ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE

6/29/2011 - CAU’s Environmental Justice Resource Center 2011 Spring Graduation: Promoting Success One Student at a Time
On Monday, June 27, after six weeks of intensive studying and hands-on training, it was time to celebrate a journey well travelled for the 22 graduates of the Workers Education and Training Program.  Instructors, collaborative and community partners gathered at Copeland’s Restaurant to break bread and reflect on challenges met and goals obtained.   Through testimonials, it was obvious to everyone, that this was a life changing experience.  Several participants, who had been chronically unemployed, believe that they now have the skills and support system necessary for them to achieve success. Click HERE for Full Media Advisory.

4/26/2011 A 20-Point Plan for Building an Effective Environmental Health and Racial Equity Movement
More than 100 studies now link racism to worse health.  Similarly, some 200 environmental studies also have shown race and class disparities. One of the most important indicators of an individual’s health is one’s zip code or street address. Eliminating environmental health and racial disparities will make us a much stronger nation as a whole.  Researchers at the Environmental Justice Resource Center (EJRC) at Clark Atlanta University developed the twenty-point plan in an effort to support and strengthen the work around environmental justice, health and racial equity in the United States.  READ MORE!

4/22/2011 Georgia nuclear reactor shuts down from CNN NewsWire
A nuclear reactor at Georgia's Vogtle Electric Generating Plant has been taken off line indefinitely until investigators determine the cause of an automatic shutdown this week, the Southern Co. said Friday. A plan to restart the reactor, which has been in operation since 1987, will be implemented once the investigation has been completed. The reactor shut down early Wednesday, said the Southern Co., which supplies power to much of the state. To view the article please click HERE.

4/21/2011 The State of Environmental Justice Since Summit II Timeline-Milestones 2002-2011 Earth Day Report
As part of Earth Day 2011 celebration, the Environmental Justice Resource Center at Clark Atlanta University prepared a Timeline-Milestones report that chronicles the major accomplishments of the Environmental Justice Movement since the October 2002 Second National People of Color Environmental Leadership Summit or Summit II. To view the full report click HERE.

4/14/2011 TVA to Pay $10 Million Fine in Landmark Settlement with EPA by News Channel 9
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced a settlement with the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) Thursday to resolve alleged Clean Air Act violations at 11 of its coal-fired plants in Alabama, Kentucky, and Tennessee. The settlement will require TVA to invest a TVA estimated $3 to $5 billion on new and upgraded state-of-the-art pollution controls that the EPA says will prevent up to 3,000 premature deaths, 2,000 heart attacks and 21,000 cases of asthma attacks each year, resulting in up to $27 billion in annual health benefits. TVA will also invest $350 million on clean energy projects that will reduce pollution, save energy and protect public health and the environment. To view the article please click HERE.

4/11/2011 Goldman Environmental Prize Awards $150K to Clean Air Activism on the Gulf Coast by Rachel Cernansky for Treehugger.com
This year's North American recipient of the Goldman Environmental Prize has been spending more than a decade working in his Texas Gulf Coast community to fight for stronger environmental regulations, better enforcement of existing regulations, and to improve relations generally between the community, industry, and local government. He has worked with the EPA, served on its National Environmental Justice Advisory Council, and his town of Port Arthur has been selected as an EPA national showcase city. I talked to Hilton Kelley over the weekend about these efforts and some of their accomplishments over the years. Here are the highlights of what he had to say. To view the article please click HERE.

4/4/2011 New APHA book examines racial equity, environmental health by Teddi Dineley Johnson
From safe streets to clean water and air, a community’s physical environment influences the health of its residents. But low-income Americans and minorities have long borne an unequal burden of environmental health threats compared to the general population, according to a new APHA book. Living in the shadows cast by incinerators, smelters, garbage dumps, sewage treatment plants, landfills and chemical plants, residents of low-income and minority communities are disproportionately and adversely affected by industrial pollution and unequal enforcement of environmental regulations. To view the article please click HERE.

3/24/2011 Many U.S. Blacks Moving to South, Reversing Trend By SABRINA TAVERNISE and ROBERT GEBELOFF for the New York Times
The percentage of the nation’s black population living in the South has hit its highest point in half a century, according to census data released Thursday, as younger and more educated black residents move out of declining cities in the Northeast and Midwest in search of better opportunities. The share of black population growth that has occurred in the South over the past decade — the highest since 1910, before the Great Migration of blacks to the North — has upended some long-held assumptions. To view the article please click HERE.

3/23/2011 The Radioactive Racism Behind Nuclear Energy by Michelle Chen for ColorLines.com
When the apocalyptic cloud erupted over Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the world woke up to the dawn of the nuclear age. Today, if we survey the landscape of nuclear development across the planet, we see that the destructive impacts of the technology are often paired with the dehumanizing impacts of environmental racism. At every point in the nuclear production chain, the industry has sloughed a disproportionate share of the risk on marginalized communities, from native peoples in the Southwest United States to the Australian outback. While the rest of the world hums along with nuclear power, many of these communities have fought a losing battle against the standard corporate line that technological advancements have led to seamless safety. Last week in South Africa, environmental activists recharged their anti-nuclear campaign in light of the metastasizing disaster in Japan. To view the article please click HERE.

3/22/2001 Judge Halts California Greenhouse Gas Cap and Trade Program by ENS
A San Francisco Superior Court judge has halted implementation of California's cap and trade program to reduce climate-warming greenhouse gas emissions, ruling that the state did not adequately evaluate alternatives. Judge Ernest Goldsmith sided with six environmental justice groups and seven individuals who sued to block the cap and trade program by the California Air Resources Board, ARB. The plaintiff groups argued that cap and trade is pollution trading "allows the worst polluters to continue or increase their pollution by buying 'reductions.'" To view the article please click HERE.

2/24/2011 Florida High Speed Rail, like ARC Tunnel, Dead Again by Transportation Nation
Republican Florida Governor Rick Scott is sticking to his decision to kill the Tampa to Orlando high speed rail. Scott’s decision is a major setback to President Obama’s goal, put forward in his state of the union, to link eighty percent of Americans to high speed rail within 25 years. In an unusually sharply worded statement, U.S. Department of Transportation spokeswoman Olivia Alair said “The U.S. Department of Transportation has addressed every legitimate concern Governor Scott has raised with respect to plans to connect Florida through high-speed rail. We have repeatedly and clearly told Governor Scott and his staff that Florida would not bear financial or legal liabilities for the project, and that there is strong private sector interest in taking on the risk associated with building and operating high-speed rail in the state.” To view the article please click HERE.

2/21/2011 Talking Clean, Acting Dirty: How Energy Apartheid Hurts African Americans by Robert D. Bullard for OpedNews.com
Much attention in recent years has been devoted to green energy and reducing the human carbon footprint to counter the global warming and climate change threat.   According to the U.S. Energy Information Agency, the electric power sector is the largest source of energy-related carbon dioxide emissions by end-use sectors, accounting for 40.6 percent of all energy-related CO2 emissions, followed by the transportation (33.1%), and the residential and commercial sector (26.3%). The movement to renewable energy is the preferred strategy to a clean energy future for the country. However, all Americans do not have equal access to clean and green energy, which maps closely with race and social class. Who gets clean and green energy and who gets left behind with dirty technology is an environmental justice issue.   It is also a social equity, economic, and health issue.   Anyone who knows anything about Black History and the Environmental Justice Movement in the United States knows African Americans have never been the first to get the "best of the best." Clean energy and green jobs are no exception. The de facto energy apartheid policy of "talking green" and "acting dirty" hits African Americans and other people of color especially hard--and ultimately add to the widening health disparities. To view the article please click HERE.

2/9/2010 Dismantling Energy Apartheid in the United States: A Black History Month Special Report by Robert D. Bullard for Dissident Voice
Much attention in recent years has been devoted to green energy and reducing the human carbon footprint to counter the global warming and climate change threat.  According to the U.S. Energy Information Agency, the electric power sector is the largest source of energy-related carbon dioxide emissions by end-use sectors, accounting for 40.6 percent of all energy-related CO2 emissions, followed by the transportation (33.1%), and the residential and commercial sector (26.3%). The movement to renewable energy is the preferred strategy to clean energy future for our nation.  Clean energy market is growing. More than $243 billion in new investments were made in clean energy in 2010. Yet, in 2009, renewable energy’s market share reached just 8 percent of the total U.S. energy consumption. It is worth noting that biomass energy generation made up 50 percent of the renewable energy in 2009. To view the article please click HERE.

2/4/2011 Census Finds Hurricane Katrina Left New Orleans Richer, Whiter, Emptier by David Mildenberg for Bloomberg.com
Five years after Hurricane Katrina drove Lena Johnson from New Orleans, her family’s home since the 1930s, she misses its food, music and Mardi Gras. And she never wants to live there again. “It was like a bird leaving a cage,” said Johnson, 60, a New Orleans Chamber of Commerce employee for 24 years who left for Dallas and recently earned a college degree there. “I’m in Texas because there’s opportunit for me to grow. Home is still suffering.” The extent of the exodus after the August 2005 disaster can be gauged by 2010 Census data released yesterday. New Orleans lost 140,845 residents, a drop of 29 percent from 2000. The percentage of black population fell to 60.2 percent from 67.3 percent. The loss in New Orleans translates into one fewer congressional seat for Louisiana -- now six instead of seven. To view the article please click HERE.

2/1/2011 Egypt Protests; Environmental Justice; Black History; Rap Prodigy by The Michael Eric Dyson Show
Today begins Black History Month, and we start with a look at the impact of the environment on minorities with Dr. Robert Bullard, one of the most prominent leaders in the environmental justice movement. Bullard heads the Environmental Justice Resource Center at historically Black Clark Atlanta University. His most recent book, published in 2009, is titled Race, Place, and Environmental Justice after Hurricane Katrina: Struggles to Reclaim, Rebuild, and Revitalize New Orleans and the Gulf Coast. To listen to the interview please click HERE.

11/21/2010 Environmental justice issues take center stage by Juliet Eilperin Washington Post Staff Writer
The winding Mataponi Creek looks clear in the sunlight, with marsh grasses lining its banks. But some of the coal ash waste from a nearby power plant is also coursing through its waters, and residents are worried it is contaminating their well water. The area around the Brandywine ash storage site - where waste from Mirant Mid-Atlantic's Chalk Point plant containing carcinogens and heavy metals ends up - is a fairly rural community, with residents who are far from politically active and have little leverage with elected officials who might act on the matter. To view the article please click HERE.

11/12/2010 Over Three Dozen Environmental Justice Groups Offer “Call to Action” Plan to New EPA Region 4 Head
After meeting with Gwen Keyes Fleming, the first African American to EPA Region 4 (which includes eight southern states, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, and 6 Tribal Nations) on Wednesday November 10, more than three environmental justice, civil rights, faith, community based organizations, and leaders from polluted communities delivered an eleven-point “Call to Action” for Region 4 reform that demanded fundamental change, a new culture, and a new enforcement framework at EPA—one that actually protects the environment and public health.  They also called for equal protection and equal enforcement of environmental laws, something that has been lacking in the southern states for decades; end to the collusion between EPA Region 4, state environmental agencies, and polluting industry;  halt to the “look-the-other-way” approach that has been a trademark of Region 4 which has led to higher health costs and degraded environments; and bold leadership and an uncompromising dedication to equal protection, environmental justice, and public health as top priorities in the region. The plan generally can be summarized in four words:  transparency, accountability, justice, and trust. Working together with this shared vision and with impacted communities, the leaders are hopeful that the new region administrator can make environmental justice a top priority. Click HERE for the full “Call to Action” plan and addendum.   

11/9/2010 Polluted Communities to Meet with First Black EPA Region 4 Head by Robert D. Bullard for OpedNews.com
It has now been two months since former DeKalb County District Gwen Keyes Fleming made history when the Obama administration named her to become the first African American and female to head EPA Region 4, region that includes eight southern states, Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, and 6 Tribal Nations. A dozen environmental justice leaders from poisoned communities are set to meet with the region administrator on Wednesday November 10 (1:00pm 2:30pm) at Region 4 headquarters in Atlanta. Given the dire circumstances impacted communities find themselves, environmental justice leaders are calling upon the new region administrator to r everse the deadly impact of environmental racism and establish transparency, accountability, justice, and trust as hallmarks of her administration. This meeting allows residents from environmental "sacrifice zones" to give first-hand accounts of their concerns, their evaluation, and their assessment of actions EPA Region 4 has or has not taken since their meeting this past October with the acting Region 4 administrator A. Stan Meiburg. The region's "look-the-other-way" approach has perpetuated unequal protection and unequal enforcement. This flawed protection model has also allowed polluters to walk away in many cases unpunished. Residents are demanding a stricter polluter pays principle be enacted and communicated where potentially responsible parties (PRPs) causing harm are held accountable. Click HERE to view the article.

10/1/2010 EPA to Consider the Kerr-McGee Chemical (Columbus) Site for Proposal to Superfund’s National Priorities List
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced that it is moving forward with the process to propose the Kerr-McGee Chemical (Columbus) site to the National Priorities List (NPL) list of hazardous waste sites. This decision is based on the bankruptcy filing of Tronox, LLC. A formal decision to propose the site may be made as early as March 2011, the date when a number of other sites across the nation are expected to be proposed to the NPL as part of the federal rulemaking process. Consideration to propose the site to the NPL does not guarantee that the site will be proposed, or, that the site will be listed on the final NPL. Click HERE to view the press release.

10/1/2010 MARTA price increases to go into effect by AP
Metro Atlanta's transit system plans to implement pass price increases over the weekend. The base fare for a ride on the Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority, or MARTA, will remain $2. But the cost of multi-day passes, including weekly, monthly and Mobility passes will increase Sunday. Also beginning Sunday, customers will no longer be able to reload Breeze tickets, which will still cost 50 cents in addition to the cost of a one-way, roundtrip or one-day pass. Click HERE to view the article.

9/30/2010 Industry wraps coal ash regulation fight in the mantle of civil rights by Sue Sturgis for the Institute for Southern Studies
Standing out among the more than 250 people who testified at the recent Environmental Protection Agency hearing on proposed coal ash regulations in Charlotte, N.C. was one speaker with an especially distinguished background: Charles Steele Jr., the first African-American member of the Tuscaloosa City Council and a former Democratic state senator from Alabama who went on to lead the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, the legendary civil rights organization whose first president was Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. Steele left SCLC last year. Click HERE to view the article.

9/28/2010 The Gulf Oil Spill: An Environmental Justice Disaster Submitted by Julie Weiss
This year’s oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico was clearly a disaster for the environment. But it has also been a disaster for people, and it did not affect everyone equally. The spill’s impact has been felt most keenly by low-income people and people of color. African Americans and Southeast Asians in the region are heavily dependent on the seafood industry for jobs. But the spill affected Gulf residents beyond just robbing them of income. Research by Robert Bullard at the Environmental Justice Resource Center shows that BP—with the government’s approval—has been disposing of oil-related debris at landfills in neighborhoods where mainly blacks, Latinos and Asians live. Click HERE to view the article.

9/29/2010 Environmental Justice Comes Back to Life by Emily Badger for Miller-McCune.
The Environmental Protection Agency last week resuscitated an interagency working group to tackle environmental justice, an issue that hasn’t been discussed much in Washington in nearly a decade. EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson called the group’s first meeting — attended by Attorney General Eric Holder and the secretaries of Interior, Transportation and Housing and Urban Development — a historic event, as federal agencies recommit themselves to rooting out the “environmental discrimination” that occurs when landfills, coal plants and toxic waste dumps are located disproportionately in communities of color. Advocates who have decried the problem since the 1970s want to see more than meeting minutes from the new government group, but they’re heartened that at least someone in the capital is talking about this again. Click HERE to view the article.

9/22/2010 Administration vows to advance 'environmental justice' by Melanie Eversley for The USA Today
The Obama administration has revived the intent of a Clinton-era executive order that directed federal agencies to make "environmental justice" part of their missions. Lisa Jackson, administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, and Nancy Sutley, chairwoman of the White House council on Environmental Quality, led a meeting Wednesday morning with four Cabinet secretaries and representatives from other federal agencies during which the group outlined a plan for hearing from the public. Attorney General Eric Holder, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, Housing Secretary Shaun Donovan and Interior Secretary Ken Salazar were there, along with representatives from other departments. Click HERE to view the article.

9/22/2010 EPA Hosts Historic Meeting on Environmental Justice On September 22, 2010
EPA Administrator Lisa P. Jackson and White House Council on Environmental Quality Chair, Nancy Sutley, reconvened the Interagency Working Group on Environmental Justice (EJ IWG) in a meeting held at the White House. The meeting, attended by five cabinet members, demonstrates the federal government’s dedication to ensuring all Americans have strong federal protection from environmental and health hazards. This historic gathering marks a recommitment to advancing the mandate of Executive Order 12898, “Federal Actions to Address Environmental Justice in Minority Populations and Low-Income Populations,” which states that each agency, with the law as its guide, should make environmental justice part of its mission. Click HERE to view the press release.

9/17/2010 Why is the city of Montgomery condemning the property of African-Americans along a civil rights trail? By Radley Balko for Slate
When the city of Montgomery, Ala., razed the home of Karen Jones' family last April, there were still photos and family furniture inside. The city says it gave Jones notice the bulldozers were coming, but she says the notices were sent to her deceased grandmother (the home's former owner) and a deceased uncle. The reason given for the demolition was that the front porch wasn't up to code. The city declared her property "blighted," and destroyed the building, rather than helping Jones and her family fix the porch, or fixing it and sending her a bill. And then Montgomery sent Jones a bill of $1,225, the cost of the demolition. If she doesn't pay, the city will put a lien on the property. If she still doesn't pay, the city can seize the land or sell it at auction. Click HERE to view the article.

9/16/2010 Income, Poverty and Health Insurance Coverage in the United States: 2009 by the US Census
The U.S. Census Bureau announced today that real median household income in the United States in 2009 was $49,777, not statistically different from the 2008 median. The nation's official poverty rate in 2009 was 14.3 percent, up from 13.2 percent in 2008 — the second statistically significant annual increase in the poverty rate since 2004. There were 43.6 million people in poverty in 2009, up from 39.8 million in 2008 — the third consecutive annual increase. Meanwhile, the number of people without health insurance coverage rose from 46.3 million in 2008 to 50.7 million in 2009, while the percentage increased from 15.4 percent to 16.7 percent over the same period. Click HERE to view the article.

9/16/2010 Census report shows Georgia poverty increase by Craig Schneider for the AJC.com
Georgia had 300,000 more people fall into poverty from 2008 to 2009, a 20-percent increase that exceeds the national average, according to U.S. Census Bureau figures released today. The state ranked second behind Mississippi, according to an annual report called Income, Poverty, and Health Insurance Coverage in the United States: 2009. Last year Georgia trailed six other states. Click HERE to view the article.

9/1/2010 EPA Announces Regional Administrator for Region 4
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lisa P. Jackson announced President Barack Obama's selection of Gwen Keyes Fleming as the Agency's Regional Administrator for EPA's Region 4. This region encompasses Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee and 6 Tribal Nations. "I look forward to working closely with Gwen Keyes Fleming on the many urgent environmental issues we face throughout the country, and especially along Region 4's Gulf Coast," EPA Administrator Lisa P. Jackson said. "Gwen is coming on at an exceptionally challenging time. I'm thrilled to have Gwen as part of our leadership team at EPA. She will certainly play an instrumental role in protecting the health and environment of all those living in the region." Regional Administrators are responsible for managing the Agency's regional activities under the direction of the EPA Administrator. They promote state and local environmental protection efforts and serve as a liaison to state and local government officials. Regional Administrators are tasked with ensuring EPA's efforts to address the environmental crises of today are rooted in three fundamental values: science-based policies and programs, adherence to the rule of law, and transparency. Gwen Keyes Fleming has more than 15 years experience as both a prosecutor and administrator, serving as the District Attorney for the past five years in Georgia's Stone Mountain Judicial Circuit which encompasses all of Dekalb County. She is the first African-American and the first woman to have held the District Attorney position. Click HERE to view the press release.

8/25/2010 Gulf Waste Heads to Landfills, Some With Problems: Oily boom, trash from Gulf spill heads to landfills, some with state environmental issues by AP Staff Writers
The cleanup of history's worst peacetime oil spill is generating thousands of tons of oil-soaked debris that is ending up in local landfills, some of which were already dealing with environmental concerns.The soft, absorbent boom that has played the biggest role in containing the spill alone would measure more than twice the length of California's coastline, or about 2,000 miles. More than 50,000 tons of boom and oily debris have made their way to landfills or incinerators, federal officials told The Associated Press, representing about 7 percent of the daily volume going to nine area landfills. Click HERE to view the article.

8/24/2010 Dickson Landfill Battle Still Moving Forward by Nicole Ferguson for NewsChannel5.com
Plaintiffs in the long fought battle over Dickson County's contaminated landfill are now asking the local government to get rid of waste left on their property in July. Sheila Holt-Orsted said county officials served the family with a search warrant on the basis of rumors that her father had allowed illegal dumping of sorts on the family, thus contributing to the contamination. A barrel labeled "purged water," and dated 7/14/10 now sits on the property. Holt-Orsted says the water was dug from 300 feet below the well the family drank from before being notified earlier in the decade of its trichloroethylene contamination. Click HERE to view the article.

8/24/2010 BP Waste Oil Spill Waste Disposal Correction
A recent study from the Environmental Justice Resource Center at Clark Atlanta University reported that over 60 percent of the BP oil spill waste was being disposed in communities of color in landfills in Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, and Mississippi.  One of the nine approved landfills (Tidewater Landfill in Venice, LA) was geocoded incorrectly in the study.  This error was caused by an inconsistency between the digital map and the stored address list. Continue HERE.

8/21/2010 Stories of Survival in the Post-Katrina Gulf These books present must-read portraits of the diverse people rebuilding lives five years after Hurricane Katrina by Brentin Mock
One of the more fascinating stories Horne tells comes in the chapter "In Search of Common Ground," about Black Panther activist Malik Rahim, who rode out the storm (his neighborhood, Algiers, wasn't flooded) and then organized hundreds of visiting volunteers to form the first running health clinic. The setting wasn't exactly fertile for this clinic's sprouting: Horne reports how white vigilantes armed with guns were looking for African Americans under a "shoot first, ask later" policy. But with the help of his white comrades, who traveled from as far as Washington, D.C., Rahim was able to maneuver around to get his health clinic, Common Ground, running. The list of books about Katrina is extensive and ever growing. These works, released in the last year, also offer sobering insights. Click HERE to view the article.

