations, Milwaukee Water Works will provide a voucher for a free water filter at properties when a lead service line replacement is scheduled.

The health department also recommends maintaining other clean practices to help lower lead risks. These recommendations include washing hands regularly, washing children’s toys and removing shoes at the door to prevent tracking in soil with lead dust.

News414 is a service journalism collaboration between Wisconsin Watch and Milwaukee Neighborhood News Service that addresses the specific issues, interests, perspectives and information needs identified by residents of central city Milwaukee neighborhoods. Learn more at our website or sign up for our texting service here.

Lead hazards are everywhere in Milwaukee. Here’s what you can do to mitigate them. is a post from Wisconsin Watch, a non-profit investigative news site covering Wisconsin since 2009. Please consider making a contribution to support our journalism.