Environmental Justice: Principles, Policies, Guidance, and Effective Practices

1
Environmental Justice Principles, Policies,
Guidance, and Effective Practices

• FTA Region VI Civil Rights Colloquium
• March 29, 2006

2
The Environmental Justice Movement

• 1982--Protests in Warren County, NC against
  siting a landfill in predominantly
  African-American and low-income community,
• 1983--The GAO found that 3 out of 4 hazardous
  waste landfills in the South were located in
  minority and low-income communities.
• 1990s--The first national people of color
  environmental leadership summit.
• 1992--EPA creates office of environmental equity.
  
• 1994Executive Order on Environmental Justice

3
Executive Order 12898

• Each Federal agency shall make achieving
  environmental justice part of its mission by
  identifying and addressing, as appropriate,
  disproportionately high and adverse human health
  or environmental effects of its programs,
  policies, and activities on minority populations
  and low-income populations in the United States.

4
Principles of Environmental Justice

• To avoid, minimize, or mitigate
  disproportionately high and adverse human health
  and environmental effects, including social and
  economic effects, on minority populations and
  low-income populations.
• To ensure the full and fair participation by all
  potentially affected communities in the
  transportation decision-making process.
• To prevent the denial of, reduction in, or
  significant delay in the receipt of benefits by
  minority and low-income populations.

5
Terms and Concepts

• Minority--defined according to census categories.
• Low-Income--means a person whose median household
  income is at or below the Health and Human
  Services policy guidelines.
• Low-income population--low-income persons who
  live in geographic proximity or geographically
  dispersed/transient persons.

6
Terms and Concepts

• Adverse effect--can include economic as well as
  effects to the human and natural environment.
• Disproportionately high adverse effects are those
  effects that are
• Predominantly borne by a minority or low-income
  population or
• Effects that will be suffered by the minority or
  low-income population and is appreciably more
  severe or greater in magnitude than the adverse
  effect that will be suffered by the non-minority
  or non-low-income population.

7
The DOT Order on Environmental Justice

• This order incorporates environmental justice
  principles into the DOTs existing programs,
  policies, and activities.
• DOTs Planning and programming activities will
  include explicit consideration of the effects of
  the activities on minority and low-income
  populations.
• DOT will continuously monitor its programs,
  policies, and activities to ensure that
  disproportionately high and adverse effects to
  minority and low-income populations are avoided,
  minimized, and mitigated.

8
The DOT Order on Environmental Justice

• The U.S. DOT Order applies to all policies,
  programs, and other activities that are
  undertaken, funded, or approved by the Federal
  Highway Administration (FHWA), the Federal
  Transit Administration (FTA), or other U.S. DOT
  components
• Policy Decisions.
• Systems Planning.
• Metropolitan and Statewide Planning.
• Project Development and Environmental Review
  under NEPA.
• Preliminary Design.
• Final Design Engineering.
• Right-of-Way.
• Construction.
• Operations and Maintenance.

9
The DOT Order on Environmental Justice

• In making determinations regarding
  disproportionately high and adverse effects, DOT
  will consider mitigation and enhancement measures
  and offsetting benefits provided to minority and
  low-income population, as well as the design,
  comparative impacts, and number of similar
  elements in non-minority and non-low-income
  areas.

10
DOT Order on Environmental Justice

• Activities that have adverse and
  disproportionately high effects on minority and
  low-income populations will only be carried out
  if mitigation measures and alternatives that
  would avoid these effects are not practicable.

11
The National Environmental Policy Act

• The National Environmental Policy Act seeks to
  ensure that public projects take into account
  social goals
• Specifically, NEPA seeks to
• Prevent or eliminate damage to the environment
• Stimulate the health and welfare of man
• Enrich the understanding of ecological systems
  and the natural resources important to the
  nation.

12
The National Environmental Policy Act

• Under NEPA, the Federal responsibility is to
• Act as trustees of the environment
• Assure, safe, healthful, productive,
  aesthetically and culturally pleasing
  surroundings
• Attain the widest range of benefit without
  degradation or undesirable and unintended
  consequences
• Preserve important historic, cultural, and
  natural aspects
• Achieve a balance between population and resource
  use
• Enhance the quality of the environment

13
Essential Elements of NEPA

• Scoping
• Alternatives
• Impacts
• Mitigation
• Public Involvement
• Interagency Coordination
• Documentation

14
Scoping

• The purpose of scoping is to define the
  objectives, scope, and impacted areas of a
  project.
• Determine whether a potentially affected area
  includes minority populations or low-income
  populations.
• Develop a strategy for effective public
  involvement.

15
Alternatives

• NEPA requires that project sponsors identify a
  reasonable array of alternatives that meet the
  purpose and need of the project and that a no
  build alternative be evaluated.
• Evaluate environmental justice issues for all
  reasonable alternatives.
• Alternatives should be developed that mitigate
  and avoid effects to both the population at large
  and any disproportionately high and adverse
  effects on minority and low-income populations.

16
Impacts

• Identify the direct, indirect, and cumulative
  impacts of a project to the human and natural
  environment.
• For each alternative, identify whether there
  would be adverse and disproportionate effects on
  minority and low-income populations.

17
Mitigation

• Consider measures that would avoid, minimize,
  preserve, repair, rehabilitate, or restore the
  human and natural environment.
• Mitigation measures should be developed
  specifically to address disproportionately high
  and adverse effects to minority and low-income
  communities.
• Ensure that the affected community receives its
  fair share of the benefits of the proposed action

18
Public Involvement

• Make a targeted effort to overcome linguistic,
  institutional, cultural, economic, historical, or
  other barriers that may prevent minority and
  low-income persons and populations from
  effectively participating in a recipients
  decision-making process.

19
Public Involvement

• Examples
• Coordination with individuals, institutions, or
  organizations in the affected predominantly
  minority and/or predominantly low-income
  communities to reach out to members of the
  community.
• Provision of opportunities for public
  participation through means other than written
  communication, such as personal interviews or use
  of audio or video recording devices to capture
  oral comments.
• Use of locations, facilities, and meeting times
  that are local, convenient and accessible to the
  disabled, low-income, and minority communities.
• Use of different meeting sizes or formats, or
  variation in the type and number of news media
  used to announce public participation
  opportunities, so that communications are
  tailored to the particular community or
  population.
• Implementing the Department of Transportations
  policy guidance concerning recipients
  responsibilities to limited English proficient
  persons to overcome linguistic barriers to public
  participation.
• Providing assistance to people with disabilities,
  including individuals who are blind or have
  low-vision or are hearing impaired.

20
Interagency Coordination

• Coordinate with other Federal agencies to
  identify and address possible adverse and
  disproportionate impacts to minority and
  low-income populations.

21
Documentation

• Environmental Impact Statements and Environmental
  Assessments should contain an environmental
  justice section that identifies and addresses
  adverse and disproportionate effects of project
  alternatives on minority and low-income
  populations.
• Applications for a documented categorical
  exclusion should also reference any environmental
  justice issues.

22
Resources

• Effective methods for Environmental Justice
  Assessment

23
Resources

• DOT Environmental Justice Website ,
  www.fhwa.dot.gov/environment/ej2.htm