8/20/2010 BP Accused of Withholding 'Critical' Spill Data by Dina Cappiello and Harry R. Weber for Associated Press
The company that owned the oil rig that exploded in the Gulf of Mexico is accusing BP of withholding critical evidence needed to investigate the cause of the worst offshore oil spill in U.S. history, according to a confidential document obtained by The Associated Press. BP called the claims a publicity stunt. The new complaint by Transocean follows similar complaints by U.S. lawmakers about difficulties obtaining necessary information from BP in their investigations. In a sternly worded letter to BP's attorneys, Transocean said the oil giant has in its sole possession information key to identifying the cause "of the tragic loss of eleven lives and the pollution in the Gulf of Mexico." Click HERE to view the article.

8/16/2010 Waste from BP oil spill cleanup has gulf residents near landfills concerned By Krissah Thompson for the Washington Post
The pile of soiled boom sitting more than four feet high and cooking under the summer sun at an abandoned shipyard here will be a part of the oil spill that endures. As beach cleanup is scaled down, the fate of all the oily trash created and collected along the Gulf Coast is causing a raging debate that BP and federal officials are trying hard to curb. People want to know what is in those trash bags, where they will end up and if the workers handling the oily trash are safe. The answers are leaving important groups unsatisfied. One coastal county threatened to sue BP if it continues to put trash from the spill in a local landfill. Not wanting to get into a tussle with the residents, the company relented, diverting the trash to other landfills. Others are arguing that too much of the trash is going to low-income and minority communities. Click HERE to view the article.

8/15/2010 Tiny toxic Florida town takes on a corporate Goliath by Ronnie Greene for the Miami Herald
The main drag in this tiny blue collar hamlet is nearly hidden west of U.S. 301, a world away from the bustle of nearby Carrabba's, The Fresh Market and Starbucks. Tallevast Road lacks sidewalks, so if you're walking through town, tread gingerly to avoid the work trucks rumbling through. A long-closed plant anchors one end of town, hovering like the ghost of dead industry. Yet Tallevast retains a small town richness, where news spreads word of mouth, neighbors are often kin, and many, though not all, of the 80 homes maintain the well-kept look of the working class. Click HERE to view the article.

8/13/2010 Oil's toxic legacy not erased by Politico
The U.S. government declared that BP's damaged Macondo well gushed almost 5 million barrels of oil in to the Gulf of Mexico. It is officially the largest accidental oil spill in human history — almost 20 times larger than the Exxon Valdez incident. As we learned from Exxon Valdez, oil disasters of this magnitude leave a toxic legacy on the environment and the communities that depend on it for their livelihoods — a legacy that can last for decades. Click HERE to view the article.

8/11/2010 Oil cleanup comes with tensions in this Louisiana town by Louis Sahagun, Los Angeles Times
An influx of nearly 1,000 BP contract workers — many of them black and Latino — brings out an ugly side of tiny Grand Isle. Confederate flags go up: 'Our way of telling strangers to keep out.' BP pledged to rid this semi-tropical coast resort's sensitive shorelines of oil — to "make things right," as the company put it. But as the cleanup work drags on, BP's efforts have left the community at odds, heightening racial tensions and pitting neighbor against neighbor in disputes over money. The oil giant's cleanup campaign in this community of 1,500 permanent residents began in May with the arrival of nearly 1,000 cleanup workers who were housed in fishing camps, motels and cottages otherwise reserved for the bread-and-butter summer clientele of sport fishermen and vacationers. Click HERE to view the article.

8/9/2010 Five Years since Hurricane Katrina: Pain Index Still at Crisis Level for Many by blackvoicenews.com
It will be five years since Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans on August 29. The impact remains quite painful for many. This article looks at what has happened since Katrina - not from the perspective of the higher ups looking down from their offices, but from the street level view of the people – a view which looks at the impact on the elderly, the renter, people of color, the disabled, the working and non-working poor. So, while one commentator may happily say that the median income in New Orleans has risen since Katrina, a street level perspective recognizes that is because large numbers of the poorest people have not been able to return. Click HERE to view the article.

8/8/2010 Is BP's Waste Being Dump in your Back Yard? by Jacqui Patterson, Director, Climate Justice Initiative, NAACP
As the NAACP continues its fight against the monumental environmental and human implications of the Gulf Oil disaster, we continue to uncover new and alarming details about the clean-up processes that BP is utilizing. One of the "fathers of Environmental Justice" and NAACP member Dr. Robert D. Bullard has written two articles that shed light into the common practices of dumping waste in landfills located near communities of color. Click HERE to view the article.

8/4/2010 Here’s Where BP is Dumping Its Oil Spill Waste by ColorLines
The Environmental Protection Agency has approved nine landfills in the Gulf Coast to receive the waste products from the country’s largest oil spill. Five of those nine landfills are located in communities where a majority of residents are people of color. The sites are in Alabama, Florida, Louisiana and Mississippi and are regular municipal landfills, not designed for hazardous waste, according to the Miami Herald. That’s because waste management officials claim the debris is not hazardous. So far, the landfills have received 40,000 tons of “oily solids” and waste from the clean up of the disaster, including soiled gloves. The analysis of the landfill sites and racial data was done by Robert D. Bullard, a prominent figure in the environmental justice movement and director of the Environmental Justice Resource Center. Calls to the EPA were not returned. Click HERE to view the article.

8/4/2010 Where's all that oil spill waste going? Much of it to 'communities of Color' by the Press Register staff
An analysis by Robert Bullard of the Environmental Justice Resource Center of Clark Atlanta University has made a provocative and, no doubt, controversial finding: that much of the waste generated by the oil spill cleanup efforts is being winding up in common landfills located in majority-black areas.Click HERE to view the article.

8/3/2010 Environmental Justice Concerns in the Gulf Coast by Maya Roy for The Race Equity Project
It has been over 100 days since the explosion of  British Petroleum’s Deepwater Horizon oil rig and we are months into the recovery and clean-up efforts of the largest oil spill in United States history.  A new report by Robert Bullard, director of the Environmental Justice Resource Center of Clark Atlanta University, exposes an environmental justice concern regarding the placement of oil spill waste in landfills that border communities of color in the Gulf Coast region. Click HERE to view the article.

8/3/2010 BP's Dumping Oil-Spill Waste in Communities of Color, Study Finds by Michelle Chen
More than one hundred days into the BP disaster, folks are wondering where all the oil has gone--much of it seems to have crept under the water's surface, or maybe evaporated into thin air. But, as officials scramble to assess the pending damage, we do know the destination of around 40,000 tons of the spill waste: it's headed for the families that have been getting dumped on for years. In what may be yet another calm before the storm, BP's colorfully advertised waste management plan appears to follow a haunting pattern of environmental racism. Click HERE to view the article.

7/31/2010 Over 60 Percent of BP Waste Dumped in Minority Communities by Robert D. Bullard for OpEdNews
As of July 15, more than 39,448 tons of BP oil spill waste was disposed in nine approved landfills in Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, and Mississippi. Five of the nine the landfills receiving BP oil-spill solid waste are located in communities where people of color comprise a majority of residents living within a one-mile radius of the waste facilities. A significantly large share of the BP oil-spill waste, 24,071 tons out of 39,448 tons (61 percent),was dumped in people of color communities. This is not a small point since African Americans make up just 22 percent of the coastal counties in Alabama, Florida, Mississippi, and Louisiana, while people of color comprise about 26 percent of the population in coastal counties. These numbers present significant environmental justice implications that have not been addressed by government, including the U.S. EPA. Click HERE to view the article.

7/30/2010 BP Agrees to Stop Dumping Oil Waste at Landfill in Mostly White Mississippi  Community by Melissa M. Scallan for The Sun Herald
After mounting pressure  from Harrison County Supervisors and local residents, BP representatives agreed to stop dumping oil-coated waste into the Pecan Grove landfill, located in a predominately white community in Pass Christian, MS. For the full story click HERE

7/29/2010 BP’s Waste Management Plan Raises Environmental Justice Concerns by Robert D. Bullard for Dissident Voice
Much attention the past three months has been focused on the British Petroleum (BP) oil spill disaster and clean up efforts. Government officials estimate that the ruptured well leaked between 94 million and 184 million gallons of oil into the Gulf. However, not much attention has been given to which communities were selected as the final resting place for BP’s oil-spill garbage. A large segment of the African American community was skeptical of BP, the oil and gas industry, and the government long before the disastrous Gulf oil disaster, since black communities too often have been on the receiving end of polluting industries without the benefit of jobs and have been used as a repository for other people’s rubbish. Click HERE to view the article.

7/26/2010 EPA Releases Rulemaking Guidance on Environmental Justice
EPA is releasing an interim guide on incorporating environmental justice into the Agency’s process for developing rules and regulations. The Interim Guidance on Considering Environmental Justice During the Development of an Action PDF is a step-by-step guide that helps EPA staff ask questions and evaluate environmental justice considerations at key points in the rulemaking process. It helps EPA staff determine whether actions raise possible environmental justice concerns and encourages public participation in the rulemaking process. The Guide is part of EPA’s efforts to advance environmental justice and to protect the health and safety of the historically underrepresented in the environmental decision-making process—minority, low-income, and indigenous populations, and tribes—who are often most at risk from environmental hazards. Click HERE to view the Rulemaking Guidance.

7/22/2010 Government Allows BP to Dump Oil-Spill Waste on Black Communities by Robert D. Bullard For OpEdNews
For three months the nation watched and held its breadth as the busted British Petroleum (BP) well spewed as much as 60,000 barrels (2.5 million gallons) of oil into the Gulf of Mexico every day. Government officials estimate that the ruptured well leaked between 94 million and 184 million gallons of oil into the Gulf, surpassing the record-setting, 140-million gallon Ixtoc I spill off Mexico's coast from 1979 to 1980. Clearly, the massive BP oil spill disaster has created an environmental nightmare on the Gulf Coast from Florida to Texas. According to National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the government closed more than 81,181 square miles in the Gulf to fishing, which is approximately 33.5 percent of Gulf of Mexico federal waters. The spill fouled 120 miles of U.S. coastline, imperiled multibillion fishing and tourism industries and killed birds, sea turtles and dolphins. The full health, environmental, and economic impact of this catastrophe may not become clear for decades. Click HERE to view the article.

7/13/2010 Minorities See Little Green in BP Oil Spill Jobs by Brentin Mock
Ever since the BP oil spill disaster began, a glut of contracts and jobs has surfaced. But who is benefiting? If you got an oil spill contract from the federal government, more than likely you are white. If you're not white, and you're fortunate enough to be working in the oil cleanup, then you're likely to be involved in the more hazardous jobs, according to organizations monitoring the situation on the ground.  Click HERE to view the article.

7/1/2010 F as in Fat: How Obesity Threatens America's Future 2010 by Trust for America's Health
Adult obesity rates increased in 28 states in the past year, and declined only in the District of Columbia (D.C.), according to F as in Fat: How Obesity Threatens America's Future 2010, a report from the Trust for America's Health (TFAH) and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF). More than two-thirds of states (38) have adult obesity rates above 25 percent. In 1991, no state had an obesity rate above 20 percent. The report highlights troubling racial, ethnic, regional and income disparities in the nation's obesity epidemic. For instance, adult obesity rates for Blacks and Latinos were higher than for Whites in at least 40 states and the District of Columbia; 10 out of the 11 states with the highest rates of obesity were in the South -- with Mississippi weighing in with highest rates for all adults (33.8 percent) for the sixth year in a row; and 35.3 percent of adults earning less than $15,000 per year were obese compared with 24.5 percent of adults earning $50,000 or more per year.  Click HERE to view the report.

6/23/2010 Ten African American Green Heroes
To mark Juneteenth and the Fourth of July for 2010, Planet Harmony, the online environment al network especially for people of color, salutes ten African American Green Heroes who have made notable efforts to end environmental tyranny affecting communities of color. Their achievements range from challenging the discriminatory dispersal of toxic chemicals to the recasting of cities to enhance the quality of life to botanical genius to help folk care for and reap the bounty of the land. Robert Bullard, Ph.D., director of Clark Atlanta University’s Environmental Justice Resource Center this month was named among Planet Harmony’s 10 African-American Green Heroes.  The list was published in observance of the July 4th holiday, honoring individuals who have “made notable efforts to end environmental tyranny affecting communities of color.”  Click HERE to view the article.

6/23/2010 The United States of Transportation Inequity by Laura Barrett for the Huffington Post
In a few days, New York City is going to lose two subway lines and dozens of bus routes. With the city's transit agency facing a $400 million budget deficit, there are more cuts to come. Nobody likes transit cuts. In fact, the overwhelming majority of Americans want more public transportation, not less. In a poll by our partners Transportation for America, 82 percent of voters said "the United States would benefit from an expanded and improved transportation system, such as rail and buses." Seventy-nine percent of rural voters said the same. But if cuts are an inconvenience for Americans who have transportation options, they can be a disaster for Americans who don't: low-income people, people of color, older Americans, and Americans with disabilities who rely on public transportation to get to work, school, church, and access medical care. Click HERE to view the article.

6/17/2010 Seeking Environmental Justice in the Gulf by Brentin Mock for the Root
Those in disadvantaged areas, already hard hit by poverty and illness, say their concerns are not being addressed. In President Obama's address to the nation Tuesday, he pledged to create a "Gulf Coast restoration plan" for families and workers whose lives have been negatively affected by the BP oil spill. "The plan," said the president, "will be designed by states, local communities, tribes, fishermen, businesses, conservationists and other Gulf residents." For that to happen, he'd be best served by consulting with the community-based organizations throughout the Gulf region that are fully engaged in "the worst environmental disaster America has ever faced." Otherwise, the most vulnerable communities might not get the recovery resources from the federal government that they need, as happened after hurricanes Katrina and Rita. There's no reason this needs to happen. Click HERE to view the article.

6/10/2010 Assessing Outdoor Air Near Schools
As part of a new air toxics monitoring initiative, EPA, state and local air pollution control agencies will monitor the outdoor air around schools for pollutants known as toxic air pollutants, or air toxics.  The Clean Air Act includes a list of 187 of these pollutants. Air toxics are of potential concern because exposure to high levels of these pollutants over many decades could result in long-term health effects. EPA selected schools after evaluating a number of factors including results from an EPA computer modeling analysis, the mix of pollution sources near the schools, results from an analysis conducted for a recent newspaper series on air toxics at schools, and information from state and local air pollution agencies. Click HERE to view the webpage.

6/3/2010 Georgians Help Clean Up Oil Spill Unemployed Workers Undergo Training, Seek Work In Gulf Clean Up by CBSAtlanta.com
Unemployed Georgians are undergoing HAZMAT training in hopes of gaining employment in a different region-- the Gulf of Mexico. The Minority Worker Education and Training program, partially funded by the Georgia Department of Labor, provides free HAZMAT training for people who are looking for work. Clark Atlanta University is hosting the summer training program that has helped Kevin Knox land a new job. Click HERE to view the article.

5/26/2010 State of the South 2010 report finds recessions nearly erased Gilded Age
A new analysis of the Southern economy shows that the two recent recessions knocked the South off an upward trajectory that had broadened the middle class and nearly closed the poverty gaps that perennially separated it from the rest of the country. In the first chapter of The State of the South 2010, researchers at MDC found that the boom of the 1980s and ’90s amounted to a “gilded age” for the region, reducing poverty at a rate faster than the rest of the U.S. But the 2000s were a lost decade in the region as well as the nation. Over the past ten years, median household income declined more in the South than in any other region, and the South returned to the poverty rates of a decade ago. To view the press release click HERE, for the report click HERE.

5/25/2010 Bias Payments Come Too Late for Some Farmers by Ashey Southall for New York Times
On a recent Sunday in rural Macon, N.C., John W. Boyd Jr., the president of the National Black Farmers Association, went to his fourth funeral in a week. On a recent Sunday in rural Macon, N.C., John W. Boyd Jr., the president of the National Black Farmers Association, went to his fourth funeral in a week. Mr. Boyd has been burying his group’s members with bitter frequency, attending two or three funerals most weeks. Each death makes him feel as if he is running out of time. Wrangling over the federal budget in Washington has delayed payouts from a $1.25 billion settlement that Mr. Boyd and several others helped negotiate with the federal government to compensate black farmers who claimed that the Agriculture Department had discriminated against them in making loans. Click HERE to view the article.

5/25/2010 Black Gulf Fishers Face a Murky Future By Brentin Mock for The Root
The African-Americans who make their living from shrimp and oysters on the Louisiana Gulf Coast have long been an endangered breed. The oil spill may be the final blow to their way of life. As Rodvid Wilson boards close the sides of his uncle's boat he hums Erykah Badu's "Window Seat" while preparing for a voyage through the Louisiana bayou into the bays above the Gulf of Mexico.  In the cabin behind the wheel sits Judge Williams, 67, an oystermanfor over 40 years. Behind him is a bunkbed, where he and his nephew Wilson often sleep. By the bed is a small gas stove. The smell of neckbones and hot metal mix as a pot of beans burns on one eye, and a small hatchet burns on the other.  Sitting next to the stove is half an oyster shell with cigarette ashes in it. A half-empty pack of Newports rests close by. Click HERE to view the article.

5/24/2010 Clark Atlanta University Has Hand In Gulf Of Mexico Oil Spill Clean-Up
Seventy-five graduates of a training program co-sponsored by Clark Atlanta University and Dillard University are helping to clean the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, while at the same time promoting minority involvement in the construction and environmental industries. Since 1995, the Clark Atlanta University Environmental Justice Resource Center (EJRC), in partnership with Dillard University’s Deep South Center for Environmental Justice (DSCEJ), has implemented the Minority Worker Training Program (MWTP) in Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, Texas and Florida. Click HERE to view the article.

5/24/2010 Boats moored by the BP oil spill, a long-threatened community of black fishers fears for its future by Brentin Mock for NOLA.com
Headed down La. 39 on the east bank of Plaquemines Parish, a few miles down after the Belle Chasse Ferry, drivers pass a tall, white picket fence on the left with a sign that reads “Welcome White Ditch” in a circle around an outline of the state  with a pelican inside. A few yards ahead, to the right are two rusting red pipes connected to the Mississippi River which dip below the highway and then surface on the left to flush river water into a fenced-off canal that leads to acres of marsh and bayou. This is the White’s Ditch Siphon. But to some in the area, it is a division marker. From this point south are  predominantly African-American communities such as Phoenix, Davant and Pointe a la Hache. The communities north of this mark are mostly white. Click HERE to view the article.

5/20/2010 Environmental Justice Discussed at U.S.-Brazil Meeting on Joint Action Plan to Eliminate Racial Discrimination (JAPER)
On May 20-21, 2010, the fourth meeting of the U.S.-Brazil Joint Action Plan to Eliminate Racial Discrimination (JAPER) was held at Morehouse College in Atlanta, GA. The objective of JAPER is to promote joint efforts and opportunities to eliminate racial discrimination. Meeting themes included economic empowerment and labor, health, civil rights and education, racial equality in the justice system, and – for the first time – environmental justice. The U.S. and Brazil explored opportunities for partnership on environmental justice, consistent with EPA’s commitment to environmental justice, and the protection of vulnerable populations. This meeting was the first time the JAPER discussed environmental issues and environmental justice. Click HERE to view the article.

5/20/2010 75 Grads Of Training Program Get Oil Spill Jobs: Environmental Justice Centers Offer Training by WDSU TV
Seventy-five graduates of a training program run by environmental justice centers in New Orleans and Atlanta are now working on the Gulf of Mexico oil spill cleanup - a half-dozen of them as supervisors. Dillard University's Deep South Center for Environmental Justice and Clark Atlanta University's Environmental Justice Resource Center have given environmental clean-up courses for 15 years. Click HERE to view the article.

5/19/2010 New Report Reveals the Impact Transportation Has on Health
The American Public Health Association (APHA) today released “The Hidden Health Costs of Transportation,” a new publication that addresses how our nation’s current transportation system contributes to today’s soaring health costs and impedes progress toward improving public health. Chief among those costs are U.S. traffic fatalities and injuries, which remain unacceptably high. In March 2010, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration revealed a statistical projection that shows that roughly 33,963 people died in traffic crashes in 2009. Furthermore, according to the American Automobile Association, traffic crashes cost an astounding $164.2 billion each year, or roughly $1,051 per person annually. Some of the more hidden costs of transportation include physical inactivity, rising asthma and obesity rates in both adults and children, and degraded air quality. All are increasing to staggering levels and negatively impacting Americans. To view the press release click HERE, for the report click HERE

5/18/2010 U.S.-Brazil Conference on Racial Equality: Two-day event will include talks on labor, health, civil rights, education
The Department of State’s Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs will host a conference of the U.S.-Brazil Joint Action Plan to Eliminate Racial and Ethnic Discrimination and Promote Equality on May 20-21, 2010, at Morehouse College in Atlanta, GA. The two-day Joint Action Plan conference, “A Call to Action,” will bring U.S. and Brazilian government, civil society, and private sector representatives together using an engaging and interactive format.  Participants will discuss key issues in racial equality, including economic empowerment and labor, health concerns, environmental justice, civil rights and education, and racial equality in the justice system. To view the press release click HERE.

5/17/2010 New Study Finds Racial Wealth Gap Quadrupled Since Mid-1980s National Data Reveals the Effects of Policies that Benefit the Wealthiest, Persistent Discrimination in Housing, Credit and Labor Markets
The wealth gap between white and African-American families increased more than four times between 1984-2007, and middle-income white households now own far more wealth than high-income African Americans, according to an analysis released on Monday by the Institute on Assets
and Social Policy (IASP) at Brandeis University. IASP, in a research brief, also reported that many African Americans hold more debt than assets and at least 25 percent of African-American families had no assets to turn to in times of economic hardship. The fourfold increase in the wealth gap, it said, reflects public policies, such as tax cuts on investment income and inheritances, which benefit the wealthiest and persistent discrimination in housing, credit and labor markets. Click HERE to view the press release.

5/4/2010 Siting Nukes in a Poor Black Town -- If A Black President Does It, Is It Still Environmental Racism? by Bruce Dixon for The Huffington Post
In the weeks since President Obama announced $8.3 billion in loan guarantees to build new nuclear reactors next to an existing pair of nukes in mostly black Burke County, GA, the inconvenient questions, unanswered and mostly unasked, continue to pile up. The first and most obvious questions are why nukes, and why Burke County? The answer to "why nukes" is that discussion of the catastrophic risk inherent to nuclear power is pretty much off the table in mainstream media these days. The Obama administration likes to call it "safe nuclear energy," often in the same breath as "clean coal." Both are colossal and equally transparent lies. The 24th anniversary of the horrific nuclear accident at Chernobyl, Ukraine on April 24 passed almost unnoticed in the mainstream US media, although video of a brawl over something else in that nation's parliament made most of the networks here. Greenpeace marked the event with the release of a study by more than 50 scientists across the planet who peg the human toll of Chernobyl at a quarter million cancers, 100,000 of them fatal. Like the anniversary of the disaster itself, the Greenpeace story dropped soundlessly down the memory hole. Our amnesia is nearly perfect. I spoke to a class of journalism students at a local university at the beginning of April. Not a one of them ever heard of Chernobyl, or even of Three Mile Island. Click HERE to view the article.

