ROBERT WILLIAM COLLIN, SENIOR RESEARCH SCHOLAR,

CENTER FOR SUSTAINABLE COMMUNITIES

&

Environmental Justice & EJ Law In Oregon

What is Environmental Justice?

The United States Environmental Protection Agency defines EJ as follows:

"Environmental Justice is the fair treatment and meaningful involvement of all people regardless of race, color, national origin, or income with respect to the development, implementation, and enforcement of environmental laws, regulations, and policies. EPA has this goal for all communities and persons across this Nation. It will be achieved when everyone enjoys the same degree of protection from environmental and health hazards and equal access to the decision-making process to have a healthy environment in which to live, learn, and work."

It will be achieved when everyone enjoys the same degree of protection from environmental and health hazards and equal access to the decision-making process to have a healthy environment in which to live, learn, and work."

People of color – African American, Native American and Latino --are more exposed to toxins and hazardous substances in the environment where they live, work, play and learn.

Is it Race?Or income

Or property values

Or geology

Or . . . .

What characteristic predicts exposures to toxic waste and pollution?

1. Race/ethnicity - even when numerous potentially relevant variables are included, strong positive association with environmental quality.

2. Income – mixed3. Poverty - strong positive between

unemployment and pollution4. Political Mobilization - consistent

relationship; owner occupied especially.

Cerrell & Associates

1984 California Waste Management Board commissioned a study on how to site waste incinerators – called Political Difficulties Facing Waste to Energy Plant Siting by Cerrell Associates aka Cerrell Report.

The consultants suggested targeting small rural communities whose residents are low income, older people, or people with a high school education or less, communities with a high proportion of Catholic residents and communities who engage in extractive industries such as agriculture, mining, and forestry.

Ideally, “officials and companies should look for lower socioeconomic neighborhoods that are also in a heavy industrial area with little if any commercial activity.”

If you’re not at the table, you’re probably the meal.

“ fair treatment and meaningful involvement of all people regardless of race, color, national origin, or income with respect to the development, implementation, and enforcement of environmental laws, regulations, and policies”

Conclusion of Studies of Waste Streams

RACIAL BIASES IN THE DISTRIBUTION AND DENSITY OF TOXIC RELEASE INVENTORY FACILITIES

Even controlling for other factors, African American and Hispanic residential areas are more likely to be exposed to environmental risks.

.

Cancer by Race from Environmental Stressors

For person of color risk of cancer is almost 1 in 3, including hispanic people

For Anglos that risk is about 1 in 7

Latinos and Air Pollution

66 % of Latinos (25.6 million people)live in areas that do not meet the federal government’s air quality standards

NYC, San Diego, South Phoenix, Chicago – Latino’s in areas with air pollution and high asthma rates; sometime 4 times the national average and sometimes the demographic group hit the hardest (NYC).

Asthma contributes to more emergency room visits and hospitalizations for respiratory conditions.

Pregnant women and children most vulnerable to air pollutants– increases risks of complications, premature birth, low birth rate, and cardiac defects in babies.

Air pollution can worsen lung cancer, allergeries, and bronchitis.

Latinos and Safe Drinking Water

Colonias along the US Mexico border lack potable water and adequate waste water treatment –leading to waterborne diseases like giardiasis, hepatitis, and cholera.

Arizona’ Maricopa County and much of Southern California (heavily Latino) take drinking water from the Colorado River which is contaminated with perchlorate, linked to thyroid and cancer.

California officials have closed about 800 wells because of high levels of nitrates

Nitrates come from pesticides, feces, and animal manure)

Nitrogen interferes with blood’s ability to carry oxygen to the brain, can be fatal to infants.

Latinos and Pesticide Exposures at Work

Latino farmworker in California had a 59 – 69 % greater risk of stomach, cervical, and uterine cancer, and some leukemias, compared with other Latinos in California.

US Dept of Labor – water for washing is unavailable in 16 % of the fields

General health impacts of exposure are skin rashes, burning eyes, cough, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, and difficulty breathing.

Latinos and Mercury Exposure

Main exposure routes are through fish, cosmetics, and cultural ceremonies. (Santeria – sometimes sprinkles Mercury)

Very few warnings on any of these exposure vectors in Spanish regarding dangers of Mercury exposure.

Mercury accumulates in the body. Can affect the brain of developing fetus in pregnant mother.

Latino children generally, have higher Mercury levels than Whites.

Released into air by power plants and chemical companies, falls into the water as a metal, working its way through the ecosystem until it accumulates in fish.

Latino Children and Lead Poisoning

Latino children in general are twice as likely as non Latino White children to have blood Lead levels above the threshold established by the Centers for Disease Control for risk of lead poisoning.

In Arizona in 2002 77 % of children diagnosed with lead poisoning were Latino, they make up 25.3 % of the population then.

In children, lead exposure can cause neurological problems even in tiny does.

Associated with decline in IQ and learning disabilities, hyperactivity, violence, and an increase in anti social behavior.

Sources, lead paint, lead glazed pottery, traditional remedies as greta and azarcon, lead in land, air, and/or water.

Asthma and Children of Color

Asthma strikes African-American and Latino youth more often and much harder.

Farmworkers

Large issue in Oregon; 1.2 billion pounds of pesticides for

$4.6 billion per year in US 600 active chemical ingredients

combined with others to form about 35,000 different chemical formulations

313,000 US farmworkers suffer from exposure related illnesses; 800 - 1000 die.

