When: Tuesday, February 15, 2000

Time: 11:00am - 12:30pm

Where: Clark Atlanta University, Science Research Center, Board Room (#1036)
223 James P. Brawley Drive, Atlanta

Who: Environmental Justice Resource Center, Clark Atlanta University

HIGHLIGHTS OF NATIONAL STRUGGLES AGAINST TRANSPORTATION RACISM
Hear from the nation's leading expert on transportation racism. Dr. Robert D. Bullard, director of the Environmental Justice Resource Center at Clark Atlanta University, will present findings from his recent studies and books that document the adverse impact of transportation and land-use planning, and sprawl-driven development on people of color and the poor. His books, Just Transportation: Dismantling Race and Class Barriers to Mobility (1997) and Sprawl City: Race, Politics, and Planning in Atlanta (2000), clearly document that after more than a century after Plessy v. Ferguson (a landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision that legalized "separate but equal"), institutional racism continues to make transportation a major civil rights, environmental justice, and economic issue.

BRIEFING ON THE ATLANTA TRANSPORTATION EQUITY PROJECT (ATEP)
Hear from social scientists and other researchers who are coordinating a comprehensive transportation initiative, Atlanta Transportation Equity Project or ATEP, that brings together policy analysis, community-driven research, information dissemination, public outreach, and grassroots organizing around transportation justice. The ATEP is funded by grants from the Turner Foundation and the Ford Foundation.

EXPERTS JOIN WITH COMMUNITY GROUPS TO DEVELOP STRATEGIES AND SOLUTIONS TO TRANSPORTATION EQUITY CONCERNS
Hear from members of the Metropolitan Atlanta Transportation Equity Coalition (MATEC), a network of grassroots groups, organizations, and associations whose mission is to ensure fair and equitable distributions of transportation benefits and investments. Representatives from the group will travel to Los Angeles February 10-13 on a fact-finding mission where a similar coalition (Labor/Community Strategy Center and Bus Riders Union) won a major transportation racism and civil rights court settlement (Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964) against the Los Angeles MTA. The MATEC includes members from local bus riders, grassroots organizations, labor representatives, civil rights groups, neighborhoods and civic associations, homeowners groups, educators, researchers, and planners.

Learn more about the breifing on transportation equity here.

FOR MORE INFORMATION CONTACT:
Marie Green
Communications Coordinator
Environmental Justice Resource Center
(404) 880-6914