5/3/2010 Obama's Nuclear Energy Proposal Sparks Debate Among Black Environmentalists by Eboni Farmer for blackvoicenews.com
Dr. Robert Bullard sees the red flags waving when it comes to the nuclear reactors President Obama has pledged government aid to construct in the town of Shell Bluff which is located in Burke County, Ga. The first red flag: Burke County is 51 percent African-American and already has nuclear reactors at Southern Company’s Plant Vogtle. "After looking at environmental injustices over the past 30 years I can't help but question why these reactors are being built in Burke County," says Bullard, an environmental injustice expert and activist. "When a community gets something good, African-American communities are usually not the first to get it." In February, Obama announced a proposal of $8.33 billion in guaranteed loans to help build the first new nuclear reactors in the country in Burke County in nearly 30 years. In addition he has proposed tripling the funding for other nuclear power plants from $18 billion to $54 billion in his 2011 fiscal budget. Click HERE to view the article.

5/3/2010 USA: United States of Atlanta? Short Film “Sprawlanta” Offers Stark Warning About Atlanta’s Unstoppable Suburban Sprawl
The pilot episode of a new web series about America's cities sounds the alarm bell on Atlanta’s suburban sprawl, warning that America’s fastest growing city is on pace to spread from coast to coast by the year 2050.“When it was founded in 1850, Atlanta was 3.14 square miles. Today metro Atlanta is approximately 8,379 square miles. Extrapolating this exponential growth rate, Atlanta could cover the entire continental United States by mid-century," explains filmmaker John Paget. Sprawlanta serves as the series premiere of American Makeover, a new online show spotlighting the harmful effects of sprawl and the transformational possibilities of new urbanism and traditional neighborhood design in cities across America. The unique series is partially sponsored by the Notre Dame School of Architecture and The Fund for the Environment and Urban Life (www.enviro-urban.org) and is free to watch at www.americanmakeover.tv.

4/30/2010 Southern Alliance for Clean Energy Wins Lawsuit: Georgia Public Service Commission Acted Illegally in Approving Georgia Power’s Plan to Build New Nuclear Reactors at Plant Vogtle
Today, the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy won its lawsuit in Fulton County Superior Court that aimed to protect Georgians from unfair utility costs in connection with the proposed construction of two new nuclear reactors at Plant Vogtle near Waynesboro, Georgia. The Court found that the Georgia Public Service Commission acted illegally in violation of Georgia state law. The Commission’s approval last year during the certification process for the proposed new Vogtle reactors is now in jeopardy. Click HERE to view the article.

4/28/2010 America's Cities Show Success Fighting for Air: Despite Gains, American Lung Association finds Healthy Air Remains a Goal, not Reality for Most U.S. Cities USNewswire
The American Lung Association's State of the Air 2010 report finds that a decade of cleanup measures to reductions in emissions from coal-fired powered plants and the transition to cleaner diesel fuels and engines have paid off in cutting levels of deadly particle and ozone pollution, especially in eastern and midwestern U.S. cities, including Atlanta, Cincinnati, Cleveland, New York City, Pittsburgh, St. Louis, and Washington, DC/Baltimore, MD. Despite that progress, State of the Air 2010 reveals that more than half the population of the United States still suffers pollution levels that are too often dangerous to breathe.  The report finds that unhealthy air remains a threat to the lives and health of more that 175 million people - roughly 58 percent of the population.  And, despite progress in many places, the report finds that some cities, mostly in California, had air that was more polluted than in the previous report. Click HERE to view the article.

4/25/2010 Health, race underlie landfill issues by Dennis Sherer for Times Daily
A dozen west Florence landowners are convinced the city did not do enough to protect their safety when it closed the landfill in their neighborhood in 1988. They feel so strongly they are seeking a remedy in Lauderdale County Circuit Court. Their case will be heard in June. Landowners contend methane gas generated by decaying garbage poses a constant threat, but there are plenty of other related issues that many of them say should be addressed. They're just not sure the courtroom is the place. Click HERE to view the article.

4/23/2010 Your Take: Climate Change Is a Civil Rights Issue by Jacqui Patterson Published on The Root
African Americans are disproportionately affected by global warming and pollution. As we honor the 40th anniversary of Earth Day and pay homage to the gifts of air, water, land, flora, fauna and the rich diversity of the animal kingdom, we must acknowledge that not all of the earth's inhabitants have equal access to basic essential elements of life and well-being. Continued and progressive deprivation is a looming threat, in the form of climate change, to communities of color in the United States and countries predominated by people of color worldwide. Climate change is a statistical change in the distribution of weather over time. One of these changes is global warming, which is the increase in the temperature of the earth's near-surface air and oceans. Climate change is driven primarily by emissions of carbon dioxideand exacerbated by deforestation because forests play a key role in absorbing carbon dioxide. Here is where the justice issues and civil rights violations begin to come into play. Click HERE to view the article

4/21/2010 Earth Day at Forty Still Leaves "Dirty Dumping in Dixie" Practices in Place by Robert Bullard for OpEdNews
On April 22, 2010, the nation celebrates the fortieth anniversary of Earth Day. Much has been achieved in environmental and public health protection over these past four decades. However, much work remains, especially in terms of achieving equal protection and equal enforcement of our environmental and energy laws. In the real world, all communities are not created equal. If a community happens to be poor, black or a community of color, or located on the "wrong side of the tracks," it received less protection than communities inhabited largely by affluent whites in the suburbs. Let us not forget that the long march to equality for people of color predates the first Earth Day. Two years before the first Earth Day, in April 1968, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. went to Memphis, Tennessee to lead an environmental and economic justice protest march on behalf of striking sanitation workers. He was assassinated in Memphis that same year. Click HERE to view the article.

4/21/2010 Black farmers call on Congress to pay racial bias settlement by CNN
African-American farmers hoping for government settlement money in a racial bias case met with lawmakers Wednesday and called on Congress to come up with a way to fund the $1 billion deal. Litigation known as the Pigford Case established a longstanding pattern of discrimination at the U.S. Agriculture Department against African-American farmers who had applied for farm loans and support from federal programs. Under the terms of an involved process overseen by a federal judge and dating to 1999, qualified farmers could receive $50,000 each to settle claims of racial bias. In addition, U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack has said those farmers may pursue a claim for actual damages from the bias and potentially receive up to $250,000. Click HERE to view the article.

4/20/2010 Transit Cuts Are Protested in Atlanta by Shaila Dewan for the New York Times
When Danielle White boarded her bus to go to work on Tuesday morning, it was emblazoned from top to bottom with a giant, painted red X. Ms. White knew what that meant. “This is one of the buses that’s getting cut,” said Ms. White, a security guard at the Georgia Aquarium. “I’m going to have to figure out how to get there.” On Monday night, workers and officials at the Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority volunteered to paint the X’s on a third of the system’s buses and trains to symbolize the 30 percent cut in service the agency is facing because of a decline in sales tax revenue and a Republican-dominated Statehouse that has been slow to help. On Tuesday morning, with a parade of X’d-out buses stopping on the street behind them, more than 200 public transit workers and riders gathered at the system’s main hub, Five Points. They were kicking off a week of rallies, telephone campaigns and other events in 11 cities across the country coordinated by the Transportation Equity Network, an advocacy group based in St. Louis, to protest transportation cuts and fare increases. Click HERE to view the article.

4/19/2010 For them, Earth Day was late in coming by Brian Winter for the USA TODAY
When freed slaves founded the community of Turkey Creek in 1866, there was nothing here but swamps, oak trees and a muddy creek. Through the years, sixth-generation resident Derrick Evans says, the area became a "dumping ground" for the kinds of hazardous or undesirable development no one wants to live next to: a sewage treatment facility, a chemical plant (which caught fire, leaked waste and closed), the city airport, and so on. By 2005, many of the area's wetlands had been paved over, leaving Turkey Creek especially vulnerable to flooding when Hurricanes Katrina and Rita hit the Gulf Coast. Click HERE to view the article.

4/15/2010 Over 200 Groups Appeal Directly to Obama to Issue Federal Coal Ash Safeguards by EARTHJUSTICE.ORG
For the last 180 days, the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) has held up the first ever federal regulations on coal ash disposal. Lobbyists with the power, mining and coal ash industries have met with OMB nearly 30 times during this delay, putting pressure on the White House and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to scale back and even scuttle any effective federal oversight of this toxic threat. Today, environmental leaders from 239 national, state and local public interest groups from all 50 states appealed directly to President Barack Obama to issue these regulations and “trigger the public process of rulemaking, thereby ensuring a fair and open process in which all stakeholders have an equal opportunity to address the complexities of the proposed rule,” the groups wrote. Click HERE to view the article.

4/15/2010 Industry Must Prove Safety Under Proposed Safe Chemicals Act by Environment News Service (ENS)
Legislation to require safety testing of all industrial chemicals, which puts the burden on industry to prove that chemicals are safe in order stay on the market, was introduced in both houses of Congress today. Introducing his new bill, U.S. Senator Frank Lautenberg, a New Jersey Democrat, called the Toxic Substances Control Act of 1976 now in force, "an antiquated law that in its current state, leaves Americans at risk of exposure to toxic chemicals." Lautenberg, who chairs the Senate Subcommittee on Superfund, Toxics and Environmental Health, says his bill, the Safe Chemicals Act of 2010, will give the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency more power to regulate the use of dangerous chemicals. It requires manufacturers to submit information proving the safety of every chemical in production and any new chemical seeking to enter the market. Click HERE to view the article.

4/15/2010 Tennessee cleanup sends coal ash, anxiety, to Alabama site by Renee Schoof for McClatchy Newspapers
When the mound of wet coal ash began to rise in the landfill across the road from her pretty yellow house with the peonies and roses in the front yard, Ruby Holmes felt overpowered by a horrible smell. A few doors down, Mary Williams, a retired Avon sales office manager, shut her windows and kept the air filters running and still couldn't sleep. She was nauseated. Her eyes, nose and throat burned, and her husband, a retired Greyhound driver, had trouble breathing." Uniontown's Arrowhead Landfill so far has taken in 1.8 million tons of coal ash from one of the nation's biggest environmental disasters, the December 2008 spill from a coal ash pond at a Tennessee Valley Authority power plant in Kingston, Tenn. Trains bring about 10,000 tons a day. Click HERE to view the article.

4/9/2010 New EPA Data On Civil Rights Backlog May Help Reshape Equity Agenda by Daily News from InsideEPA.com
New EPA data provide first-time details of the agency’s backlog in handling Civil Rights Act complaints dating back to 1993 and show repeated failures to meet regulatory deadlines for responding to complaints, which activists say bolsters their calls for an overhaul of the agency’s Office of Civil Rights Office (OCR) amid EPA efforts to make equity a key factor in enforcement, permitting and other decisions. The data was compiled as part of a settlement with activists over a civil rights complaint. An Inside EPA review of the data shows OCR has received more than 300 complaints since the early 1990s, and continues to investigate about 30 of them, including 12 awaiting jurisdictional decisions. Click HERE to view the article.

3/30/2010 Black residents of Mossville win hearing in legal battle over industrial pollution By Mark Schleifstein, The Times-Picayune
African-American residents of Mossville, a community just west of Lake Charles, have won a hearing before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights on charges that the U.S. government has violated their rights to privacy and racial equality in not forcing local chemical plants to stop polluting. It's the first time the international organization has agreed to hear complaints of environmental racism against the United States by its on citizens, said a spokeswoman for the law firm that filed the complaint. Mossville is adjacent to 14 chemical plants and refineries that release millions of pounds of toxic chemicals into the air, land and water each year, according to federal and state records. Click HERE to view the article.

3/28/2010 Black Atlantans Left Behind as the City Goes Green and Sustainable By Robert Bullard for OpEdNews
The State of Black Atlanta Summit 2010 was held last month on the campus of Clark Atlanta University in Atlanta, GA. The one-day Summit was convened by the Environmental Justice Resource Center to coincide with the Black History Month celebration and was part of the center's Smart Growth and Sustainable Communities Initiative (SGSCI) funded by a grant from the Ford Foundation. The Summit organizers commissioned working papers from top Atlanta leaders in academic, public health, business, media, and local community based organizations with the goal of impacting public sector policies around health, environmental justice, civil rights and human rights, transportation and land use, housing and home ownership, wealth creation and business development, equitable development, education, food security, and parks and green access in Atlanta's underserved communities. More than a dozen Summit authors presented a shared vision for leading Black Atlanta into a just, healthy, and sustainable future. To view the three part article click PART 1, PART 2, and PART 3.

3/24/2010 National Urban League's State Of Black America Report, Offers Jobs Plan to Put Urban America Back to Work
With black unemployment numbers nearly double that of whites, the National Urban League's State of Black America report shows that the ravages of the recession are impacting minorities much worse than the rest of the nation. The solution to this crisis is getting jobs to people in these communities and the Urban League is encouraging the nation's leaders to act swiftly and support a $168 billion plan it has to generate jobs to make sure no one is left behind or left out of economic recovery efforts. The report coincides with the National Urban League's Centennial initiative, "I AM EMPOWERED," which includes a goal for the nation to achieve access for every American to a quality job with a living wage and good benefits by 2025. Click HERE to view the press release.

3/23/2010 Atlanta moves to 9th largest US Metro area By Ty Tagami, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Atlanta's reputation as a booming metropolis is confirmed by new census figures that show the city and its suburbs breaking into the top 10 U.S. metro areas by population. As of 2009, Atlanta was ranked ninth in the nation, based on new population estimates from the U.S. Census Bureau. The metropolitan statistical area, which includes Sandy Springs and Marietta, reached 5,475,213 people, an increase of  1,227,192 from 2000 when Atlanta was ranked 11th. Click HERE to view the article.

3/22/2010 Environmental Justice and the Green Economy: A Vision Statement and Case Studies for Just and Sustainable Solutions By Alternatives for Community & Environment, Inc
This report is the follow-up to the “Stimulating Environmental Justice” statement released on this site in early 2009. This report describes a shared vision for a just and sustainable economy, and highlights grassroots environmental justice successes in our communities that are leading the way. We hope to stimulate discussion and build consensus around the idea that sustainability and justice – “justainability” – must be simultaneous results; that one simply cannot happen without the other. The report includes case studies from low income communities and communities of color in Los Angeles, Navajo Nation, Harlan County Kentucky, Miami, Chicago, San Diego, New York, and Richmond California. Our cases show a diverse environmental justice movement shaping the future of the green economy at a very critical stage. As Stimulus funds are distributed and green economy resources are earmarked for “infrastructure” projects, it is vitally important for tools such as this report to be available and visible. Click HERE to view the report.

3/17/2010 EIP REPORT: ELECTRIC POWER INDUSTRY "NOT MAKING A DENT" IN DANGEROUS MERCURY POLLUTION, WHICH ROSE AT OVER HALF OF THE NATION'S 50 DIRTIEST POWER PLANTS
More than half (27) of the nation's 50 worst power plants for mercury emissions increased their mercury emissions from 2007 to 2008 (the latest year for which data is available), according to a new report from the nonprofit and nonpartisan Environmental Integrity Project (EIP). The six leading U.S. power suppliers with three or more plants on the mercury emission list by total pounds include Luminant (formerly TXU), American Electric Power (AEP), Southern Company, Entergy, Ameren, and NRG. Click HERE to view the report.

2/1/2010 TheGrio's 100: Robert Bullard, Father of environmental justice inspires next generation By Brentin Mock
When Lisa Jackson took her seat as the first African-American administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, she made sure in her first year to consult with Bullard, who is considered the "father of environmental justice." When the U.S. was gearing up for the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen, top policymakers conferred with Bullard on how to best create policy that protects vulnerable communities. Bullard was part of a team of African-American leaders sent to Copenhagen by the widely influential Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies. And when the NAACP publicly addressed global warming in launching their Climate Justice Initiative, it was Bullard they consulted to help them design it. All said, as the U.S. embarks upon huge technological shifts, history-making legislation and regulatory upgrades for the 21st century, Bullard is actively playing a key role in keeping the lives of minorities and the impoverished a chief priority. Click HERE to view the article.

1/27/2010 Ala. Landfill Owner Bankrupt Despite TVA Ash Deal by the Associated Press
The owners of a west Alabama landfill have filed for bankruptcy protection despite a multimillion-dollar contract to accept tons of coal ash spilled in an environmental accident at a Tennessee Valley Authority power plant. The bankruptcy petition was filed Tuesday in Mobile by Perry Uniontown Ventures LLC and Perry County Associates. The companies own the land and permits for the Arrowhead Landfill, which has accepted tons of coal ash spilled at a Tennessee power plant in 2008. According to court documents, landfill operators Phillips and Jordan Inc. and Phill-Con Services have a multimillion-dollar contract with TVA to accept coal ash from Kingston, Tenn., site of the spill. But the owners of the landfill accuse the companies operating it of withholding money from them. Click HERE to view the article.

1/24/2010 Environmental woes heard by Nicklaus Lovelady for the Clarion-Ledger
Sherri Jones of Hattiesburg said he's waited years for a chance to address U.S. Environmental Protection Agency officials about concerns he and his neighbors share. Jones brought pictures to a town hall meeting with the EPA at Jackson State University on Saturday of a former creosol site that appears to be spewing a suspicious liquid from a well near his home. EPA administrator Lisa Jackson attended the meeting, joined by 2nd District Rep. Bennie Thompson, a Bolton Democrat, and local leaders, to open her Environmental Justice Tour. The tour is sponsored by the EPA and the Congressional Black Caucus to study environmental justice challenges facing underserved communities. Nearly 100 people attended the meeting, which allowed residents from across the state to ask questions and voice their concerns on environmental issues. Jones said state officials have not been able to identify the substance spewing from the ground near his home. Click HERE to view the article.

1/22/2010 EPA, Congressional Black Caucus Announce Joint Environmental Justice Tour Jackson, Miss. marks first stop on tour highlighting impact of environmental issues on underserved communities by EPA (news release).
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lisa P. Jackson and U.S. Representative Barbara Lee, Chair of the Congressional Black Caucus, today announced plans to visit American communities most ravaged by environmental degradation and pollution. The joint EPA-CBC Environmental Justice Tour will visit several areas throughout the country to highlight environmental justice challenges faced by Americans in all communities. The tour will also include stops in South Carolina, Maryland, and Georgia among other states. To read the full release please click HERE.

1/17/2010 Alabama becoming popular place to ship nation's garbage By Ben Raines for AL.com
Alabama is gaining a reputation as one of the best places in the nation to dump garbage. The Alabama Department of Environmental Management has issued permits allowing nearly 19 million tons of garbage to be deposited in the state each year, about 7.5 percent of the garbage generated nationwide, according to U.S. Environmental Protection Agency figures. Meanwhile, Alabama is home to but 1.5 percent of the nation's population and produces 1.6 percent of the nation's trash, or about 4 million tons of garbage a year, according to Press-Register calculations based on an EPA formula. Click HERE to view the article.

1/15/2010 In Renewed Effort on Environmental Justice, EPA to Assess Impacts of Waste Rule on Disadvantaged Communities Agency’s draft plan on hazardous waste recycling rule open for public comment (Press Release)
Consistent with EPA Administrator Lisa P. Jackson’s commitment to reach out to communities historically underrepresented in EPA decision-making, the agency is requesting public input on a draft plan for assessing the potential impacts of its hazardous waste recycling rule on low-income, minority and tribal populations. To encourage safe recycling and to help conserve natural resources, EPA’s Definition of Solid Waste (DSW) rule published in October of 2008, modified the regulations for hazardous materials that are recycled, also known as hazardous secondary materials. EPA is reaching out to stakeholders, including the environmental justice community, requesting public comment before the analysis begins. To read the full release please click HERE.

1/13/2010 Interview with Robert D. Bullard, Ph.D. and Kenneth Olden, Ph.D., Sc.D., L.H.D. on ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE Volume 3, Number 1, 2010
Interview cunducted by Sylvia Hood Washington, Ph.D., N.D., M.S.E., M.P.H., Editor-in-Chief, Environmental Justice. To read the full interview please click HERE (PDF).

1/10/2010 Hurricane propels Jackson's justice quest at EPA By DINA CAPPIELLO for The Associated Press
More than four years after Hurricane Katrina, the single-story brick rancher in Pontchartrain Park where Lisa Perez Jackson grew up stands empty. Floodwaters long ago ate away the walls of her corner bedroom, where the current head of the Environmental Protection Agency once hung Michael Jackson and Prince posters and studied her way to the top of her high school class. Faded spray paint, left by search teams to indicate that no bodies were found, serves as a reminder of the day Jackson evacuated her mother, Marie, to Bossier City ahead of the approaching storm. Katrina was the closest that an environmental disaster had hit home for someone who has spent her career solving environmental problems. Now, she's in charge of ensuring that all communities are equally protected from pollution. The storm's toll on Jackson's childhood house and on New Orleans, particularly the Ninth Ward where she was raised, has intensified her quest for what's known as environmental justice. That means involving and getting fair treatment for the poor and minorities, who often endure the greatest exposure to environmental hazards but are outside the mainstream movement trying to find solutions. It's this fight that Jackson wants most to be remembered for from her tenure as President Barack Obama's chief environmental steward. Click HERE to view the article.

1/6/2010 Slow Ride to Nowhere? City's new environmental law faces uncertain future By Matt Cunningham for CityBeat.com
With the election of a new City Council, the future looks uncertain for Cincinnati’s Environmental Justice Ordinance. The first-of-its-kind law, which was slated to go into effect Dec. 21, was touted by backers such as former councilman David Crowley as a way to ensure the city’s poorest residents are protected from heavily-polluting businesses. But the ordinance failed to earn funding in the current city budget, approved after Crowley and fellow Democrat Greg Harris left the group. A motion submitted in June by Councilman Jeff Berding, an Independent, seeks to postpone implementation of the law by one year. Click HERE to view the article.

12/17/2009 Climate Change As Civil Rights By Joint Center For Political And Economic Studies
The climate change issue offers an enormous opportunity for addressing a broad range of social issues of critical concern to minority communities across the world, according to members of the U.S.-based Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies' Commission to Engage African Americans on Climate Change who are attending the United Nations' climate talks here. At a press conference held at the Copenhagen summit, Commission delegates said that the process of transforming the global energy economy holds enormous potential for making progress on issues of economic opportunity, health and housing in many countries. Click HERE to view the article.

12/16/2009 New Orleans Group's Climate Change Advertisement in Copenhagen Newspaper Puts the Spotlight on the Gulf Region
For each of the three final days of the UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen, Denmark, Advocates for Environmental Human Rights ("AEHR") based in New Orleans is running a full page newspaper advertisement that focuses on the trauma of Hurricane Katrina and 10 steps that President Obama can take to protect the Gulf Region and other communities vulnerable to climate change. The 10 Steps for Climate Action were developed by AEHR and a coalition of diverse organizations based in the Gulf Region. To view add click HERE. To view the press release click HERE

12/15/2009 African American Environmental Justice Advocates Appeal to World Leaders to Honor Commitment to Communities Most Impacted by Climate Change Edited by Carly Zander
Temperatures are rising at the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen as negotiators scuffle to reach a consensus before heads of state arrive later this week. Many African American environmental justice NGO representatives balance support for the global south and their own communities back home as the focus turns to President Obama's speech this coming Friday. Representatives from developing nations believe the industrialized world is not doing enough to reduce pollution. They want developed nations to commit to significant cuts in greenhouse gas emissions along with the allocation of billions of dollars to poor countries. Click HERE to view the article.