Fish Most studies of fish consumption overlook subsistence fishers;

Different amounts of fish; plus different consumption

patterns (often culturally based)

yield larger exposure vectors for certain populations because fish are highly contaminated.

Foundational Federal Law

In 1994 President Clinton signed Executive Order 12898, charging all federal agencies with integrating environmental justice concerns into their operations.

EXECUTIVE ORDER NO. 12898

FEDERAL ACTIONS TO ADDRESS ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE IN MINORITY POPULATIONS AND LOW-INCOME

POPULATIONS

Each Federal agency shall conduct its programs, policies, and activities that substantially affect human health or the environment, in a manner that ensures that such programs, policies, and

activities do not have the effect of excluding persons . . . from participation in, denying persons . . . the benefits of, or subjecting

persons . . . to discrimination under, such programs, policies, and activities, because of

their race, color, or national origin.

The Executive Order requires Federal agencies to examine the services they provide, identify any need for services to those with limited English proficiency (LEP), and develop and implement a system to provide those services so LEP persons can have meaningful access to them.

Executive Order 13166, "Improving Access to Services for Persons with Limited English

Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act

Recipients of federal funding may not discriminate on the basis of race.

No requirement to prove intentional discrimination; Disparate or disproportional impact by race is required.

DOJ’s Title VI implementing regulations prohibit not only intentional discrimination but also facially-neutral practices that have a discriminatory impact. The “failure to ensure that LEP persons can effectively participate in or benefit from Federally assisted programs and activities” may constitute national origin discrimination.

Remedies are loss of federal funds.

All Oregonians have a voice in Environmental policies that affect where they live, work, recreate and worship. The Task force was created by the legislature to safeguard all Oregonians.

SB 420: It’s The Law

Oregon SB 420 created the Environmental Justice Task Force, to ensure environmental justice for all Oregonians.

Oregon Environmental Justice Defined

Environmental justice is equal protection from environmental

and health hazards, and meaningful public participation in decisions that affect the environment in which people live, work, learn, practice spirituality and play.

Environmental Justice Defined in Oregon

Environmental justice is equal protection from

environmental and health hazards, and meaningful public participation in decisions that affect the environment in which people live, work, learn, practice spirituality and play.

National Award Winner, 2010

EPA is pleased to recognize the Oregon Environmental Justice Task Force for effective implementation of the State’s environmental justice legislation and its ability to incorporate environmental justice considerations into State agencies’ programs.

The Oregon Environmental Justice Task Force has achieved several significant milestones, including unprecedented cooperation and relationship-building between Task

Force members and Oregon state agency representatives; the creation of a “Your Voice for Environmental Justice” document

outlining citizens’ rights to be involved in decisions that affect their quality of life;

http://www.epa.gov/compliance/ej/resources/publications/awards/2010/oejtf.pdf

Monday April 25, 2011the Oregon Senate passed Senate Bill 97, which directs the Oregon Health Authority and 18 health professional regulatory boards to develop guidelines and standards for providing culturally competent care to minority groups. It now moves to the House for consideration.

Cultural Competency: New Legislation

Go to

www.scorecard.org Type in your zip code to

discover what toxic emissions occur in your zip code

New Coalitions

Many Separate Paths to Justice:

Housing, Education,

Employment ,Spirituality

ONE ENVIRONMENT

“truth crushed to earth will rise again.”

“the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.”

What we have done to the People of the Earth, we have done to the Earth, but the Earth doesn’t lie. People do.

Find Out More

America’s Migrant Farmworkers, National Center for Farmworker Health www.ncfh.org/.

Citizens Clearinghouse for Hazardous Wastes www.chej.org.

Collin, Robert William. Environmental Justice in Oregon: It’s The Law, online at http://legacy.lclark.edu/org/envtl/objects/38-2_Collin.pdf.

…….BATTLEGROUND:ENVIRONMENT(Greenwood Press 2008)

…….and Collin, ENCYCLOPEDIA OF SUSTAINABILITY (ABC –Clio Press 2010).

……."Environmental Equity: A Law and Planning Approach to Environmental Racism" University of Virginia Environmental Law Review, Vol. 11, No. 4, summer 1992. Reprinted in "Law and the Environment" edited by Robert V. Percival & Dorothy C. Alevizatos (Temple University Press Philadelphia).

…….. "Where Did All The Blue Skies Go? Sustainability and Equity:" with Robin Morris Collin, 10 Journal of Environmental Law and Litigation, winter 1995.

………and Collin. Sustainability and Environmental Justice: Is the Future Clean and Black?” Environmental Law Reporter June 2001.

Environmental Justice for All: A 50 State Survey – www.uchastings.edu/site_files/plri/EJ2007.pdf.

More Environmental Justice Resources

Fish Advisories - www.epa.gov/waterscience/fish/advisories. or for state information - http://.epa.gov/waterscience/fish/promo.

Indigenous Environmental Network – www.ienearth.org/.

Northwest Center for Alternatives to Pesticides - http://www.pesticide.org.

Oregon Toxics Alliance - http://www.oregontoxics.org/.

Oregon Environmental Justice Task Force website: http://governor.oregon.gov/Gov/GNRO/environmental_justice.shtml.

Pineros y Campesinos Unidas del Noreste, Northwest Treeplanters and Farmworkers United – www.pcun.org.

TRI - TOXICS RELEASE INVENTORY - go to www.scorecard.org. type in a zip code per their instructions and discover what toxic emissions occur in that zip code..