February 1995; Volume 1, Issue #5
(sub)TEX

The enviromental justice movement has come a long way since its birth a decade ago in rural, mostly African-American, Warren County, North Carolina. The selection of Warren County for a PCB (polychlorinated biphenyl) landfill sparked widespread protests, marches, and more than 500 arrests - including District of Columbia Delegate Walter Fauntroy (chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus), the Reverend Benjamin Chavis, Jr. (Commission for Racial Justice), and the Reverend Joseph Lowery (Southern Christian Leadership Conference).

Although the protesters were unsuccessful in blocking the PCB landfill, they brought national attention to waste facility siting inequities and galvanized African American church and civil rights leaders' support for environmental justice. The demonstrations also put "environmental racism" on the map and challenged the myth that African Americans are not concerned about or involved in environmental issues.

Grassroots groups, after decades of struggle, have grown to become the core of the multi-issue, multi-racial, and multi-regional environmental justice movement. Diverse community-based groups have begun to organize and link their struggles to issues of civil and human rights, land rights and sovereignty, cultural survival, racial and social justice, and sustainable development. The impetus for getting environmental justice on the nation's agenda has come from an alliance of grassroots activists, civil rights leaders, and a few academicians who questioned the foundation of the current environmental protection paradigm - where communities of color receive unequal protection. Whether urban ghettos and barrios, rural "poverty pockets," Native American reservations, or communities in the Third World, grassroots groups are demanding an end to unjust and nonsustainable environmental and development policies.

Despite the many laws, mandates, and directives by the federal government to eliminate discrimination in housing, education, employment, and voting, few attempts have been made by the government to address discriminatory environmental laws, regulations, and policies are not applied uniformly. The current environmental model places low-income and communities of color at risk. Institutional barriers such as housing discrimination, redlining, and residential segregation make it difficult for people of color to buy their way out of health threatening physical environments.

Threatened communities in Southeast Louisiana's petrochemical corridor (the 85-mile stretch along the Mississippi River from Baton Rouge to New Orleans) typify the industrial madness that has gone unchecked for too long. The corridor has been dubbed "Cancer Alley" by some environmentalists. Health concerns raised by residents and grassroots activists who live in small towns along the Mississippi River have not been adequately addressed by local, state and federal agencies. Public health concerns finally reached the attention of the U.S. Civil Rights Commission. In its September 1993 report, the Louisiana Advisory Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights reinforced what many people already knew: African-American communities along the lower Mississippi River chemical corridor bear a disproportionate health and environmental burden from industrial pollution.

It has been an uphill battle convincing some government and industry officials and some environmentalists that unequal protection, disparate impact, and environmental racism exist. In 1991, for example, Admistrator William Reilly of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) established an internal Environmental Equity Work Group to study disparate health risks found in low-income communities and communities of color.

In 1992, the agency issued a report [Environmental Equity: Reducing Risks for All Communities], created an Office of Environmental Equity, initiated a number of environmental justice projects in the 10 regions, and took the lead in coordinating an interagency research workshop - co-sponsored with the National Institute for Environmental Health Sciences and the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry - on environmental threats in low-income and people of color communities.

The enviromental justice message reached the White House with the election of President Bill Clinton and Vice President Al Gore. Two environmental justice activists (Drs. Benjamin Chavis, Jr. and Robert D. Bullard) served on the Clinton transition team in the natural resources and environment cluster and assisted in preparing a briefing book for newly designated EPA Administrator Carol Browner. In a speech at the African American Church Summit held in Washington D.C., on December 2-3, 1993, Vice President Gore acknowledged environmental discrimination as a national problem. On February 11, 1994, President Clinton signed an Executive Order on Environmental Justice.

Today, grassroots groups and impacted communities are calling for greater input into shaping environmental priorities that were in the past left to a small, homogeneous group of scientists, environmentalists, health professionals, and government bureaucrats. Grassroots leaders are positioning themselves to become "partners" (not silent or junior partners, but full partners) with environmental policy makers on issues that affect the health of their communities.

Slowly, the enviromental justice message has begun to reach the U.S. Congress. For example, a half-dozen bills have been introduced which address some aspect of environmental justice. The federal government cannot solve many of the environmental injustices faced by people of color alone. Much of the fault rests with the states. Thus, state action is also needed. Arkansas and Louisiana were the first two states to pass environmental justice laws. Virginia passed a legislative resolution on environmental justice. Several other states (California, Georgia, New York, North Carolina, and South Carolina) have pending legislation to address environmental disparities.

Endangered communities are not waiting for the government or the polluting industry to get their acts together. Community leaders are demanding an end to unequal protection and environmental racism through enforcement of existing laws. And where appropriate, environmental justice groups are demanding that new federal and state laws be enacted to address environmental problems affecting those communities that are at greatest rik - low-income communites and communities of color.

Fom the People of Color Environmental Groups 1994-1995 Directory. compiled by Robert D. Bullard of the Environmental Justice Resource Center, Clark Atlanta University, Georgia The directory is available from the Mott Foundation, 1200 Mott Foundation Building, Flint, MI 45802-1851. Publications Hot Line: (810) 766-1766.