12/5/2009 CAU Sociology Professor Part of Climate Justice Delegation to Copenhagen
Clark Atlanta University sociology professor Robert D. Bullard is part of a six member delegation assembled by the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies that will travel to Copenhagen, Denmark for the UN Climate Change Conference (COP15) meeting this week.  Bullard is also part of a team of sociologists that contributed to the Sociological Perspectives on Global Climate Change report published in 2008 by the National Science Foundation.  This year Professor Bullard and Dillard University sociology professor and delegation member Dr. Beverly Wright edited Race, Place, and Environmental Justice After Hurricane Katrina: Struggles to Reclaim, Rebuild, and Revitalize New Orleans and the Gulf Coast, a book that chronicles post-disaster reconstruction and differential disaster adaptation of the region’s most vulnerable and marginalized populations.  The Joint Center delegation represents members of its Commission to Engage African Americans on Climate Change (CEAACC) and three staff members. The Commission was formed in 2008 and is working with African Americans and others to understand the impacts that climate change will have on their communities, and is working to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and ensure that energy policies are fair to all Americans. Other Commission members in the delegation are Carolyn L. Green, Managing Partner, EnerGreen Capital Management, LLC based in Philadelphia, Leslie G. Fields, Esq., Sierra Club; Dr. Julianne Malveaux, Bennett College for Women;  Frank M. Stewart, American Association of Blacks in Energy; and Dr. Beverly Wright from Dillard University.

12/3/2009 EPA Drops Rule Allowing Hazardous Waste to be Burned as Fuel (ENS) -
Environmental groups are applauding the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for its plan to repeal a rule that would have permitted the burning of hazardous waste as fuel.The so-called Emissions Comparable Fuels rule took effect on the very last day of the Bush administration, January 20, 2009. It allowed industries to burn fuel that would otherwise be regulated as hazardous waste, but that generates emissions comparable to fuel oil.The rule, requested by the National Association of Manufacturers and the American Chemistry Council, would have allowed more than 100,000 tons of hazardous waste to be burned without federal hazardous waste protections. Click HERE to view the article.

12/3/2009 Attorney wants coal ash shipments to Perry County stopped By Tom Gordon -- The Birmingham News
Environmental attorney David Lud­der has raised another issue that he says is linked to the southern Perry County landfill now receiving massive amounts of coal ash from Tennessee. In an e-mail  this week, Lud­der, former general counsel at the Ala­bama Department of Environmental Management, said leachate from the Arrowhead Landfill is going to a sludge lagoon in the Perry County seat of Marion and that gases from the lagoon are causing respiratory problems for area residents. In a group of earlier mailings to fed­eral and state authorities as well as to the landfill's owners, Ludder called upon the federal Environmental Pro­tection Agency to put a stop to the coal ash shipments. Click HERE to view the article.

12/2/2009 First BPA Detection In U.S. Infant Cord BloodStudy Found More than 200 Chemicals in Cord Blood of African American, Asian and Hispanic Newborns by Environmental Working Group (EWG) and Rachel's Network
Laboratory tests commissioned by Environmental Working Group (EWG) and Rachel's Network have detected bisphenol A (BPA) for the first time in the umbilical cord blood of U.S. newborns. The tests identified the plastics chemical in 9 of 10 cord blood samples from babies of African American, Asian and Hispanic descent. The findings provide hard evidence that U.S. infants are contaminated with BPA beginning in the womb. Additional tests conducted by five laboratories in the U.S., Canada and Europe found up to 232 toxic chemicals in the 10 cord blood samples. Besides BPA, substances detected for the first time in U.S. newborns included a toxic flame retardant chemical called tetrabromobisphenol A (TBBPA) that permeates computer circuit boards, synthetic fragrances (Galaxolide and Tonalide) used in common cosmetics and detergents, and perfluorobutanoic acid (PFBA, or C4), a member of the notorious Teflon chemical family used to make non-stick and grease-, stain- and water-resistant coatings for cookware, textiles, food packaging and other consumer products. Click HERE to view the article.

11/30/2009 U.S.: Katrina Lawsuit Raises Broader Questions About Levee Safety By Matthew Cardinale for IPS
Since a federal judge ruled earlier this month that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers was responsible for the devastating 2005 levee breach at the Mississippi River Gulf Outlet (MRGO) in Louisiana during Hurricane Katrina, some legal scholars believe that millions – or even billions - could be owed to additional Hurricane Katrina victims. The 156-page ruling, obtained by IPS, ordered payments ranging from 100,000 to 300,000 dollars to several residents of affected areas who had brought the case, including Anthony and Lucille Franz, Tanya Smith, Kent Lattimore, and Lattimore and Associates. Click HERE to view the article.

11/29/2009 Reversal Haunts Federal Health Agency by Mireya Navarro for the New York Times
Earlier this month, a federal health agency backed away from its earlier findings that decades of explosive detonations by the Navy on the Puerto Rican island of Vieques posed no health hazards to residents. It was the second time this year that the agency, the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, changed its mind in a highly publicized case. Last April the agency, charged with analyzing public health risks from environmental contamination, rescinded its conclusion that contaminated drinking water at Camp Lejeune, N.C., posed no increased risk of cancer to adults. Now the agency, part of the Health and Human Services Department, is facing tough scrutiny from Congress and the threat of reform legislation, with some lawmakers accusing it of cursory evaluations that often get the science wrong and ignore independent studies and community complaints. Click HERE to view the article.

11/24/2009 EPA: Creosote testing poorly handled by Terry L. Jones American Staff Writer
It seems like the city of Hattiesburg may not have gotten its money's worth for an environmental study of a south Hattiesburg neighborhood. According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, testing performed by APEX Environmental Consultants to determine whether the soil and groundwater of the residential neighborhood west of the railroad tracks that run along Eastside Avenue was still contaminated with creosote did not comply with its standards and protocols. The EPA's findings have prompted members of the Forrest County Environmental Support Team to ask city leaders to once again revisit an issue that has been plaguing the neighborhood for more than three decades. In a seven-page letter dated Nov. 6, Dawn Taylor, a member of the EPA's Site Evaluation Section, told Mayor Johnny DuPree that APEX specialists failed to test for the primary constituents normally associated with creosote contamination. The EPA became involved with the case after members of the FCEST traveled to Atlanta to meet with experts. Click HERE to view the article.

11/20/2009 Lawyer asks EPA to order end to coal ash shipments to Perry County landfill By Tom Gordon for The Birmingham News
An environmental attorney has asked the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to order a massive landfill in Alabama's Perry County to stop receiving coal ash from Tennessee until it has a state permit to discharge liquid waste into the treatment plant in the county seat of Marion. David Ludder filed documents this week on behalf of a Marion resident, Jackie Fike, who lives near the town's wastewater treatment plant. Ludder said Perry County Associates LLC, which owns the Arrowhead landfill, does not have a permit from the Alabama Department of Environmental Management to discharge "pollutants contained in leachate generated" at the site through the Marion wastewater plant and into a tributary of the Cahaba River, Rice Creek. "Accordingly, such discharge is unlawful," Ludder writes.  Because the landfill does not have the necessary permit, EPA should order it to stop taking massive amounts of the coal ash it is now receiving from the Tennessee Valley Authority, Ludder said. Click HERE to view the article.

11/20/2009 Equity Advocates Say Region IV Actions Qualify As ‘Abuse’ For OIG Study by The InsideEPA.com Environmental NewsStand
Environmental justice advocates are arguing that EPA Region IV’s inaction in addressing contamination in minority communities qualifies as “abuse” and should guide the agency’s Office of Inspector General (OIG) as it reviews whether it can investigate the allegations under its authority to investigate fraud, waste and abuse at the agency. The advocates’ push comes as sources say senior EPA officials are agreeing to a number of new environmental justice efforts in Region IV -- which represents eight Southern states -- including a possible tour of toxic sites in the region by EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson and members of the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC), and an additional review by headquarters officials of the advocates’ allegations separate from a potential OIG investigation or Region IV assessment. Click HERE to view the article.

11/19/2009 Coal’s Assault on Human Health by Physicians for Social Responsibility
Physicians for Social Responsibility has released a groundbreaking medical report, “Coal’s Assault on Human Health,” which takes a new look at the devastating impacts of coal on the human body. Coal combustion releases mercury, particulate matter, nitrogen oxides, sulfur dioxide, and dozens of other substances known to be hazardous to human health. This report looks at the cumulative harm inflicted by those pollutants on three major body organ systems: the respiratory system, the cardiovascular system, and the nervous system. The report also considers coal’s contribution to global warming, and the health implications of global warming. To view the report please click HERE (PDF).

11/18/2009 EPA keeping close eye on Louisiana, new chief Lisa Jackson says in N.O. by Mark Schleifstein, The Times-Picayune
The Environmental Protection Agency will more closely monitor the regulatory activities of Louisiana and other states that administer the federal Clean Air Act and Clean Water Act, and may step in when states aren't adequately enforcing the law, EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson said Tuesday. "Many of these state programs are 20, 30 years old, and we might even need to hit the reset button and say, 'OK, we're going to hold you to a standard. If you're doing your job, great, but if you're not, we're going to be here going inside until you are," Jackson said in an interview with reporters and editors of The Times-Picayune. "It's EPA's job to oversee," Jackson said. "We often say we're partners, but we're also delegating our authority to a state, and of course, ultimately that means your ultimate answer would be to take it back. Click HERE to view the article.

11/15/2009 Dumping ash, and cash, on Perry County by Tom Gordon for The Birmingham News
If she could throw as she once could, Ruby Holmes could walk across the road in front of her house and toss a rock over a treeline and have it land in the sprawling landfill that has been operating there the past two years. Holmes, 80, would like to do more than throw a rock. She would like to throw the Arrowhead Landfill out of Perry County altogether. At a minimum, she says, its absence would allow her to once again sleep with her window open during mild weather. About a mile north of Holmes' house, on a railroad spur near a dirt and gravel road just off U.S. 80, a long line of open container railroad cars caterpillared into the 1,000-acre landfill site. Many days, 85 or 110 cars bring in coal ash from Kingston, Tenn., each carrying 105 tons of moist ash sealed in thick plastic material that Tennessee Valley Authority officials call "burrito wraps." Click HERE to view the article.

11/10/2009 IG Reviewing Ability To Investigate Alleged Region IV Equity Complaints by The InsideEPA.com Environmental NewsStand
EPA's Office of Inspector General (IG) is gathering information to determine whether it has the authority to grant environmental justice advocates' request for an IG investigation into an alleged decades-long record of decisions by EPA Region IV, which the advocates say have disproportionately impacted minorities. Acting IG Bill Roderick in a Nov. 9 letter says IG investigative authority is limited under the Inspector General Act to investigations that involve fraud, waste and abuse of an EPA program or operation. Click HERE to view the article.

11/2/2009 America's Most Toxic Cities by Francesca Levy for Forbes.com
In Atlanta, Ga., you'll find southern gentility, a world-class music scene--and 21,000 tons of environmental waste. In spite of its charms, the city's combination of air pollution, contaminated land and atmospheric chemicals makes it the most toxic city in the country. An urban skyline dotted with puffing smokestacks isn't the only measure of a city's cleanliness (or lack thereof). Most major cities suffer from a range of unseen hazards. Contaminants can seep into the ground from bygone chemical spills or shuttered steel mills. Invisible leaks at industrial complexes discharge harmful substances into the air, or the normal course of business requires factories to expel toxins that eventually find their way to the water supply. Click HERE to view the article.

10/28/2009 Call For GAO, IG Investigation Of Region IV Key To Broad Equity Push by The InsideEPA.com Environmental NewsStand
Environmental justice advocates are urging federal watchdogs to investigate EPA Region IV’s alleged decades-long record of decisions that have disproportionately impacted minorities, part of a broad equity push that also includes lobbying President Obama to nominate environmental justice officials to head several key agency regions and urging EPA headquarters to establish equity as a mandatory factor in a wide range of policies. Click HERE to view the article.

10/27/2009 Coal ash poses significant risk: EPA report says By Anne Paine for the Tennessean
A new EPA report says that the potentially toxic pollutants in coal ash – from mercury to arsenic - are of particular concern because they can concentrate in large amounts that are discharged to waterways or seep into groundwater. The more than 230-page report, which comes about ten months after the massive coal ash spill at TVA’s Kingston power plant in East Tennessee, has brought accolades from the environmental community and a call for regulatory action. Click HERE to view the article.

10/16/2009 Beverly Wright Tackles Environmental Racism By Faiza Elmasry for VOANews
New Orleans native Beverly Wright still remembers vividly the moment she became aware of environmental injustice. "I was a graduate student, my graduate advisor was working on the Love Canal story," she recalls. The residential community had been built on an abandoned toxic waste site, and the resulting contamination poisoned the air and water and led to a high rate of birth defects and miscarriages among Love Canal families.Wright discovered a similar situation when she returned home. "I began to find out about 'Cancer Alley.' That's the stretch of land between the cities of New Orleans and Baton Rouge [Louisiana]. It's home to about 136 petrochemical plants, six refineries and every other toxic facility that you can imagine." She was surprised to discover that "the people I loved most were even more exposed [to toxins] than the people were in Love Canal." Click HERE to view the article.

10/15/2009 Bold Initiatives Spur Calls for New EPA Watchdog By ROBIN BRAVENDER of Greenwire for the New York Times
The Obama administration has yet to nominate someone to serve as top watchdog at U.S. EPA, a delay that is worrying advocacy groups and lawmakers on both sides of the aisle. The EPA inspector general is an independent officer charged with preventing fraud, waste and abuse through audits and investigations. During George W. Bush's presidency, the inspector general's office was known for casting a critical eye on many of the administration's environmental policies. Both Republican and Democratic lawmakers are urging President Obama to nominate someone for the post, which requires Senate confirmation. Republicans want someone to oversee the new administration's sweeping new environmental policies, while Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) has called for an IG who would probe the agency's work during the Bush years. Click HERE to view the article.

10/15/2009 Davis asks EPA to reveal risks, raise coal ash standards By Dana Beyerle for the GadsdenTimes.com
U.S. Rep. Artur Davis has asked the federal environmental agency to determine whether millions of tons of coal ash that is being buried in a Perry County landfill is bad for the health of residents. Davis wrote Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lisa Jackson asking her to gauge the impact of coal ash on the environment, drinking water, and health. Davis said Perry County residents and elected officials deserve to know of any risks posed by coal ash since so much of it is being buried in a private landfill near Uniontown. He said if coal ash poses an unacceptable level of risk, national guidelines should replace inconsistent state standards to elevate the safety of people in one community to the same level found in others. Click HERE to view the article.

10/14/2009 Utne Reader Names Three Atlantans “Visionaries” in List of 50 by Atlanta Progressive News
Utne Reader, the best of the alternative press, names Lance Ledbetter, Rosemarie Garland-Thomson, and Robert Bullard as visionaries who are making their individual marks on the world. They are among 50 people the magazine has chosen in its November-December issue, on newsstands Oct. 20. Garland-Thompson, a social critic and professor of women’s studies at Emory University, works to turn a would-be stigma of staring at disabled people into empowerment. She wrote “Staring” to explore staring, what motivates it and how it affects people. Bullard was one of the first activists to insert race and class into the environmental debate, writing and editing 15 essential books, including “Race, Place and Environmental Justice After Hurricane Katrina.” Click HERE to view the article.

10/13/2009 Clayton pulls plug on bus service By Megan Matteucci and Marcus K. Garner for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
Bus service in Clayton County is scheduled to end March 31. The county commission voted 4-1 Tuesday night to terminate its contract with MARTA, which operates C-Tran, the county's cash-strapped bus system. About 2.1 million rides were taken on C-Tran buses during the last fiscal year, according to MARTA. County Commissioner Michael Edmondson said when C-TRAN started five years ago it was funded 100 percent with federal monies that no longer exist. Edmondson said although he voted to shut down the bus service, he felt the board's hands were tied. Click HERE to view the article.

10/11/2009 Tenn. may receive radioactive dirt from NY by the USA Today
A Tennessee landfill could receive very low-level radioactive soil from a closed plutonium extraction plant in New York under plans by the U.S. Department of Energy. The Knoxville News-Sentinel reported that the Chestnut Ridge Landfill in Anderson County was mentioned as the likely destination for the dirt during a conference call Thursday organized by DOE. The Department of Energy is excavating about 6,000 cubic yards of soil that contains Cesium-137 and detectable levels of Strontium-90 and Plutonium-239/240 from the New York site starting in mid-October. That's the equivalent of some 200 dump truck loads of waste. Click HERE to view the article.

10/2/2009 Tallevast residents are dealt a setback By Christopher O'Donnell for the Herald Tribune
Residents of Tallevast say living above 200 acres of polluted groundwater is making them sick. They have repeatedly asked Lockheed Martin to buy their homes and help them move away from the pollution that will take 50 years to cleanup. But representatives from the defense industry giant told residents Thursday that they have no plans to relocate them, meaning several lawsuits filed by residents against Lockheed seeking damages for health issues and falling property values are headed to court. Click HERE to view the article.

9/25/2009 Grading federal efforts to promote affordable housing near transit report by The Government Accountability Office
The Government Accountability Office has released a report to Congress examining the job the Federal Transit Administration and the Housing and Urban Development agency have done in promoting affordable housing in transit-oriented developments. The conclusion: "Key Practices Could Enhance Recent Collaboration Efforts between DOT-FTA and HUD." As part of this examination, the GAO reviewed what is know about the effect transit-oriented developments have on the availability of affordable housing. The report found that in five years as many as 160,000 renters in 20 metro areas could lose their affordable apartments near transit because the contracts on their privately-owned HUD-subsidized rental units are due to expire. The renewed popularity of urban living means that properties in walkable neighborhoods near transit have increased in value, and that property owners are likely to opt out of the HUD program and convert the housing from affordable to market rate. To view the report please click HERE.

9/18/2008 Vancouver community group gets big legal win over EPA By Scott Learn, The Oregonian
A Vancouver community group won a big legal victory this week against the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, convincing an appellate court that the EPA's civil rights office shows "a consistent pattern of delay" in responding to discrimination complaints. The case dates back to a 2003 allegation by the Rosemere Neighborhood Association that the city of Vancouver improved stormwater and septic systems in affluent neighborhoods but neglected older, poorer neighborhoods in West Vancouver. The civil rights office is supposed to thwart discrimination in the use of EPA money. Click HERE to view the article.

9/15/2009 Dillard environmentalist receives national honor by John Pope, The Times-Picayune
Beverly Wright, director of the Deep South Center for Environmental Justice at Dillard University and co-author of Race, Place, and Environmental Justice After Hurricane Katrina: Struggles to Reclaim, Rebuild, and Revitalize New Orleans and the Gulf Coast, is one of 10 recipients of the 2009 Heinz Awards because the awards board said, she has brought attention to environmental issues affecting poor communities. The awards by the Heinz Family Foundation, which are being announced today, recognize public-spirited work. They will be presented Oct. 28 in a ceremony in the National Portrait Gallery in Washington. Each recipient will be given $100,000 and a medallion. Click HERE to view the article.

9/10/2009 Race, the Job Market, and Economic Recovery: A Census Snapshot by Center for Social Inclusion (CSI)
A new report by the Center for Social Inclusion (CSI) addresses 2009 U.S. Census findings, showing that people of color and especially Black America are at greatest risk of being left out of the economic recovery. The CSI report, Race, the Job Market, and Economic Recovery: A Census Snapshot, details that rising poverty and unemployment, and decreasing access to healthcare are undermining recovery in communities of color, slowing the engine of America’s struggling economy. To view the press release please click HERE (PDF). To view the report please click HERE (PDF).

9/3/2009 Time for New Type of EPA Regional Administrators by Robert Bullard for OpEdNews
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) was created in December 1970 under President Richard M. Nixon. From the very beginning, EPA's ten regions were set up as nearly autonomous sub-agencies. President Barack Obama made a bold move this year by selecting Lisa P. Jackson, the first African American to head the EPA. Now the president is set to select EPA regional administrators—ten important and powerful posts that can reshape the agency which suffered severe setbacks under President George W. Bush. Having Jackson, an African American woman who grew up in New Orleans, at the helm of EPA is historic. However, having a black head at EPA headquarters in Washington, DC is not sufficient. Fundamental change is needed in the regions, especially regions where states have a legacy of slavery, Jim Crow segregation, and resistance to civil rights and equal environmental protection under the law, such as Region 4, eight states in the Deep South (Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Tennessee). Click HERE to view the article.

9/1/2009 National Civil Rights Leaders Gather for Environmental Racism Rally By Terry McMoore Clarksville, TN Online
On September 5, 2009 Civil Rights Leaders from across the nation will gather on the grounds of the Memorial Building Mayors Office at 202 Center Avenue in Dickson, Tennessee for an all day rally from 10:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. Dickson is home to one of the worst Environmental Racism cases in the history of the United States. The Holt family has been fighting for the past 10 years to bring justice and awareness to the contaminated water leaked from the county landfill. Click HERE to view the article.

8/29/2009 Rally for Environmental Justice in Dickson, TN, by UCC News
Rally with Justice and Witness Ministries of the United Church of Christ, the Tennessee Baptist Missionary Convention, The Center for Environmental Justice of Clark Atlanta University and the Tennessee NAACP on September 5, 2009, 10 a.m. at the Memorial Building, 200 Center Ave, in Dickson TN (35 miles west of Nashville) in support of the Holt family whose well became contaminated with TCE, a dangerous toxin.  Those who lived on the property, just 54 ft from the landfill have suffered death and disease.  The family believes their health issues came from drinking contaminated water from their well.  Having finally been warned of the danger, they stopped drinking the well water.  Their homestead is still contaminated. Click HERE to view the article. You can sign the petition at by clicking HERE or you can view the rally announcement HERE (pdf).

8/27/2009 Six amicus briefs filed in case against coal plant by Ricki Barker for the Albany Herald.com
More than 30 organizations have joined the fight against a proposed coal-fired plant set to be built in Early County. Six amicus briefs were filed Wednesday in the Georgia Supreme Court that cite various concerns of negative effects the Longleaf plant could pose for Southwest Georgia. Among the critics is prominent civil rights leader and recent Presidential Medal of Freedom recipient the Rev. Joseph Lowery, who also filed an amicus brief to try and block the $2 million plan to build Longleaf. Click HERE to view the article.

