ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE

What is Environmental Justice?
Environmental Justice is the concept that people have the right to equal environmental protection regardless of race, ethnicity or socioeconomic status. In other words, people are entitled to have safe work, home and recreational environments in which they can live and work without fear of injury or sickness. The Environmental Justice movement is working to end the discriminatory practices inherent in public housing, land use, industrial planning, health care and sanitation.

Why is There a Need For Environmental Justice?
A disproportionate number of toxic waste sites, sanitation facilities, and incinerators are located in neighborhoods and on lands occupied by minorities, tribes and the poor. These facilities harm the health and wellness of individuals, lower property values and discourage investment. Overlooking the needs of their citizens, poorer cities and communities often welcome dangerous and noxious facilities in order to make money. Without, or unaware of, their rights, citizens of these communities are often left without a voice in the decision-making process and are forced to pay with their health, safety and sometimes lives for benefits they will never see.

New York and Environmental Justice
There are actions being taken by corporations, government agencies, and businesses in New York everyday that demonstrate the need for environmental justice. For example: New York City’s sewage waste often ends up traveling 2,065 miles to an isolated impoverished county on the Mexican border whose largest town can't even afford a sewer system of its own. Like citizens of countless other cities across the United States, these men and women are unfairly burdened with the waste of those who enjoy safe and healthy environments, a luxury they cannot afford. As a state we need to be aware that our actions both inside and outside our borders can have detrimental impacts if the rights of citizens are ignored or bypassed based on their race, ethnicity or socioeconomic status.

Power Plants
Power plants are among the most commonly sited facilities in minority and low-income areas. Their emissions present a threat to the surrounding population due to the presence of particulate matter and the formation of ground level ozone or smog. When inhaled, small particulate matter can damage the lungs contributing to respiratory disease, most commonly asthma. In addition, chemical and particle laden smog, a by-product of power plants, has the ability to cause asthma symptoms in healthy individuals, and aggravate asthmatics often triggering attacks. With an estimated 3000 lives being cut short each year in New York State due to the inhalation of particulate matter, decisions on where to site power plants and the way in which they will operate should be made carefully.1 

Brownfields
Brownfields, contaminated and abandoned former industrial sites, are disproportionately located in urban communities, particularly low-income neighborhoods and communities of color. Brownfields undermine social and economic vitality, depressing property values and fuel the residential, commercial and industrial exodus from the nation’s older cities. Located in areas already suffering economic hardship, brownfields are an added and unnecessary burden to those who live near them.

Click here for more information on brownfields here. 

Environmental Injustice

71 percent of African Americans and 50 percent of Latinos live in areas with the worst air pollution. Only 34 percent of white Americans live in these areas.2

96 percent of black children and 80 percent of white children of poor families in inner cities have unsafe levels of lead in their blood – amounts sufficient to reduce IQ, harm hearing, reduce the ability to concentrate, and stunt physical growth.3 

More than 300,000 farm workers suffer pesticide-related illnesses each year. People of color make up 80-90 percent of all migrant farm workers.4

The U.S. exported 139,000 tons of toxic waste in 1990 alone.5

3 out of 5 Americans of color live in communities with uncontrolled toxic waste sites.6

Abandoned hazardous waste sites in minority communities take 20 percent longer than those in non-minority areas to be placed on the national priority list for cleanup.7

Penalties under hazardous waste laws at sites having the greatest non-minority population were 500 percent higher than penalties with the greatest minority population. The fines averaged $335,566 for non-minority areas: $55,318 in minority areas.8

Environmental Advocates of New York & Environmental Justice
Environmental Advocates of New York supports state legislation that gives equal protection to individuals regardless of race, ethnicity or socioeconomic status.

1 http://www.nrdc.org/air/pollution/bt/NY.asp

2 Luke Cole, “Empowerment as the key to Environmental Equity,” The Environmental Justice Project (Lawyer’ Committee for Civil Rights Under the Law: Washington, D.C., 1993).

3 Karen Florini and others, “Legacy of Lead: America’s Continuing Epidemic of Childhood Lead Poisoning,” (Washington, D.C.: Environmental Defense Fund, Mar,1990).

4 “Environmental Justice at Home and Abroad,” People of Color Environmental Groups, 1994-5 Directory, (Flint, MI: Mott Foundation).

5 “International Toxics Trade,” People of Color Environmental Groups, 1994-5 Directory, (Flint, MI: Mott Foundation).

6 Lester Brown, State of the World (Norton: New York, 1994).

7 Robert Bullard, “Environmental Justice Project” (Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under the Law: Washington D.C., 1993).

8 Robert Bullard, “Environmental Justice Project” (Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under the Law: Washington D.C., 1993).