8/26/2009 Sept. 5 Labor Day “Call to End Toxic Racism” Rally in Dickson, Tennessee By Robert Bullard for OpEdNews
To highlight the nation's continuing toxic dumping problem in African American communities, civil rights, faith based, environmental justice, and health leaders from around the country are planning a rally in Dickson, Tennessee on Labor Day weekend Saturday, September 5. Dickson is located about 35 miles west of Nashville. Organizers of the rally chose to highlight the struggle of the African American Harry Holt family--the "poster child" for toxic racism. The Holt family's 150-acre farm and wells were poisoned and their wealth stolen by the leaky Dickson County Landfill. Five generations of Holts have called the Eno Road community home. Click HERE to view the article.

8/6/2009 Confronting Climate Change by Ronald Roach for Diverse Online
A Black think tank convenes a commission to focus on the disparate impact of climate change on minority communities and help involve historically Black institutions in clean energy projects. For more than two decades, Dr. Warren M. Washington, one of the nation’s leading meteorologists, has been among the U.S. scientists that have studied and predicted the long-term impact greenhouse gas emissions are having on the earth’s climate. Long convinced that reducing climate change requires global action to curtail greenhouse gas emissions, Washington, a senior scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colo., has taken on speaking engagements and activities, such as joining the Commission to Engage African-Americans on Climate Change, to advocate on behalf of people living in economically and socially disadvantaged communities. Click HERE to view the article.

7/22/2009 EPA vows to examine impact of hazardous waste on poor communities by Amy Littlefield for the Los Angeles Times
The federal Environmental Protection Agency vowed Tuesday to home in on the impact of hazardous waste recycling plants on minorities and low-income communities. The move hearkens back to a Clinton-era executive order that required federal agencies to consider the impact of their policies on disadvantaged communities. Although the Bush administration largely ignored the mandate, Obama-appointed EPA administrator Lisa P. Jackson has promised to analyze those impacts. Click HERE to view the article.

7/21/2009 Dumping in Dixie: TVA Toxic Spill Cleaned Up and Shipped to Alabama Blackbelt by Dr. Robert Bullard for OpEdNews.com
Six months ago, a wall holding back 80 acres of sludge from the Tennessee Valley Authority  (TVA) Kingston Fossil Plant broke spilling more than 500 million gallons of toxic coal fly ash over a dozen homes and up to 400 acres of the surrounding landscape, endangering aquatic life and the water supply for more than 25,000 residents. Numerous media stories have been written about the TVA toxic spill. Yet, the full "cradle to grave" toxic waste story has gotten little coverage from the national media.  Unfortunately, a major environmental injustice was perpetrated by the EPA approval of TVA's decision to ship 5.4 million cubic yards of  toxic coal ash by railcar from the mostly white east Tennessee Roane County to a landfill located in the heart of the Alabama "Black Belt," Perry County (69% African-American with more than 32% of its residents living in poverty) and to rural Taylor County, Georgia (41% of the population is African-American and more than 24% of residents live in poverty). Click HERE to view the article.

7/20/2009 Filling a Black Hole by Brentin Mock published on The Root
Last week, National Black Chamber of Commerce President and CEO Harry Alford gave Sen. Barbara Boxer the business over their disagreements about the climate bill before her committee. In testimony before the Senate's Environment and Public Works Committee, Alford admitted that he spoke "not as an economist" and as "not a climate change expert," but as someone with "a deep understanding of small and minority-owned businesses." In other words, he knows black people. When Boxer waved an NAACP resolution supporting climate change action in Alford's face, he took offense, accusing Boxer of "racial"-izing the climate change debate, and asked pointedly: "Why are you doing the colored people's association's study with the black chamber of commerce?" Later, he added: "Let me speak for the African-American community, since I am African American." The bickering over who speaks for black America on climate change was a distraction from the more important issue whether black people will have a voice in reshaping U.S. energy policy. Click HERE to view the article.

7/16/2009 Some Ala. residents unhappy with TVA coal ash coming to town by Harlow Sumerford for 6WATE.com
TVA is in the process of sending roughly 3 million tons of coal fly ash to Arrowhead Landfill in Uniontown, Alabama. "If Tennessee don't want it, why would Alabama want it?" says Bennie Carter, who also lives near the site. The residents in the area have been told how dangerous the coal ash could be and they worry about the air quality and the water supply. Click HERE to view the article.

6/30/2009 EPA releases locations of high-hazard coal ash dumps; most are in the South by Sue Sturgis for Facing South
After initially saying it would not release the information due to "security concerns," the Environmental Protection Agency relented Monday and disclosed the locations of the nation's 44 "high hazard" coal ash dump sites. These are the surface impoundments holding the waste from coal-fired power plants where a failure of the containment structure -- like the one that occurred last December at the Tennessee Valley Authority's Kingston plant in Roane County, Tenn. -- could kill significant numbers of people. The South is home to 24 of the 44 high-hazard sites. Click HERE to view the article.

6/30/2009 Environmental Justice Advocates Testify: Repeal Bush-Era Hazardous Waste LoopholeRule deregulates 1.5 million tons of toxic waste, puts low-income and communities of color at increased risk by CommonDreams.org
Environmental justice advocates from around the country traveled to Arlington, Virginia today to ask the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to repeal a Bush-era hazardous waste loophole and restore safeguards to prevent toxic spills and contamination. The rule, which went into effect in the closing days of the last administration, stripped federal oversight of recyclers who handle 1.5 million tons of hazardous waste generated by steel, chemical, pharmaceutical and other industrial companies each year. Click HERE to view the article.

6/24/2009 Air has elevated cancer risk in 600 neighborhoods By Dina Cappiello Associated Press Writer
Millions of people living in nearly 600 neighborhoods across the country are breathing concentrations of toxic air pollutants that put them at a much greater risk of contracting cancer, according to new data from the Environmental Protection Agency. The levels of 80 cancer-causing substances released by automobiles, factories and other sources in these areas exceed a 100 in 1 million cancer risk. That means that if 1 million people breathed air with similar concentrations over their lifetime, about 100 additional people would be expected to develop cancer because of their exposure to the pollution. In King County, 30 areas, virtually all of them in Seattle, have levels between 100 and 200 in 1 million. The average cancer risk across the country is 36 in 1 million, according to the National-Scale Air Toxics Assessment, which will be released by the EPA on Wednesday. Click HERE to view the article.

6/16/2009 TRPT Packs D.C. Briefing Room: Advocacy Day 2009 Report By Francisca Porchas for the Labor/Community Startegy Center
On Tuesday, June 9th, ten different organizations from across the country, including our allies from Transportation Equity Network (TEN) joined Transit Riders for Public Transportation (TRPT) for their first national Advocacy Day on the Hill. The Advocacy Day culminated with a Congressional Briefing hosted by TRPT and Transportation and Infrastructure Committee member, Congresswoman Grace Napolitano on the importance of greatly expanding permanent transit operating assistance funding in the next federal surface transportation act. Click on the links to view the article and video.

6/10/2009 Luke Cole, Court Advocate for Minorities, Dies at 46 Dennis Hevesi for the The New York Times
Luke Cole, an early leader of the environmental justice movement, which holds that many minority neighborhoods have become toxic dumping grounds because their residents are poor and powerless, died Saturday in Uganda. He was 46 and lived in San Francisco. As executive director of the Center on Race, Poverty and the Environment, an organization based in San Francisco that he founded in 1989 with Ralph Abascal, Mr. Cole played a key role in several significant environmental law cases. Click HERE to view the article.

6/10/2009 Study on government response to Katrina highlights need for Stafford Act reform
The Rockefeller Institute of Government released a report last week calling for a presidential appointee to take charge of the government's response to major disasters like Hurricane Katrina. The Stafford Act that authorizes the federal government response to disasters should be amended to allow the president to quickly appoint a special officer-in-charge — with pre-approved discretionary funding — to oversee effective government response to a major disaster, according to a new report issued today by two of the principals involved in a long-term study of governmental response to Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in 2005. To view the press release please click HERE. To view the report please click HERE (PDF).

6/8/2009 Shell to Pay $15.5 Million to Settle Nigerian Case by By Jad Mouawad for The New York Times
Royal Dutch Shell, the big oil company, agreed to pay $15.5 million to settle a case accusing it of taking part in human rights abuses in the Niger Delta in the early 1990s, a striking sum given that the company has denied any wrongdoing.The settlement, announced late Monday, came days before the start of a trial in New York that was expected to reveal extensive details of Shell’s activities in the Niger Delta. The announcement caps a protracted legal battle that began shortly after the death of the Nigerian activist Ken Saro-Wiwa in 1995. Mr. Saro-Wiwa, Shell’s most prominent critic at the time in Nigeria, was hanged by that country’s military regime after protesting the company’s environmental practices in the oil-rich delta, especially in his native Ogoni region. Shell continued Monday to deny any role in the death. It called the settlement a “humanitarian gesture” meant to compensate the plaintiffs, including Mr. Saro-Wiwa’s family, for their loss and to cover a portion of their legal fees and costs. Some of the money will go into an educational and social trust fund intended to benefit the Ogoni people. Click HERE to view the article.

5/28/2009 The Climate Gap: Inequalities in How Climate Change Hurts Americans & How to Close the Gap, by Rachel Morello Frosch, Manuel Pastor, Jim Sadd, and Seth Shonkoff
This report helps to document the Climate Gap, connecting the dots between research on heat waves, air quality, and other challenges associated with climate change. But we do more than point out an urgent problem; we also explore how we might best combine efforts to both solve climate change and close the Climate Gap -- including an appendix focused on California’s global warming policy and a special accompanying analysis of the federal-level American Clean Energy Security Act. Most of all, we stress that addressing the climate gap is an issue of importance for all Americans.  Properly maintaining the levees would have shielded the Lower Ninth Ward and would have saved all of New Orleans from the destruction of Hurricane Katrina. In like fashion, by choosing policies that shield against the very real dangers facing poor neighborhoods and people of color, we will make climate policy more effective for all of us. To view the executive summary, full report and our analysis on the American Clean Energy Security Act, please click HERE.

5/12/2009 Dumping in Dixie: TVA sends toxic coal ash to poor black communities in Georgia and Alabama by Sue Sturgis for Facing South
The Tennessee Valley Authority has begun shipping toxic coal ash from the massive spill that occurred last December at its Kingston power plant in east Tennessee's Roane County to landfills in the neighboring states of Georgia and Alabama as part of a test to determine a final resting place for the waste. The counties where the ash is going have large black populations and high poverty rates, raising questions about environmental justice. Click HERE to view the article.

5/18/2009 Race and Recession: How Injustice Rigged the Economy and how to Change the Rules by Applied Research Center
This report takes us beyond the numbers to explore the root causes of racial inequity. As the recession ravages the country, the Applied Research Center has been following its path. From Rhode Island’s welfare offices to job placement centers in Detroit, from Washington State’s hospitals to construction sites of Austin, Texas, we gathered real stories about what this recession means in a country in which race is a significant predictor of one’s economic situation. These stories and supporting data reveal the policies behind the patterns of racial inequity that have created an economy that is precarious for everyone. The report calls for an inclusive recovery, recognizing that a healthy economy requires explicit attention to our deepest racial divides. To view the full report please click HERE.

4/30/2009 Justice in the Air: Tracking Toxic Pollution from America's Industries and Companies to Our States, Cities, and Neighborhoods, by Michael Ash, James K. Boyce, Grace Chang, Manuel Pastor, Justin Scoggins, and Jennifer Tran
With climate change threatening our way of life, dirty air triggering asthma, and industrial pollutants causing cancer, the nation is more motivated than ever before to take a hard look at the problems we face and seek new approaches that can better secure the future of the planet and save lives. This report contributes to that lofty goal. In it, we go beyond tracking the countrys biggest industrial polluters. This study is one of the first to track which states and metropolitan areas have the biggest gap between the health risk from toxic pollution faced by people of color and the poor compared to their proportion of the population. The results confirm what many Americans of color and low-income Americans have known for a long time: clean air is not necessarily an equal opportunity affair. To view the full report please click HERE.

3/17/2010 Special Report After Katrina: Redemption and Rebuilding
Special issue of The American Prospect dedicated to the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina and the community rebuilding progress. To view the report click HERE.

3/2/2009 EPA: Air tests near schools a priority by Blake Morrison and Brad Heath, USA TODAY
In an unprecedented step aimed at protecting children from toxic chemicals, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is expected to announce plans Monday to determine whether industrial pollution taints the air outside schools across the nation.The EPA plan, promised by new administrator Lisa Jackson during her Senate confirmation hearings in January, calls for regulators to identify 50 to 100 schools where pollution might pose significant health risks. At many of those locations, the agency will work with state and local regulators to monitor the air for a variety of toxic chemicals. Click HERE to view the article.

2/23/2009 The Power of Race and Place: How and why the predominantly black areas of the Gulf Coast are still struggling to recover from Hurricane Katrina by Robert Bullard and Beverly Wright for The American Prospect
It is clear that race and place greatly determine personal ability to recover from Hurricane Katrina and color a personal view of recovery. Communities least affected by the storm tend to have larger percentages of white residents. These communities are also more likely to describe the recovery as satisfactory. While these areas received less damage, they have also benefited the most from federal dollars for recovery. Flood insurance claims were larger, leading to a large concentration of hazardous mitigation dollars flowing into these areas. Because of this, these areas are well on the way to a full recovery. Click HERE to view the article.

2/4/2009 The Tipping Point for Environmental Justice by Hamida Kinge for the Next American City
Environmental justice, often simply referred to as “E.J.” by insiders, is a term not yet ingrained in America’s collective consciousness. But everything has its tipping point, and if last week’s conference is any indication, the phrase will soon become as familiar as one’s own “carbon footprint.” The movement gained momentum in the early 80’s, when activists began to protest the disproportionate exposure of low-income communities of color and poor whites to environmental hazards, such as industrial toxics and waste dumping. “Climate justice” is a newer term coined for those communities that are experiencing the earliest climate disasters, or soon will. Click HERE to view the article.

1/21/2009 Drop in U.S. air pollution linked to longer lifespans By Anne Harding for CNN.com
Americans are living longer because the air they breathe is getting cleaner, a new study suggests. The average drop in pollution seen across 51 metropolitan areas between 1980 and 2000 appears to have added nearly five more months to people's lives, according to a study published Wednesday in The New England Journal of Medicine. Residents of cities that did the best job cleaning up air pollution showed the biggest jump in life span; for example, Pittsburgh's clearer air meant people there could expect to live nearly 10 months longer. Click HERE to view the article.

1/15/2009 State of the Dream 2009: The Silent Depression by United for a Fair Economy
Our new report finds that people of color are being hurt by the economy far more than the general population. While the general population has been in recession for one year, people of color have been in recession for five years. By definition, a long-term recession is a depression. We detail additional evidence that shows the current racial economic inequity, including poverty rates, wealth and assets and economic mobility. While racial barriers did not prevent an African-American from becoming President, they continue to impede many people of color from achieving the same economic success as their white counterparts. To view the full report please click HERE.

1/13/2009 Industry and Environmental Justice: Can a Historic Black Neighborhood Be Preserved? By Ethan Goffman for E/The Environmental Magazine
Lincoln Park is a sleepy African American neighborhood nestled in east Rockville, Maryland, a suburb of Washington, DC. Founded in 1891, it holds a tightly knit community of families dating back generations, with small, well-kept houses and deep back yards, recalling a time when space was needed for a well, a privy and a vegetable garden. The place is also an oasis in a sea of light industry—auto body and paint shops, printing and kitchen supply stores, truck depots and warehouses. To the west the Washington metro tracks cut off the neighborhood, while to the north and northwest stretches Washington Gas, a 126-acre complex of fields and towers demarcated by a fence and forbidding signs. Residents feel surrounded. Click HERE to view the article.

1/5/2009 Citizens Reprimand Grady Board over Proposed Cuts By Jonathan Springston, Senior Staff Writer, The Atlanta Progressive News
Grady officials said Monday they want more information before voting on a proposal that could change the service delivery model at Grady Memorial Hospital. In their meeting today, January 05, 2009, Members of the Grady Memorial Hospital Corporation (GMHC) did not even discuss a proposal that would require Fulton and DeKalb County patients who earn between 126 percent and 200 percent of federal poverty guidelines to pay 40% of their bill, up to 25% of their annual income. Click HERE to view the article.

12/22/2008. Will Environmental Justice Finally Get Its Due? by Brentin Mockfor The American Prospect
Obama's environment, energy, and urban affairs appointees are poised to enact policies that environmental justice activists have long been pushing for. If President-Elect Barack Obama's recent cabinet choices are any indication, the decades-old environmental justice movement may finally see many of its top policy goals fulfilled. The Obama administration is poised to finally deliver on White House promises made in the early 1990s to protect minorities from toxic waste, and with the addition of an Office of Urban Policy, it may go even further toward correcting historical racial disparities when it comes to environmental hazards. Click HERE to view the article.

12/4/2008 Board votes to move graves for landfill; NAACP wants inquiry by CNN.com
The NAACP in Georgia is calling for the state attorney general's office to investigate a county board after it voted to move about 300 African-American graves from a site that will be used to expand a landfill. The Clayton County Board of Commissioners voted Tuesday to allow the graves in Union Bethel A.M.E. Church Cemetery to be moved to a graveyard in nearby Riverdale, a suburb south of Atlanta. After the graves are moved, the land will be used to expand a debris landfill that surrounds the Union Bethel cemetery. CNN's Rick Sanchez discusses a plan to convert a historic Atlanta cemetery to a waste landfill (Click HERE to watch the video). Click HERE to view the article.

12/4/2008 Many Children Lack Stability Long After Storm by Shaila Dewan for The New York Times
After more than three years of nomadic uncertainty, many of the children of Hurricane Katrina are behind in school, acting out and suffering from extraordinarily high rates of illness and mental health problems. Their parents, many still anxious or depressed themselves, are struggling to keep the lights on and the refrigerator stocked. More than 30,000 former trailer residents landed in apartments paid for by the federal government until March 2009, a small fraction are in the hands of private charities or government housing programs for the disabled, and thousands more simply traded in their trailers for other temporary quarters. Case managers promised by FEMA to help these families find permanent homes have yet to start work in Louisiana. To view the article please click HERE.

12/3/2008 Differential Vulnerabilities: Environmental and Economic Inequality and Government Response to Unnatural Disasters by Robert D. Bullard
This paper was published by The New School as part of the Social Research International Quarterly Journal as a follow up to the Disasters: Recipes and Remedies. The conference took place November 1-2, 2007. The purpose was to examine the unequal protection and treatment of populations made vulnerable by their location and or socioeconomic status; the impact of disasters on the economy and overall human development; how hazards develop into disasters; and how design factors either mitigate or amplify their effects. To view the paper click HERE.

12/1/2008 Lockheed makes amends with Tallevast residents By Christopher O'Donnell for the HeraldTribune.com
About 35 Tallevast families took Lockheed Martin's offer to move into hotels while the company demolishes two buildings at a former plant that used the metal beryllium to make parts for nuclear warheads. Lockheed officials maintain that the work poses no health risk to nearby residents. But the company's willingness to relocate residents for up to month may mark a turning point in the aerospace giant's dealings with the mostly black community in South Manatee. To view the article please click HERE.

11/4/2008 Legacy of shame: the on-going public health disaster of children struggling in post-Katrina Louisiana by the Children’s Health Fund.
Children who remain displaced three years after hurricane Katrina are plagued by alarmingly high rates of medical problems, according to a report by the Children’s Health Fund. They fare worse than poor children elsewhere in the USA, says the Fund, whose mobile medical units provided post-disaster care in the area. Between January and September 2008, the Fund reviewed medical charts for hurricane-affected children in Louisiana’s second largest city, Baton Rouge, which became home to people who fled New Orleans after hurricanes Katrina and Rita hit in 2005. Their sample included children housed temporarily in ‘villages’ set up by the US Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). To view the full report please click HERE (PDF).

10/21/2008 And Justice For All An environmental expert talks about the challenges of helping disadvantaged communities deal with pollution and climate change at a local level By Daniel Stone for NEWSWEEK
The way people are affected by the environment is often presented on a global scale—tides rising or forests dying as a result of climate change. But the way human beings have a direct impact on the planet is often more visible on a local level. Communities closer to industrial areas may be affected by higher than average asthma rates, for instance, and towns with poor water treatment or slow clean-up from disasters may show a disproportionate number of children with developmental problems. Activists for environmental justice claim that the people most affected usually lack the time or resources to fight against factors that will affect their health. But the problem, says Julie Sze, director of the Environmental Justice Project at the University of California, Davis, is rarely politically motivated, at least not explicitly. It's more an issue of business-focused zoning and lax regulatory control. It can also be a symptom of the larger inequality in America, which often falls along race and class lines. To view the interview please click HERE.

10/5/2008 Why CDC Responded With ‘Lack of Urgency’ to Formaldehyde Warnings by Joaquin Sapien for Pro Publica
The Centers for Disease Control study sounded reassuring when it was made public in 2007. Hurricane Katrina survivors didn't have to worry about reports that there were harmful levels of formaldehyde in their trailers. The air was safe to breathe and the contamination would not reach a "level of concern" as long as they kept the windows open. Today, senior CDC officials acknowledge that the study was based on a fundamental error. An agency standard says that people exposed to as a little as 30 parts of formaldehyde per billion parts of air (ppb) for more than two weeks can suffer constricted airways, headaches and rashes. The trailers all measured above that level. To view the article please click HERE.

9/22/2008 Toxic Trailers - Toxic Lethargy: How the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Has Failed to Protect the Public Health - Staff Report Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight by Committee on Science and Technology for U.S. House of Representatives 
The mission of ATSDR, a sister agency of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), “is to serve the public by using the best science, taking responsive public health actions, and providing trusted health information to prevent harmful exposures and disease related to toxic substances.”  Unfortunately, the agency failed to meet any of those objectives when it produced a “health consultation” on formaldehyde levels in travel trailers provided by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to survivors of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in February 2007.  In almost every respect ATSDR failed to fulfill its mission to protect the public from exposure to formaldehyde at levels known to cause negative health effects.  The agency’s incomplete and inadequate handling of their public health assessment, the failure to quickly and effectively correct their scientific mistakes and their reluctance to take appropriate corrective actions was all marked by notable inattention and inaction on the part of ATSDR’s senior leadership.  As a result, tens of thousands of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita families living in trailers with elevated levels of formaldehyde were kept in harm’s way for at least one year longer than necessary. To view the executive summary please click HERE. To view the full report please click HERE (PDF).

9/16/2008 Environmental Justice: Heck of a Job Ahead by Deeohn Ferris for SHELTERFORCE
The new president has a lot of catching up to do on the unmet imperatives of environmental justice. Originally anchored in the urgency of redressing the impact of environmental poisons and discriminatory pollution on workers and low-income people in communities of color, the environmental and economic justice movement forged a coherent vision that defines and addresses community health and vitality. This vision is about meeting community needs and aspirations, and positions those who live, work, worship, and are educated there as integral partners in decisions about policy and place. To view the article please click HERE.

9/3/2008 Co-op America Announces 2008 Winners of Building Economic Alternatives (BEA) Award: Coal River Mountain Wind Project, Dr. Robert Bullard Recognized as Leaders in Environmental Justice
The Coal River Mountain Project and Dr. Robert Bullard are the 2008 recipients of the Building Economic Alternatives (BEA) award. This is the 19th year this award has been given to those who exemplify the socially responsible activities closest to the heart of Co-op America's goals of advancing social justice and environmental sustainability. The Co-op America Award is given to an organization, individual, or business whose outstanding work deals with issues covered by the previous year's Co-op America Quarterly, a national magazine with over 75,000 subscribers. The Coal River Mountain Wind Project is receiving the organizational award in recognition of its work to protect Coal River Mountain in southern West Virginia from destructive mining by building a wind farm in the location. Dr. Robert Bullard is an individual recipient of the 2008 BEA award for his lifetime of work as the "father" of the environmental justice movement. To view a press release click HERE. To visit Co-op America's website please click HERE.

8/25/2008 Newsweek Names CAU Scholar One of 13 Environmental Leaders of Century
ATLANTA, GA, -- Newsweek names environmental justice scholar-activist Robert D. Bullard as one of the thirteen “Environmental Leaders of the Century.” Professor Bullard is currently the Edmund Asa Ware Distinguished Professor of Sociology and Director of the Environmental Justice Resource Center at Clark Atlanta University. He is considered by many to be the father of environmental justice and was featured in a July 2007 CNN report People You Should Know, Green Issue is Black and White. For more than three decades, he has served as an expert witness and testified in dozens of hearings and civil rights lawsuits. Professor Bullard is the author of 14 books  that address sustainable development, environmental racism, urban land use, industrial facility siting, community reinvestment, housing, transportation, climate justice, emergency response, smart growth, and regional equity. Among others named to the Newsweek list include researchers, explorers, scientists, activists, conservationists, filmmakers, world leaders, and ordinary citizens who became influential environmental leaders. To view the full article please click HERE.

8/25/2008 Understanding Climate Change: An Equitable Framework by Serena W. Lin for PolicyLink
When the hurricanes hit in 2005, more than 1,500 people died in New Orleans alone. There is no doubt that better disaster management practices will be needed to respond to the impacts of climate change, including increased flooding, drought, wildfires, and stronger hurricanes. The destruction wrought by these storms reveals how the interaction of forces—energy use, environmental degradation, climate change and financial vulnerability—puts low-income communities of color at greatest risk. As the world grapples with other effects of climate change and global warming, the need to understand the embedded issues associated with these complex ecological transformations becomes clear. This report contributes to a deeper understanding of the issues, and considers the equity consequences and implications associated with global warming. To view the report please click HERE (PDF).

8/22/2008 Despite Love Canal's lessons, schoolchildren are still at risk by CNN
Thirty years ago this summer, America learned the name Love Canal. The working-class Niagara Falls neighborhood built atop tons of chemical waste became a synonym for environmental disaster. Troubles at the local elementary school -- and health problems among its students, such as seizure disorders -- were among the first signs of a much larger problem that made news around the world and prompted federal Superfund legislation to clean up the most polluted sites in the United States. Despite the outcry over Love Canal, little has been done to make schoolchildren safer from hazardous or toxic waste. To view the full article please click HERE.

8/7/2008 Minorities Often a Majority of the Population Under 20 By Sam Roberts for the New York Times
Foreshadowing the nation’s changing makeup, one in four American counties have passed or are approaching the tipping point where black, Hispanic and Asian children constitute a majority of the under-20 population, according to analyses of census figures released Thursday. Racial and ethnic minorities now account for 43 percent of Americans under 20. Among people of all ages, minorities make up at least 40 percent of the population in more than one in six of the nation’s 3,141 counties. The latest population changes by race, ethnicity and age, as of July 1, 2007, were generally marginal compared with the year before. But they confirm the breadth of the nation’s diversity, and suggest that minorities — now about a third of the population — might constitute a majority of all Americans even sooner than projected by census demographers, in 2050. In 2000, black, Hispanic and Asian children under age 20 were at or near a majority in only about one-fifth of the counties and, over all, blacks, Hispanics and Asians accounted for 40 percent or more of the population in about one in seven counties. To view the full article please click HERE.

8/2/2008 Into the Wilds of Oakland, Calif.: Young pollution sleuths and community activists fight for healthier air by Anna Kuchment for NEWSWEEK
When Juan Hernandez moved to West Oakland from Bakersfield, Calif., one year ago, his asthma flared up. He used his inhaler more and more often and, eventually, had to give up his favorite sport: running. "I was huffing and puffing, but I thought, It's my own personal problem," says Hernandez, 17. Then, while working on a school assignment, he discovered otherwise. His environmental-law teacher sent Hernandez and his classmates on a "toxic tour" of their neighborhood: they walked around and wrote down what they saw, what they smelled and how they felt. This particular section of West Oakland, which lies in the shadow of a tangled web of four freeways and the Port of Oakland, has the second highest rate of asthma in the city. To view the full article please click HERE.

8/1/2008 10% of U.S. Counties Now 'Majority-Minority' by Population Reference Bureau
Immigration and higher fertility among minorities have put the United States on a path to become "majority-minority," when less than 50 percent of the population will be non-Hispanic white. Racial and ethnic minorities,1 which currently account for one-third of the U.S. population, are projected to reach 50 percent by 2050. But new 2007 estimates from the U.S. Census Bureau show that about 10 percent (302) of the country's 3,141 counties have already passed that mark. Another 218 counties have reached the "tipping point" toward becoming majority-minority in the next few years: Between 40 percent and 50 percent of the population in those counties are minorities. To view the full article please click HERE.

7/29/2008 House Majority Whip: Climate Change Hurts Blacks More: Clyburn says African-Americans 'disproportionately impacted'; study recommends 'fee, tax or allowance auction on polluters.' By Jeff Poor for Business and Media Institute
Climate change is no longer just an environmental issue. It’s now an issue of race, according to global warming activists and policy makers.“It is critical our community be an integral and active part of the debate because African-Americans are disproportionately impacted by the effects of climate change economically, socially and through our health and well-being,” House Majority Whip James Clyburn, D-S.C., said July 29.Clyburn spoke at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., to help launch the Commission to Engage African-Americans on Climate Change, a project of the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies. The launch came on the heels of a separate report by the Environmental Justice and Climate Change Initiative (EJCC), which claims African-Americans are more vulnerable to the effects of climate change. To view the full article please click HERE.

7/29/2008 U.S. blacks face harsher climate change impact By Deborah Zabarenko, Environment Correspondent Reuters
American blacks are likely to suffer disproportionately from climate change and they are willing to pay to combat it, a commission aimed at raising awareness about global warming said on Tuesday."There is a fierce urgency regarding climate change effects on the African-American community," said Ralph Everett, the co-chair of the Commission to Engage African-Americans on Climate Change said. "People need to understand what is at stake -- our very health and well-being."Blacks are more than twice as likely as whites to live in cities where the so-called heat island effect is expected to make temperature increases more severe, the newly formed group said at a briefing.More blacks also will be "fuel poor" as energy demand rises due to higher air-conditioning loads, population growth and urbanization, commission said. To view the full article please click HERE.

7/29/2008 Heavy? Your neighborhood may be to blame: Those built before 1950 help keep you skinnier by encouraging walking by Steve Mitchell for MSNBC
It could be your neighborhood that's making you fat — or keeping you slender. A new study found that the year your neighborhood was built may be just as important as diet and exercise for shedding pounds. Those who live in neighborhoods built before 1950 are trimmer than their counterparts who reside in more modern communities, the study reported. The older neighborhoods also tend to have a variety of stores and businesses located within walking distance, so people wind up traveling by foot to do errands, go to local restaurants or other activities. To view the full article please click HERE.

7/24/2008 Congressional Hearing: A Climate of Change: African Americans, Global Warming, and a Just Climate Policy for the U.S.
A review of the report's (A Climate of Change: African Americans, Global Warming and a Just US Policy) findings by co-authors Robinson and Hoerner, discussion and speeches by Representatives Clarke and Mackey. Hosted by the Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming, The Congressional Black Caucus, and The Congressional Hispanic Caucus Task Force on Health and the Environment. To listen to the testimony please click HERE.

7/24/2008 Global warming more harmful to low-income minorities by Lea Radick for Medill Reports
Blacks are more likely to be hurt by global warming than other Americans, according to a report issued Thursday. The report was authored by the Environmental Justice and Climate Change Initiative, a climate justice advocacy group, and Redefining Progress, a nonprofit policy institute. It detailed various aspects of climate change, such as air pollution and rising temperatures, which it said disproportionately affect blacks, minorities and low-income communities in terms of poor health and economic loss. Heat-related deaths among blacks occur at a 150 to 200 percent greater rate than for non-Hispanic whites, the report said. It also reported that asthma, which has a strong correlation to air pollution, affects blacks at a 36 percent higher rate of incidence than whites. To view the full article please click HERE.

7/11/2008 Black Ohio neighborhood unjustly denied water for decades, jury finds by Eoin O'Carroll for The Christian Science Monitor
A federal jury awarded residents of a mostly black neighborhood in rural Ohio nearly $11 million Thursday, finding that local authorities denied them public water service for half a century because of their race. The plaintiffs, 67 residents of an unincorporated community in near Zanesville, Ohio, known as Coal Run, were awarded damages ranging from $15,000 to $300,000, depending on how long they have lived in the neighborhood. The money covers pain and suffering inflicted on the residents from 1956, when water lines were first laid in the region, to 2003, when the neighborhood finally got public water. During that time, some Coal Run residents trucked in water from elsewhere, as local wells were contaminated with sulfur from abandoned coal mine shafts. Others dug wells anyway. Some collected rain. The US District Court jury found that the city of Zanesville, Muskingum County, and the East Muskingum Water Authority violated state and federal civil rights laws by failing to provide Coal Run residents with access to public water, a service that was provided to white residents in surrounding areas. To view the full article please click HERE.

7/1/2008 Court upholds dump housing payout: Agriculture Street landfill site used by David Hammer for nola.com
It was nearly 15 years coming, but a ruling by the Louisiana Supreme Court handed a legal victory to thousands who sued the city of New Orleans, its public housing authority and its school board for putting their homes and school on a toxic waste dump without warning them. Now a second painstaking process begins as at least 8,000 people who lived or worked atop the closed Agriculture Street landfill wait to collect what could amount to hundreds of millions of dollars in damages. To view the full article please click HERE.

6/30/2008 Public Health and Global Warming Concerns Prevail over Profits: Judge Halts First Coal-Fired Power Plant Proposed in over Twenty Years in Georgia by GreenLaw.com
Fulton County Superior Court Judge Thelma Wyatt Cummings Moore issued a decision today effectively halting construction of the first coal-fired power plant proposed in Georgia in over 20 years. The decision overturns an administrative court’s ruling that affirmed the state Environmental Protection Division’s (EPD) decision to issue an air pollution permit for Dynegy’s Longleaf plant. In practical terms, Dynegy cannot begin construction of the plant unless it can obtain a valid permit from EPD that complies with the Court’s ruling. The Judge held that EPD must limit the amount of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from the plant, a decision that will have far-reaching implications nationwide; this is the first time since the April 2, 2007, Supreme Court decision requiring the Environmental Protection Agency to regulate CO2 that a court has applied that standard to CO2 from an industrial source rather than from motor vehicles. To view the full article please click HERE.

5/29/2008 Shrinking the Carbon Footprint of Metropolitan America by the The Brookings Institution
America’s carbon footprint is expanding. With a growing population and an expanding economy, America’s settlement area is widening, and as it does, Americans are driving more, building more, consuming more energy, and emitting more carbon. Rising energy prices, growing dependence on imported fuels, and accelerating global climate change make the nation’s growth patterns unsustainable. Metropolitan America is poised to play a leadership role in addressing these energy and environmental challenges. However, federal policy actions are needed to achieve the full potential of metropolitan energy and climate solutions. To view the full report please click HERE.

5/29/2008 Feds settle with city over Agriculture Street Landfill site by The Associated Press
The federal government has settled a lawsuit against the city of New Orleans over a contaminated Superfund site that reopened decades ago to burn hurricane debris. A consent decree filed in federal court calls for the city to maintain a synthetic liner and a soil cap over the Agriculture Street Landfill in eastern New Orleans. But the city didn't admit any liability in the case and isn't required to pay for any cleanup costs or civil penalties. To view the full article please click HERE.

5/14/2008 Atlanta's Answer to America's Urban Transit Apartheid by Bruce Dixon for the blackagendareport.com
In response to a multi-year campaign in the state legislature and the Atlanta Journal-Constitution to bring the city's transit agency under the control of the chamber of commerce and suburban counties which contributed no revenue to build the system, Atlanta Jobs With Justice (JWJ) put together the Atlanta Transit Riders Union (ATRU). JWJ-ATRU's organizing effort reached out to the area's unionized transit workers, to the disabled and transit dependent, to the black clergy and to the tens of thousands who use public transit daily. Over the course of several years, JWJ-ATRU has stopped a transit fare increase, and flexed its community organizing muscle to persuade the transit authority to restore bus service to areas it cut. To view the full article please click HERE.

5/11/2008 Beltline Investor Conspires to Raise Rent on AHA Voucher Holders By Matthew Cardinalefor the The Atlanta Progressive News
In a rare admission of intent, a real estate investor in the Beltline area, James Orr, wrote on his blog about how realtors should invest in rental properties in the area, accept vouchers for displaced public housing residents, and then raise rents as property values skyrocket around the Beltline. To view the full article please click HERE.

5/5/2008 Tanzania summit to draw African and African-American leaders By Edith M. Lederer for The Associated Press
More than a thousand prominent African-American leaders, executives, entertainers and activists will head to Tanzania for a summit with their African counterparts to help raise living standards on the world's poorest continent. Organizers said Monday that U.S. participants in next month's summit will include executives from the Coca-Cola Co., General Electric, Chevron Corp. and Procter and Gamble. Civil rights leader Jesse Jackson, comedian Chris Tucker and professional basketball player Kelenna Azubuike also plan to attend. To view the full article please click HERE.

5/3/2008 Small-town residents living on deadly ground by Ronnie Greene for MiamiHerald.com
Residents of Tallevast blame toxins that leaked into the ground and their water supply as a factor in the 80 cancers of family members and neighbors over the years, and they want someone held accountable. The water in this black community tucked between Bradenton and Sarasota is poisoned with cancer-causing chemicals leaked from an old beryllium plant that anchors the neighborhood of 80 homes. The health toll is still being gauged, but the residents have cause to fear the worst. For more than three years, neither the plant's owner nor Florida state regulators who had learned of the leak bothered to tell them. To view the full article please click HERE.

5/1/2008 Environmental Justice through the Eye of Hurricane Katrina by Reilly Morse for the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies
Disaster Preparedness Reports: The Joint Center commissioned a series of reports that examine the fundamental issues that led to different outcomes for Hurricane Katrina survivors tied to their race and ethnicity. This paper analyzes historic patterns of environmental racism found in New Orleans and coastal Mississippi, and makes important recommendations for achievable remedies. It also provides a summation of the
environmental justice movement, highlighting its relevance to ensuring effective disaster preparedness planning for the future. To view the report please click HERE.

4/30/2008 Atlanta: Transit Advocates Unveil Riders’ Vision for Regional Transit By Jonathan Springston for The Atlanta Progressive News
A diverse coalition of transit riders, employees, and other advocates released a new report Tuesday, April 29, 2008, outlining a vision for regional transit in Atlanta from the perspective of riders who depend on transit. The report is a result of two years of research conducted by the Atlanta Transit Riders’ Union (TRU), a group of transit dependent riders affiliated with Atlanta Jobs with Justice, and the Amalgamated Transit Union, Local 732 (ATU). The first section of the report examines existing transit systems, the demographics of transit riders, and transit proposals in Atlanta through the eyes of people without cars. The second section outlines the transit riders’ and workers’ vision of an accessible, affordable, and accountable regional transit system. The areas of study include the ten counties which are also represented on Atlanta’s Transit Planning Board (TPB), which is a governmental effort to plan regional transit in Atlanta: Cherokee, Clayton, Cobb, DeKalb, Douglas, Fayette, Fulton, Gwinnett, Henry, and Rockdale. The report recommends reducing the congestion relief weight and increasing the weight for the measure of mobility and accessibility for all. To view the full article please click HERE. To view the TRU plan click HERE.

4/23/2008 Waste has impact Some say transfer site proposal unjust By Sarah Frier for The Daily Tar Heel
Gertrude Nunn is tired of fighting with her next-door neighbor. When the county landfill moved into her Rogers-Eubanks Road neighborhood in 1972, a dead odor started to soak up the peace of nighttime walks. Buzzards began to feast on the trash and then crowd the tops of houses and power lines. Nunn and other residents in the historically black, low-income neighborhood feel their quality of life has been so altered by the landfill's presence that it constitutes environmental racism. To view the full article please click HERE.

4/23/2008 Poll Finds Deep Concern Among Hispanics by Jim Lobe for IPS
Hispanic voters in the United States show a high degree of awareness and concern about environmental issues, particularly global warming, according to an unprecedented national survey on Latino opinion and the environment released here Wednesday by the Sierra Club. The poll, which was conducted by Bendixen & Associates, found a strong willingness by the largest and fastest-growing ethnic community to take measures to curb energy use and thus reduce greenhouse gas emissions that scientists say contribute to climate change. More than 80 percent of the 1,000 Hispannic voters interviewed in the poll said they recognised that energy usage had a substantial impact on their environment. To view the full article please click HERE.

4/14/2008 Catfish consumption as a contributor to elevated PCB levels in a non-Hispanic black subpopulation by Max Weintrauba, and Linda S. Birnbaumb
This paper is the first to suggest a fish consumption link to racial disparities in PCB exposure at the national level and cites EPA fish data, USGS watershed data, and CDC human body burden data.  It also includes historical data about racial disparities in PCB exposure. the study suggests that catfish consumption may be a significant PCB source for the one million non-Hispanic black anglers who fish for catfish. In comparison to non-Hispanic white anglers, non-Hispanic black anglers consume more catfish, are more likely to eat the whole fish rather than just the fillets that contain less PCBs, and are more likely to fish in watersheds with high PCB contamination. To view the full article please click HERE (Fee Based).

4/13/2008 Sludge Tested As Lead-Poisoning Fix by John Heilprin and Kevin S. Vineys for The Associated Press
Scientists using federal grants spread fertilizer made from human and industrial wastes on yards in poor, black neighborhoods to test whether it might protect children from lead poisoning in the soil. Families were assured the sludge was safe and were never told about any harmful ingredients. Nine low-income families in Baltimore row houses agreed to let researchers till the sewage sludge into their yards and plant new grass. In exchange, they were given food coupons as well as the free lawns as part of a study published in 2005 and funded by the Housing and Urban Development Department. To view the full article please click HERE.

4/10/2008 The Toxic 100: The Top Corporate Air Polluters in the U.S.
The Toxic 100 index identifies the top U.S. air polluters among the world's largest corporations. The index relies on the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's Risk Screening Environmental Indicators (RSEI) project. The starting point for the RSEI is the EPA’s Toxics Release Inventory (TRI), which reports on releases of toxic chemicals at facilities across the United States. To view the report please click HERE.

4/9/2008 The Housing + Transportation Affordability Index
The Housing + Transportation Affordability Index developed by CNT and its collaborative partners, the Center for Transit Oriented Development (CTOD), is an innovative tool that measures the true affordability of housing. Planners, lenders, and most consumers traditionally measure housing affordability as 30 percent or less of income. The Housing + Transportation Affordability Index, in contrast, takes into account not just the cost of housing, but also the intrinsic value of place, as quantified through transportation costs. To use this tool please click HERE.

4/9/2008 Climate Change Brings Health Risks: CDC Official Predicts Health Impacts From Climate Change by H. Josef Hebert for The Associated Press
A top government health official said Wednesday that climate change is expected to have a significant impact on health in the next few decades, with certain regions of the country — and the elderly and children — most vulnerable to increased health problems. Howard Frumkin, a senior official of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, gave a detailed summary on the likely health impacts of global warming at a congressional hearing. But he refrained from giving an opinion on whether carbon dioxide, a leading greenhouse gas, should be regulated as a danger to public health. To view the full article please click HERE.

4/7/2008 Poor left out of environmental loop: Those with low incomes will be most affected by climate change, but often are least informed by Julie A. Varughese for the Times Union
When you're struggling with bills, the last thing on your mind is global warming. Or your carbon footprint. About 14 percent of residents in the Capital Region live in poverty, according to the U.S. Census. In 2007, the poverty threshold was defined by the federal government as a person with an income of just over $10,000 a year. Experts say climate change is going to take a much greater toll on poorer populations who tend to live in locations vulnerable to floods and who are less likely to hear warnings of natural disasters. And while that may not apply directly to the Capital Region, poor living conditions coupled with rising temperatures can also pose problems for residents here. To view the full article please click HERE.

4/7/2008 Judge Spotlights Hazards of Sewage-Based Fertilizer by the Associated Press
It was a farm idea with a big payoff and supposedly no downside: ridding lakes and rivers of raw sewage and industrial pollution by converting it all into a free, nutrient-rich fertilizer. Then last week, a federal judge ordered the Agriculture Department to compensate a farmer whose land was poisoned by sludge from the waste treatment plant here. His cows had died by the hundreds.The Associated Press also has learned that some of the same contaminants showed up in milk that regulators allowed a neighboring dairy farmer to market, even after some officials said they were warned about it. To view the full article please click HERE.

4/2/2008 Dr. King's Legacy Four Decades After His Death in Memphis by Dr. Robert D. Bullard for Black Agenda Report
This April 4th marks the fortieth anniversary of the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in Memphis, Tennessee.   Dr. King was called to Memphis in 1968 on an environmental and economic justice mission involving 1,300 striking sanitary public works employees from Local 1733.  The strike shut down garbage collection, sewer, water and street maintenance. Clearly, the Memphis struggle was much more than a garbage strike.  The "I AM A MAN" signs reflect the larger struggle for human dignity and human rights.  Although Memphis was Dr. King's last campaign, his legacy lives on even to this day. To view the full article please click HERE.

4/2/2008 The Audacity of Corporate New Orleans; Name Change an insult to memory of Mayor Ernest N. Morial by Vincent Sylvain, The New Orleans Agenda
Last year when I received word that officials at the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center were considering changing the name its name I was assured by the communication department that my information was incorrect and was assured that no such discussions were being entertained. To my disbelief it was announced this week that the "Convention Center has been renamed in promotional and advertising material in an attempt to better market it in an increasingly competitive environment center will now be called the New Orleans Morial Convention Center in brochures, pamphlets and on the uniforms and badges of employees, among other places." To view the full article please click HERE.

4/1/2008 Jobs Trails by Kelly Virella for the Chicago Reporter
The greatest job growth in the six-county Chicago region in the last 16 years occurred predominantly in municipalities with the lowest black population, according to The Chicago Reporter’s analysis of payroll data from the Illinois Department of Employment Security. Of the 97 of 139 municipalities that experienced job growth in the Chicago region between 1991 and 2007, only five were more than 30 percent black in 2007. Those cities are South Holland, Calumet City, Broadview, Forest Park and North Chicago. Of the 42 cities that experienced job loss during the same time period, nine—more than 20 percent—were more than 30 percent black. To view the full article please click HERE.

3/29/2008 EPA drops ball on danger of chemicals to children Agency oversight panel out of money and, critics say, beholden to industry By Susanne Rust and Meg Kissinger
The Environmental Protection Agency is supposed to evaluate compounds in products such as flame retardants in mattresses and car seats to see if they are especially harmful to children. But it doesn't. The EPA's Voluntary Children's Chemical Evaluation Program, which relies on companies to provide information about the dangers of the chemicals they produce, is all but dead. Funding ran out last August. Committees haven't met in nearly a year. Key members of the program can't even say if it is still alive. The EPA's own advisory committee blasted the pilot program as severely flawed and has called for a total overhaul. Still, EPA administrators call the program a priority and routinely cite it as proof that the government is answering concerns about kids being exposed to potentially dangerous household chemicals. To view the full article please click HERE.

3/27/2008 Contaminated homes denied funds by David Hammer, The Times-Picayune
It was one thing for Leatrice Roberts to find out that the government had sold her a townhome built on top of a waste dump. But it was mindboggling to learn, at age 74, that the Road Home can't buy her out because the land is contaminated. The state's $10.3 billion Road Home program pays homeowners up to $150,000 to rebuild their homes or to buy them out and transfer the land to a New Orleans redevelopment authority. Financing for the program comes from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, which currently runs HANO -- the same agency that decades ago built the Press Park complex where the Robertses' storm-damaged townhome is located. In the past two weeks, state officials informed homeowners such as Leatrice Roberts who lived atop the old Agriculture Street landfill before Hurricane Katrina hit that their Road Home applications had been placed on hold indefinitely because they live on a Superfund cleanup site. To view the full article please click HERE.

3/25/2008 Dr. King's Legacy Four Decades After His Death in Memphis: Growing Just and Green Black Communities by Robert Bullard for OpEdNews
This April 4th marks the fortieth anniversary of the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in Memphis, Tennessee.   Dr. King was called to Memphis in 1968 on an environmental and economic justice mission involving 1,300 striking sanitary public works employees from Local 1733.  The strike shut down garbage collection, sewer, water and street maintenance. Clearly, the Memphis struggle was much more than a garbage strike.  The "I AM A MAN" signs reflect the larger struggle for human dignity and human rights.  Although Memphis was Dr. King's last campaign, his legacy lives on even to this day.  To view the full article please click HERE.

3/13/2008 EPA Sets New Ozone Standards Short of Protecting the Most Vulnerable Populations
The EPA's new smog limit is 75 parts per billion of ozone, down from the current level of 80.  Because of rounding, the old standard was effectively 84 parts per billion. The EPA failed to head the advice of its independent science advisory panel who unanimously had said the standard should be no higher than 70 parts per billion. In a March 2007 letter to the EPA, panelists said there is "overwhelming scientific evidence" for a reduction of that magnitude. Click HERE for full story. 

3/11/2008 RIGHTS-US: U.N. Panel Finds Two-Tier Society by Haider Rizvi for IPS (Inter Press Service)
The United States government is drawing fire from international legal experts for its treatment of American Indians, Blacks, Latinos and other racial minorities. The U.S. is failing to meet international standards on racial equality, according to the U.N. Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) based in Geneva, Switzerland. Last Friday, after considering the U.S. government's written and oral testimony, the 18- member committee said it has found "stark racial disparities" in the U.S. institutions, including its criminal justice system. The CERD is responsible for monitoring global compliance with the 1969 Convention on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, an international treaty that has been ratified by the United States. In concluding the CERD report on the U.S. record, the panel of experts called for the George W. Bush administration to take effective actions to end racist practices against minorities in the areas of criminal justice, housing, healthcare and education. Click HERE for full story.

3/10/2008 Water Contamination Suit Filed Against Dickson County, Tennessee by ENS
The Natural Resources Defense Council and two residents of Dickson, Tennessee have filed a lawsuit against the Dickson County and city governments. They allege that trichloroethylene, TCE, an industrial chemical disposed at the Dickson Landfill that has been linked to neurological and developmental harm and cancer, poses an imminent and substantial endangerment to human health and the environment. Dickson, a town of some 12,000 people is located about 35 miles west of Nashville. The Dickson County Landfill, 74 acres off Eno Road, sits within 500 to 2,000 feet of approximately 40 homes, most owned by blacks. Click HERE for full story.

3/4/2008 Local Citizens, Conservation Group File Suit Seeking Cleanup of Alleged Water Contamination in Dickson County, Tennessee
The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) and two residents of Dickson, Tennessee, Sheila Holt-Orsted and Beatrice Holt, today filed a lawsuit against the Dickson County and City governments. The Complaint alleges that trichloroethylene (TCE), an industrial chemical disposed at the Dickson Landfill that has been linked to neurological and developmental harm and cancer, poses an imminent and substantial endangerment to human health and the environment. Click HERE for full story.

2/20/2008 Groups vow to fight carbon emissions cap-and-trade plan by Margot Roosevelt for the Los Angeles Times
Low-income community groups in five California cities launched a statewide campaign Tuesday to "fight at every turn" any global-warming regulation that allows industries to trade carbon emissions, saying it would amount to "gambling on public health." The 21-point "Environmental Justice Movement Declaration" challenges the stance of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, a national advocate of a cap-and-trade program that would allow heavy polluters, often located in poor neighborhoods, to partly buy their way out of lowering their emissions. The defiant tone of news conferences in Los Angeles, Fresno, Oakland, Sacramento and San Diego indicated that political turbulence might be ahead as the state Air Resources Board hammers out a strategy to drastically reduce greenhouse gas emissions, as required under a 2006 law. To view the full article please click HERE.

2/18/2008 Rich, Poor and Climate Change by Rachel Oliver for CNN
The general dialogue on adapting to a world affected by climate change by definition excludes the world's poorest people. And yet it's the world's poorest who are often put forward as the ones who are likely to feel the affects of climate change the most and are likely to be able to deal with them the least. Around half of the world's population -- slightly fewer than 3 billion people -- survives on less than $2 a day. None of them are likely to go shopping for an automobile any time soon in a bid to reduce on their greenhouse gas emissions; and investing in photo voltaic solar panels to put on their rooftops probably won't be a priority, either. To view the full article please click HERE.

2/13/2008 Seeing Green under a Different Light: The National Conference of Black Mayors oppose stricter clean air standards by Marcia A. Wade for BlackEnterprise.com
Evironmentalists claim that the National Conference of Black Mayors is trading the health of their residents for job creation because the NCBM does not support an increase in the Environmental Protection Agency's Clean Air Act standards. However, George L. Grace, mayor of St Gabriel, Louisiana, and president of the NCBM, contends that "poverty causes bad health also." Others disagree. "It is an illegitimate argument to even say that strengthening the Clean Air Act, protecting people’s health, and coming into compliance [with NAAQS] will hurt the economy and black people," cautions Robert D. Bullard, director of the Environmental Justice Resource Center at Clark Atlanta University. To view the full article please click HERE.

2/13/2008 Metro Detroit area had highest foreclosure rates in 2007 by Alex Veiga for the Associated Press
The Detroit area, hit hard by the double-whammy of unemployment and a slumping housing market, had the highest foreclosure rate in the nation last year, with several cities in California ranked close behind, an analysis of foreclosure activity in the country's largest 100 metropolitan areas shows. Some 4.9 percent of the households in the Detroit metro area were in some stage of foreclosure in 2007 -- 4.8 times the national average, according to the study being released Wednesday by mortgage research company RealtyTrac Inc. To view the full article please click HERE.

1/29/2008 Convention on the Elimination of all Forms Racial Discrimination (CERD) Shadow Report 2008 by the Human Rights Network
The International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, also known as ICERD, or more commonly, CERD, is an international treaty designed to protect individuals from discrimination based on race, whether that discrimination is intentional, or is the result of seemingly neutral policies. Now that the government report is submitted, groups will have an opportunity to submit their own "shadow" reports highlighting issues the U.S. fails to cover or providing additional information.Groups will be coordinating their submission to prevent excessive duplication of issues, and to enable pooling of resources between groups with more and less experience in the process. To view the full report please click HERE.

1/29/2008 Clinton Offers Broad Plan To Boost EPA's Environmental Justice Focus by the Risk Policy Report, InsideEPA.com
Sen. Hillary Clinton  (D-NY) has introduced sweeping new legislation to boost EPA and other federal agencies, environmental justice (EJ) policies -- an issue that has been drawing attention at the agency as it moves to identify risk assessment tools and practices that will improve its ability to protect public health and the environment in minority and poor communities. The legislation, endorsed by Rep. Hilda Solis (D-CA), a prominent House Democratic leader on EJ and civil rights issues, and several environmental justice groups, comes amidst a heated Democratic primary campaign where Clinton has clashed with her main Democratic rival, Sen. Barack Obama  (IL), over the candidates' records on race and civil rights. To view the full article please click HERE. (Subscription Required)

1/29/2007 Probe: FEMA sugarcoated danger of hurricane trailers by CNN.com
The Federal Emergency Management Agency manipulated scientific research to play down the danger posed by formaldehyde in trailers issued to hurricane victims, according to an investigation by congressional Democrats. Democrats on a House Science and Technology subcommittee wrote the letter to Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff. FEMA is part of the Homeland Security Department. In a separate letter, lawmakers said the federal health agency that provided guidance to FEMA was "complicit in giving FEMA precisely what they wanted." Victims living in FEMA trailers have complained of health problems related to formaldehyde, but initial FEMA tests revealed the air quality in the trailers was safe if those trailers were properly ventilated. To view the full article please click HERE.

1/25/2008 Environmental pollution and diabetes may be linked: Scientists call for more research into neglected area by the University of Cambridge
Cambridge scientists are advocating additional research into the little understood links between environmental pollution and type 2 diabetes. In the most recent edition of the Lancet, Drs. Oliver Jones and Julian Griffin highlight the need to research the possible link between persistent organic pollutants (POPs, a group which includes many pesticides) and insulin resistance, which can lead to adult onset diabetes. In their commentary, Dr Jones and Dr. Griffin cite peer reviewed research including that of Dr D Lee, et al, which demonstrated a very strong relationship between the levels of POPs in blood, particularly organochlorine compounds, and the risk of type 2 diabetes. To view the full article please click HERE.

1/24/2008 Clinton, Solis Introduce Legislation to Address Unfair Impact of Pollution on Minority Neighborhoods by MetroLatinoUSA.com
Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-NY) and Congresswoman Hilda L. Solis (D-CA) announced the introduction of the Environmental Justice Renewal Act. The legislation championed by Senator Clinton and Congresswoman Solis will increase the federal government’s efforts in addressing the disproportionate impact of environmental pollution upon racial and ethnic minority and low-income populations. The Environmental Justice Renewal Act will address the inaction of the Bush Administration on environmental justice issues by strengthening the federal infrastructure to address environmental justice and codifying the National Environmental Justice Advisory Council. It will expand existing grant programs and create new grant opportunities to help community-based groups and states address environmental justice, and will require the EPA to engage in additional outreach at the community level, and create the position of Environmental Justice Ombudsman to investigate the agency’s handling of environmental justice complaints. To view the full article please click HERE.

1/23/2008 U.S. given poor marks on the environment by Felicity Barringer for the New York Times
A new international ranking of environmental performance puts the United States at the bottom of the Group of 8 industrialized nations and 39th among the 149 countries on the list. European nations dominate the top places in the ranking, which evaluates sanitation, greenhouse gas emissions, agricultural policies, air pollution, and 20 other measures to formulate an overall score, with 100 the best possible. The top 10 countries, with scores of 87 or better, were led by Switzerland, Sweden, Norway, and Finland. The others at the top were Austria, France, Latvia, Costa Rica, Colombia, and New Zealand, the leader in the 2006 version of the analysis, which is conducted by researchers at Yale and Columbia universities. To view the full article please click HERE.

1/21/2008 MLK and the struggle for environmental justice by Nuisance Industry for the Daily Kos
As we celebrate the birthday of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and consider the effects Dr. King's work have had on the United States, I want to highlight an often overlooked aspect of that work, how Martin Luther King and the civil rights struggle have influenced American notions of environmental health and justice. To view the full article please click HERE.

1/18/2008 FEMA Flip-Flops Again on Trailers by Marc Kaufman for the Washington Post
Those trailers the Federal Emergency Management Agency bought to house Hurricane Katrina victims were at the center of the storm again yesterday -- and not in a way that's going to make folks at the beleaguered agency any happier. FEMA hurriedly bought the 145,000 trailers and mobile homes via no-bid contracts just before and after Katrina hit the coast in August 2005. But the purchase quickly became problematic, with some communities refusing them for a variety of reasons. FEMA was forced to put trailers on the market, selling them to anyone for 40 cents on the dollar. Yesterday, however, the emergency agency offered to buy them back, for their original purchase price, because of concerns that the trailers are tainted with formaldehyde. The agency said it is making the offer because of concerns about "possible adverse health effects" associated with the trailers. To view the full article please click HERE.

1/17/2008 Webcast of the Smithsonian 23rd Annual Martin Luther King, Jr. Observance Presenting Dr. Robert Bullard
Dr. Bullard will be speaking on the topic “Growing Smarter: Achieving Livable Communities and Environmental Justice Twenty-Five Years after Warren County.” Dr. Bullard is the author of numerous books and publications that address sustainable development, environmental racism, urban land use, industrial facility siting, community reinvestment, housing, transportation, climate justice, emergency response, smart growth, and regional equity. To view the Webcast please click HERE.

1/8/2008 Diversity Conversation: Dr. Robert Bullard, The Grand Rapids Community College
GRCC Behavioral Science professor Dr. Michael Vargo interviews founder of the Environmental Justice Resource Center, Clark Atlanta University, Dr. Robert D. Bullard. To view the Webcast please click HERE.

1/3/2008 BOOK: Research in Social Problems and Public Policy, Equity and the Environment, edited by Robert C. Wilkinson and William R. Freudenburg
Over the past decade, a growing body of research has shown that equity issues need to receive greater attention in academia -- not just among activists, and not just as the focus of courses on environmental ethics, but as topics that deserve careful academic study and that in many ways are at the core of what we call "environmental" problems. This volume brings together the leading research on equity and the environment and includes contributions from leading academics and researchers in the field. As environmental justice scholar Robert D. Bullard has said over the years, “we are not likely to achieve a sustainable world without addressing issues of equity and justice.”  Clearly, equity and inequality deserve to be absolutely central to the study of connections between humans and the habitat that we share with all other life on earth. Research in Social Problems and Public Policy full-text online at ScienceDirect.

1/1/2008 Talking Environmental Justice, with Dr. Robert D. Bullard feature on Waterkeeper Magazine Volume 4 Number 3, Winter 2008
Dr. Robert Bullard, a principle author of Toxic Waste and Race in the United States the seminal 1987 report on environmental justice, recently testified at the first ever Senate hearing on Environment Justice is interviewed in the winter issue of Waterkeeper magazine. To view the interview please click HERE.

12/12/2007 FEMA to start testing air quality in trailers by Dec. 19 by Associated Press
Air-quality tests on the government-issued trailers housing thousands of Gulf Coast hurricane victims are scheduled to begin by next Wednesday, nearly two months after the Federal Emergency Management Agency postponed them. Harvey Johnson, FEMA's deputy administrator, disclosed the agency's latest plans for the tests during a hearing Wednesday in Washington before the Senate Homeland Security Committee. Senators pressed Johnson to explain the delays in testing 500 occupied trailers in Mississippi and Louisiana, where tens of thousands of homes were damaged or destroyed by Hurricane Katrina in August 2005. To view the full article please click HERE.

12/6/2007 House Passes Solis’ Green Jobs Act as Part of Comprehensive Energy Reform Bill
The U.S. House of Representatives passed The Green Jobs Act of 2007, legislation introduced by Congresswoman Hilda L. Solis (CA-32) to train workers for “green” collar jobs – such as energy efficiency retrofit and service, green building construction, and solar panel installation. The bill was passed as part of H.R. 6, the Energy Independence and Security Act, historic energy reform legislation which will put the United States on a path toward energy independence. To view the full article please click HERE.

11/29/2007 For landfill’s neighbors, 35 years is enough By Taylor Sisk for The Carrboro Citizen
To a young Neloa Jones, it was simply “the homeplace.” Jones grew up mostly in Maryland, but would come down once or more a year, back in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s, to visit with family – the Rogers, the Barbees, the Wests and others – families with deep and rich heritages in this community to the north of Chapel Hill. It was from her grandmother, Velcie Rogers Barbee, that Jones first heard the community, once a township, referred to as the homeplace. Today Jones is a resident of that neighborhood – most commonly referred to as the Rogers Road community – and a spokesperson for the Rogers-Eubanks Coalition to End Environmental Racism, an organization working to keep a solid-waste facility out of the community and to gain enhancements in return for having housed landfill facilities for the past 35 years. To view the full article please click HERE.

11/28/2007 Attorney General Andrew M. Cuomo Sues EPA for Denying the Public Access to Information Toxic Chemicals in their Neighborhoods: Cuomo Leads Coalition of 12 States to Overturn EPA’s New Restrictions
Attorney General Andrew M. Cuomo today announced that New York and eleven other states are suing the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) over new regulations denying the public access to information about toxic chemicals in their communities. The EPA will allow thousands of companies to avoid disclosing information to the public about the toxic chemicals they use, store, and release into the environment by rolling back chemical reporting requirements. The suit seeks to overturn the weakened reporting requirements and provide the public with the access they had in the past. To view the full article please click HERE.

11/15/2007 Patterns emerge on race and environment: National studies and federal action cause changes in how environmental justice issues are determined and addressed By Taylor Sisk for The Carrboro Citizen
On Nov. 5, the Orange County Board of Commissioners announced they were reopening the site search for a solid-waste transfer station. The commissioners had voted unanimously last April to place the station on Rogers Road. While this was but one of the demands made by the Rogers-Eubanks Coalition to End Environmental Racism, the decision to reopen the search was, for the community, an essential step forward. This community alleges it has suffered the effects of public-policy decisions that reflect what Robert Bullard, director of the Environmental Justice Resource Center at Clark Atlanta University, calls a “pattern” of environmental racism in underserved communities. Undeniably, though, significant strides have been made in 25 years of environmental justice organization and action to turn back this pattern. As a result, the Rogers-Eubanks community proceeds today on firmer ground. To view the full article please click HERE.

11/13/2007 Economic Ladder Shaky for African Americans by Ali Gharib for IPS
Black families in the United States lag significantly behind whites in economic mobility over the past 35 years, says a report by the Pew Charitable Trusts released Tuesday. The report, titled "Black and White Families", is one of three parts of a study on the state of generational mobility since 1968, when the project began to follow over 2,300 participants, interviewing them and their descendants about their economic standing up until the early 2000s. "The report calls into question whether the American Dream is a reality for black and white families alike," said a summary of the findings. "In every income group, blacks are less likely than whites to surpass their parents' family income and more likely to fall down the economic ladder." Alarmingly, nearly 70 percent of blacks whose parents were in the middle fifth of incomes fell into the lower two income groups. Only 40 percent of white adult children showed a drop in the same circumstances. To view the full article please click HERE.

11/8/07 The Effects of Climate-Change Policies on the Federal Budget and the Budgets of Low-Income Households: An Economic Analysis by Chad Stone and Matt Fiedler for Center on Budget and Policy Priorities
Effective measures to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions can be compatible with sound budgeting and the fair treatment of low-income consumers. Designing a policy that meets these objectives requires, however, that lawmakers be mindful not just of the environmental consequences of their actions but of the budgetary and distributional implications as well. Restrictions on greenhouse-gas emissions, whether achieved through a “cap-and-trade” system that directly limits annual emissions or a carbon tax, are necessary to avoid unacceptable economic and environmental costs from global climate change. These policies end the free disposal of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere at the lowest possible cost by providing market signals encouraging energy efficiency and the development of clean alternatives to fossil fuel. At the same time, however, they raise the price of energy and energy-related products and services. Households with limited incomes will be affected the most by those higher prices, since they spend a larger share of their incomes on energy-related products and services than more affluent households do. To view the full article please click HERE.

11/8/2007 The grassroots of environmental justice By Taylor Sisk for The Carrboro Citizen
Robert Bullard is the Ware Distinguished Professor of Sociology and director of the Environmental Justice Resource Center at Clark Atlanta University and is often called “the father of the environmental justice movement.” His book Dumping in Dixie: Race, Class and Environmental Quality, published in 1990, is considered by many observers of environmental justice to be a seminal work. In October, Bullard attended the North Carolina Environmental Justice Summit, hosted by the North Carolina Environmental Justice Network, in Franklin County, where he met Rev. Robert Campbell, a member of the Rogers-Eubanks Coalition to End Environmental Racism and a longtime leader in the Rogers Road community. Bullard says that in talking with Rev. Campbell and in listening to him speak at the summit, what he heard was a story that’s all too familiar - another chapter in an extended narrative of the treatment of underserved and inadequately represented communities. To view the full article please click HERE.

11/1/2007 Toxins Threaten to Uproot Entire Town By Mark Weisenmiller for IPS
The quiet village of Tallevast in Florida's Manatee County traces its roots back to the 1890s, when a community of shacks was built there for African-American labourers who worked tapping sap from the local pine forests to make turpentine and grew sugarcane, celery and strawberries in the fields. Today, Tallevast is home to about 250 people, many of them descendants of the former slaves who founded the town. But those families now face a bitter choice. For 25 years, from 1961 to 1996, the American Beryllium Company ran a plant in Tallevast that made parts for nuclear reactors and weapons. Because beryllium has a low density and is stronger than steel, the metallic chemical compound is often used by aerospace industry companies. With the end of the Cold War, the need to produce such materials subsided and the plant was closed in 1996. To view the full article please click HERE.

10/25/2007 Letter to President Bush Demanding Truth About Climate Change
Congresswoman Hilda L. Solis, Chairwoman of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Task Force on Health and the Environment, along with Rep. Joe Baca, Chairman of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus send a letter to President Bush expressing concern regarding allegations that the White House officials heavily edited testimony provided by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention about the impact of climate change on public health. Click HERE to read the letter.

10/19/2007 Environmental Justice for All by Tracy Fernandez Rysavy for Co-op America Quarterly Fall 2007
What happens to our country's garbage isn't only an environmental issue. It's a human rights and health issue, too. And for some communities-particularly working class communities of color-it's also a life or death matter. Across the US-from the South Bronx, an area riddled with waste treatment facilities and incinerators; to Chicago's "toxic donut" of clustered hazardous waste landfills; to Louisiana's "Cancer Alley," where oil refineries and chemical plants pump foul air over the Mississippi shoreline-communities of color are bearing the toxic burdens of our industrial way of life. Neighborhoods near toxic facilities often suffer debilitating health effects from the harmful chemicals released by these facilities-chemicals often linked to birth defects, hormone disruption, diabetes, heart disease, and cancer. To view the full article please click HERE. (PDF)

10/18/2007 Martin Luther King III Discussed Impact of Climate, Oil Dependence on “Vulnerable Communities”
Many of the world’s poorest communities are also the ones most in danger from these twin challenges. Whether it is geographic location in low-lying areas, or rough economic conditions made even worse by unstable or high energy prices, or the severe health effects of a warming earth, global warming and oil dependence hit these communities hard. Witnesses discussed these challenges, as well as the solutions available to these problems. For more information please click HERE.

10/4/2007 Testimony by John B. Stephenson, Before the Subcommittee on Environment and Hazardous Materials, Committee on Energy and Commerce, House of Representatives
According to John B. Stephenson, Director Natural Resources and Environment, EPA's recent rule could reduce availability of toxic chemical information used to assess environmental justice. Also, EPA initially disagreed with
GAO's July 2005 environmental justice recommendations, saying it was already paying appropriate attention to the issue. GAO called on EPA to improve the way it addresses environmental justice in its economic reviews and to better
explain its rationale by providing data to support the agency's decisions. A year later, EPA responded more positively to the recommendations and committed to a number of actions. However, based on information that EPA has subsequently provided, GAO concluded in a July 2007 testimony that EPA's actions to date were incomplete and that measurable benchmarks were needed to hold agency officials accountable for achieving environmental justice goals. To view the full report, please click HERE. (PDF)

10/3/2007 The environmental justice braintrust: A dispatch from the Congressional Black Caucus conference by Lauren Trevisan for Grist.com
Appropriately, the theme of this year's 37th annual Congressional Black Caucus Legislative Conference in Washington, D.C., was "Unleashing Our Power." For the first time in history, the U.S. House of Representatives has four African-Americans serving as chairpersons of major committees. In addition, 17 African-Americans lead major subcommittees, and Rep. James Clyburn of South Carolina is the House Majority Whip. Activists and health experts hope that this change in leadership will help enact serious environmental justice legislation to promote safe and healthy communities. To view the full article please click HERE.

10/1/2007 Standing on Principle: The Global Push for Environmental Justice by Luz Claudio in Environmental Health Perspectives Volume 115, Number 10.
Climate change, acid rain, depletion of the ozone layer, species extinction-all of these issues point to one thing: environmental health is a global issue that concerns all nations of the world. Now add environmental justice to the list. From South Bronx to Soweto, from Penang to El Paso, communities all over the world are finding commonality in their experiences and goals in seeking environmental justice. To view the full article please click HERE.

9/19/2007 Black Mayors’ Judgment Clouded by Smog: The Air is Tough to Breathe by Robert Bullard for blackagendareport.com
Environmental racism has moved to the forefront of African American concerns, but some Black mayors have crawled into bed with the polluters. Desperate to get job-creating industry into their communities at any environmental cost, these city executives throw health issues to the winds, their minds clouded by dreams of "economic development." Sadly, the National Conference of Black Mayors' executive director is urging federal officials not to raise standards of allowable air pollution, in fear of chasing away investment in their cities. The result: the populations of Black-led cities will literally choke on the chimera of growth. To view the full article please click HERE.

9/18/2007 2007 Annual Urban Mobility Report released by the Texas Transportation Institute at Texas A&M University
The 2007 mobility report notes that congestion causes the average peak period traveler to spend an extra 38 hours of travel time and consume an additional 26 gallons of fuel, amounting to a cost of $710 per traveler. Along with expanding the estimates of the effect of congestion to all 437 U.S. urban areas, the study provides detailed information for 85 specific urban areas. The report also focuses on the problems presented by "irregular events"—crashes, stalled vehicles, work zones, weather problems and special events—that cause unreliable travel times and contribute significantly to the overall congestion problem. To view the full article please click HERE.

9/9/2007 The world's a dirty place when you are poor by Diane Roberts for the Special to the St. Petersburg Times
One of our persistent national fantasies - right up there with having God's permission to do pretty much anything we want - is that America has no class system. We tell ourselves we're not like stratified, calcified Europe. Here it doesn't matter if you went to school at Andover or Dixie County High; if you drink chateau-bottled Burgundy or Schlitz; if you live behind a gate or behind the landfill. In America, we are all equal. To view the full article please click HERE.

9/7/2007 Environmental brigade takes 'toxic tour': Newtown shows off city's southside by Debbie Gilbert for the The Times-Gainesville
Even as the fumes of a landfill fire still lingered in parts of Hall County Thursday, a group of environmentalists came to Gainesville to study air pollution from a historical perspective. The San Francisco-based National Bucket Brigade, which trains volunteers to collect air samples in their neighborhoods, is holding its annual conference in Atlanta Saturday. Some of the participants arrived early and took a bus to Gainesville to go on a "toxic tour" with the Newtown Florist Club. To view the full article please click HERE.

9/6/2007 EPA smog proposal sparks debate over environmental justice by Daniel Cusick for Greenwire
A rift between black mayors and public health experts over long-held notions about the racial dimension of environmental problems took center stage yesterday at a hearing here on a U.S. EPA proposal for tightening air pollution standards for ground-level ozone. Experts on public health in minority communities argued at the Atlanta Federal Center that poor air quality takes a disproportionate toll on blacks, and urged EPA to tighten the standard. But the National Conference of Black Mayors — representing more than 600 officials — strongly endorsed continuation of the current standard, set in 1997, which limits ozone concentrations to 80 parts per billion over an 8-hour period. To view the full article please click HERE.

9/4/2007 EPA Urged to Strengthen Ozone Standards to Protect the Most Vulnerable by Robert D. Bullard
Air pollution threatens the health of millions of Americans, especially those who live in urban areas. EPA's current ozone standard is not adequate to protect human health. The agency should come clean and set tougher new ozone standards at the lowest level to protect the most vulnerable in our society, including children and the elderly. To view the full article please click HERE.

8/9/2007 Whites Now Minority in 1 in 10 Counties: Diversity Straining Race Relations by Stephen Ohlemacher for The Associated Press
Whites are now in the minority in nearly one in 10 U.S. counties. And that increased diversity, fueled by immigration and higher birth rates among blacks and Hispanics, is straining race relations and sparking a backlash against immigrants in many communities. As of 2006, non-Hispanic whites made up less than half the population in 303 of the nation's 3,141 counties, according to figures the Census Bureau is releasing Thursday. Non-Hispanic whites were a minority in 262 counties in 2000, up from 183 in 1990. To view the full article please click HERE.

8/2/2007 HBCU Experts Call on Congress to Assist Minority Communities Near Toxic Waste Sites by Charles Dervarics
Experts from two Black colleges are calling on Congress to help low-income, minority communities, which are disproportionately more likely than other communities to live near toxic waste sites with health hazards for children and families. The House and Senate should hold hearings, clarify legal mandates and adopt new regulations to promote environmental justice, the witnesses told a Senate subcommittee in late July. To view the full article please click HERE.

8/2/2007 FEMA Suspends Use of Disaster Trailers by The Associated Press
The Federal Emergency Management Agency has stopped donating and selling disaster trailers while it studies reports that people living in them after hurricanes Katrina and Rita got sick from formaldehyde exposure. Federal health scientists are in Louisiana and Mississippi investigating the safety of the travel trailers being used by hurricane victims, FEMA officials said. The scientists have been asked to identify an acceptable air quality level for formaldehyde, which is commonly used in building materials but can cause respiratory problems in high doses or with prolonged exposure.

8/1/2007 American Lung Association Releases State of Lung Disease in Diverse Communities: 2007
The American Lung Association is well aware of the health disparities among racially and ethnically distinct communities and has created the American Lung Association State of Lung Disease in Diverse Communities: 2007 as a resource to those who have been affected by asthma, lung cancer, SIDS, RSV and other lung diseases. The report provides members of these communities with much needed health information that can be used in the fight against lung disease and risk factors that cause or contribute to lung disease. It provides statistics, background material and ongoing research about important lung health issues such as asthma, smoking and clean air as they relate to racially and ethnically diverse communities.

7/30/2007 An Open Letter to the Members of Congress: Toxic Wastes and Race at Twenty
An Open Letter to the Members of Congress. Signed July 20, 2007. More than one hundred environmental justice networks, civil rights and human rights, faith based, and health allies, representing millions of Americans, call on Congressional leaders to address environmental and health disparities in low-income and people of color communities.

7/29/2007 In minority neighborhood, kids' risk of cancer soars by Howard Witt for The Chicago Tribune
Like so many of their poor and working-class Hispanic neighbors, Rosario Marroquin's family settled in the southeast Houston neighborhood of Manchester a generation ago because the clapboard houses were cheap, the streets were safe, transportation was convenient and downtown was only 20 minutes away. It was an ideal neighborhood, except for the coughing spells, the nosebleeds, the burning odors and the acrid smoke. To view the full article please click HERE.

7/28/2007 WHO Says Environmental Hazards Kill Millions of Children
This Reuters article explores a study from the World Health Organization (WHO) released last week that concluded that four million children under the age of five die every year from environmental hazards. Polluted air or water and exposure to chemicals are to blame for this, and poisoning, acute respiratory illness, diarrhea diseases, and malaria account for most of the deaths.

7/17/2007 Bullard: Green issue is black and white by CNN
As he surveys the nation's landfills, chemical plants, waste facilities, and smelters, Robert Bullard sees an insidious form of institutional racism.Widely acknowledged as a pioneer in environmental justice, Bullard has worked in the field since 1978. He is the author of several books on the topic, including "Confronting Environmental Racism," "Dumping on Dixie" and "Unequal Protection." In his nearly two decades of work in the field, Bullard said little has changed. To view the full article please click HERE.

7/8/2007 Research Links Lead Exposure, Criminal Activity: Data May Undermine Giuliani's Claims by Shankar Vedantam for the Washington Post
Rudy Giuliani never misses an opportunity to remind people about his track record in fighting crime as mayor of New York City from 1994 to 2001. Although crime did fall dramatically in New York during Giuliani's tenure, a broad range of scientific research has emerged in recent years to show that the mayor deserves only a fraction of the credit that he claims. The most compelling information has come from an economist in Fairfax who has argued in a series of little-noticed papers that the "New York miracle" was caused by local and federal efforts decades earlier to reduce lead poisoning.

7/1/2007 NAACP Crisis Magazine Publishes Special EJ Issue
The NAACP’s Crisis Magazine devoted its July/August 2007 issue to “The Fight for Environmental Justice.” In spite of governmental protective laws, people of color bear the health burden of toxic soil, polluted water and air that is foul and contaminated. To view the special issue, click HERE.

6/27/2007 Implicit Bias Among Physicians and Its Prediction of Thrombolysis Decisions for Black and White Patients
This study represents the first evidence of unconscious (implicit) race bias among physicians, its dissociation from conscious (explicit) bias, and its predictive validity. Results suggest that physicians’ unconscious biases may contribute to racial/ethnic disparities in use of medical procedures such as thrombolysis for myocardial infarction.

6/27/2007 Citgo Found Guilty of Clean Air Act Violations by Brett Clanton for The Houston Chronicle
Citgo Petroleum Corp. was found guilty in federal court today of operating two open-air storage tanks at a Corpus Christi refinery without proper emission controls. But it avoided a guilty verdict on charges that it knowlingly violated federal air-quality laws by releasing illegal levels of benzene, which research has linked to cancer. To view the full article please click HERE.

6/21/2007 Army Ceases VX Wastewater Shipments Until Hearing
The U.S. Army has agreed to stop shipping VX nerve gas wastewater to Port Arthur, Texas, until a federal judge is able to hear the case. In May, environmental groups joined forces with a Port Arthur organization to file a lawsuit in U.S. District Court of the Southern District of Indiana against Veolia Environmental Services and the U.S. Department of the Army in protest of the incineration of wastewater from neutralized VX gas being performed at a Port Arthur facility.

6/20/2007 Regionalism: Growing Together to Expand Opportunity to All
The President’s Council—an organization of leaders from some of the largest African American-owned and operated businesses in the Cleveland area—commissioned the African American Forum on Race and Regionalism (AAFRR) to explore how regional equity policies could strengthen both Greater Cleveland’s black community as well as the health of the entire region. Two years in the making, the report, Regionalism: Growing Together to Expand Opportunity to All, shows how and why equity must be seen as a cornerstone—not a stumbling block—in regional planning. By uniting communities with opportunity—through better education, transportation, housing and economic investment—the entire Cleveland region can be more prosperous, healthy, and just. To view the report please click HERE.

6/19/2007 Hurricane Katrina Response: Committee Probes FEMA's Response to Reports of Toxic Trailers
The Committee on Oversight and Government Reform held a hearing investigating formaldehyde levels in FEMA trailers provided for victims of the Gulf Coast hurricanes and FEMA’s response to these reports. The Committee heard from current residents occupying FEMA trailers, experts who are familiar with the health impact of formaldehyde, and from FEMA Administrator Paulison. Formaldehyde is a chemical used in paint and adhesives, and is classified as a “known carcinogen” by the International Agency for Research on Cancer. Reports of high formaldehyde levels found in FEMA issued trailers and FEMA’s response raise serious public health concerns. To view the report please click HERE.

6/1/2007 Disparities in Health Care Are Driven by Where Minority Patients Seek Care
In "Disparities in Health Care Are Driven by Where Minority Patients Seek Care" (Archives of Internal Medicine, June 25, 2007), a research team including Romana Hasnain-Wynia, Ph.D., of the Health Research and Educational Trust, Joel Weissman, Ph.D., of Harvard Medical School, and Fund senior program officer Anne Beal, M.D., M.P.H., examined quality-of-care data reported by U.S. hospitals participating in the Hospital Quality Alliance, a public–private collaboration formed to measure and publicly report on the quality of hospital care. The researchers found minority patients receive lower quality care, especially counseling services, and that lower-performing hospitals tend to serve a larger proportion of minority patients. "An underlying cause of disparities may be that minority patients are more likely to receive care in lower-performing hospitals," the authors write.

5/31/2007 After Katrina: Rebuilding a Healthy New Orleans
The Final Conference Report of the New Orleans Health Disparities Initiative is now available. The report, titled Rebuilding a Healthy New Orleans grew out of a community-based conference in June of 2006 on the need to address minority health disparities in both the health care system rebuilding and in the environment after Hurricane Katrina. To view the report please click HERE.

5/30/2007 No Black Plan for the Cities, Despite the Lessons of Katrina by blackagendareport.com. The Katrina catastrophe indisputably revealed the corporate plan for America's cities. No sooner had the waters receded than corporate planners devised elaborate schemes for a "new" New Orleans - a "better" city in which Blacks would never again be allowed to become majorities. African American "leadership" should have understood that, with Katrina, corporate America had shown its hand: dramatic reduction of Black populations is at the core of the corporate urban "renaissance" model. Nevertheless, African Americans have failed to tackle the job of comprehensive urban planning that serves existing populations, and conserves Black political power for the future. To view the full article please click HERE.

5/29/2007 25th Anniversary of the Warren County PCB Landfill Protests by www.dissidentvoice.org. It has now been twenty-five years since the 1982 protests against a controversial toxic waste dump in Warren County, North Carolina gave birth to the national environmental justice movement.  The protests also put environmental racism on the map. To view the full article please click HERE.

5/18/2007 Life in Poison: An Alabama Town’s Long Struggle to Survive by Joaquin Sapien for The Center for Public Integrity
From the 1930s to the 1970s, a PCB manufacturing plant formerly owned and operated by agricultural-chemical giant Monsanto Co. discharged contaminated wastewater into streams, ditches and landfills in the impoverished west end of town, exposing hundreds of people to the hazardous materials used in electrical devices as coolants, insulators and lubricants. To view the full article please click HERE.

5/18/2007 Human Exposure 'Uncontrolled' at 114 Superfund Sites by The Center for Public Integrity
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has been reluctant to revealcritical information about 114 toxic waste sites where dangerous and possible cancer-causing substances could harm nearby residents, according to an ongoing Center for Public Integrity investigation. To view the full article please click HERE.

5/15/2007 Draft EPA Indicators May Increase Focus On Environmental Justice by InsideEPA
Findings in EPA’s draft Report on the Environment (ROE) showing minorities face increased risks of adverse health effects due to contaminants than whites could bolster efforts by Democratic lawmakers and civil rights activists to force the agency to consider environmental justice concerns in its policies. The report, which uses a host of indicators to measure the status of air, water, land, human health and ecological systems in the United States, shows, for example, that non-Hispanic blacks have the highest blood levels of lead and mercury and face the highest rates of cancer and infant mortality in the country. To view the full article please click HERE. (Subscription Required)

5/9/2007 Study: Mostly minorities live near hazardous waste By Mike Dunne, Advocate staff writer
Nearly 90 percent of the people who live near a commercial hazardous waste site in the Baton Rouge area are minorities, according to a new study. The burden of pollution falling on black people here and nationally has gotten worse rather than better in the past 20 years, according to Robert Bullard of Clark Atlanta University. Bullard has done a lot of research on “environmental justice” in Louisiana and the South and is one of the authors of a new study, “Toxics at Twenty.” It reprised a 1987 study that showed the burden of pollution falls more heavily on minority communities. Bullard was in Baton Rouge on Friday as part of a National Conference of Black Mayors panel on environmental issues confronting urban areas. To view the full article please click HERE.

5/9/2007 Link between race, hazardous-waste sites still strong by Corinne Purtill for The Arizona Republic
Twenty years after a landmark study showed that people of color were more likely to live near hazardous-waste sites than any other demographic, a follow-up report has found that the disparity is even greater across the U.S. today. The problem is more entrenched in metropolitan Phoenix, where 63.7 percent of the residents living in neighborhoods adjacent to hazardous-waste facilities are of color, according to the new report commissioned by the United Church of Christ. Nationally, the figure is 56 percent. Black and Latino residents are more likely than Anglos to live next to facilities storing the most dangerous types of wastes. They are exposed in disproportionate numbers to the potential health and safety risks of living next to volatile chemicals. To view the full article please click HERE.

5/7/2007 Burning Deadly Military Waste in Blacks Back Yard by Robert Bullard
Race is a potent factor in sorting people into their physical environment and in determining land use, industrial facility siting, housing patterns, and infrastructure development. In the real world, some communities have the “wrong complexion for protection.” The incineration of the deadly nerve agent VX waste water in Port Arthur, Texas typifies the environmental justice challenges facing African Americans and other people of color communities detailed in the new Toxic Wastes and Race at Twenty report, released in March 2007. Racism and Jim Crow segregation forced Port Arthur’s African Americans to the west part of town. There the city built the Carver Terrace housing development for low income blacks. By the 1970s, black were able to purchase homes on the other side of the KCS Railroad and many black families expanded through other parts of the city. And by 2006, 60 percent of the city’s population was African American.

5/4/2007 Fighting Environmental Racism by Scott Dyer for Diverse Online
The National Conference of Black Mayors unveiled a partnership Friday with environmental consultants Envirosource and Historically Black Colleges and Universities aimed at studying the impact of landfills on African-American communities. Robert Bowser, mayor of East Orange, N.J. and president of the National Conference of Black Mayors, said that 2,800 of the 3,000 landfills in the U.S. today are located in African-American communities. The National Conference of Black Mayors is having its annual convention in Baton Rouge this week. In addition, Bowser said the HBCUs and minority-owned Envirosource  are looking at alternative disposal methods that are a lot cleaner that traditional landfills. The catch is that the alternative disposal methods require more volume than smaller cities can generate, he said. To view the full article please click HERE.

5/4/2007 Wasted People: Environmental Racism, a 20-Year Saga by Dr. Robert D. Bullard for Black Agenda Report
Back in 1987, the environmental racism movement won its first significant victory. Twenty years later, a cadre of Black and progressive scientists are calibrating the methodical harm that has been done to Black communities by a society that treats people of color as wasted human flesh. The Bush administration has done everything in its power to silence this growing environmental-racism resistance, cutting off funding to programs that could uncover crimes against whole communities perched on the cusp of disaster - chemical death. To view the full article please click HERE.

5/3/2007 Leaders of African-American, Hispanic, and Religious Groups Take Global Warming Message to Capitol Hill by By Rosanne Skirble for Voice of America News
Global warming has become a hot topic in the U.S. Congress. Several bills now pending with lawmakers address how to reduce the carbon emissions responsible for climate change. A coalition of leaders from Latino, African-American and faith communities recently came to Washington to urge lawmakers to incorporate their concerns into proposed climate-change legislation. The two-day lobby session begins with a pep talk from Kathleen Rogers, President of Earth Day Network, a group that promotes grassroots environmental activism year Environmental activist Irma Munoz fights oil drilling in her Los Angeles neighborhoodround and sponsor of the event. To view the full article please click HERE.

5/3/2007 Making Dirty Air Permanent by Frank O'Donnell for TomPaine.com
Parting, as Shakespeare put it, is such sweet sorrow. But some of the people in the Bush administration that we’d like to part with aren’t going away-even though the Senate has sent clear signals that they ought to beat it. Defying the Senate, the White House is trying to leave behind a polluter-friendly legacy (rather like planting a dangerous virus in a computer system) that will continue to plague us long after the President has gone back to clearing brush at the ranch. Much has already been written about the legacy of the Bush Supreme Court, but it’s time to start paying more attention to this regulatory virus—and the damage it may cause. To view the full article please click HERE.

5/2/2007 EPA Resumes Quietly Dismantling Library System: Environmental Prosecutions at Risk from Loss of Original Documents and Cost by Common Dreams NewsCenter
Despite promises to consult with Congress before proceeding with dismantlement of its library system, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has ordered its libraries to “disperse or dispose of their…contents,” according to agency directives released today by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER). The move to eliminate physical collections comes as EPA’s own enforcement branch warns about the risks of hampering environmental prosecutions. To view the full article please click HERE.

5/1/2007 American Lung Association releases State of the Air: 2007
The years 2003, 2004 and 2005 showed the first truly split picture for the nation’s air quality since the American Lung Association started these annual report cards. The nation’s two most widespread and dangerous pollutants tracked in decidedly different directions: ozone went down from the peaks reported in 2002, but particle pollution—the more dangerous—went up. This finding stems from a close look at air pollution data that states themselves collected on a county-by-county basis, using the most up-to-date quality-assured data available for nationwide comparison presented in the American Lung Association State of the Air: 2007. To view the full report please click HERE.

4/27/2007 The costs of contamination: Neighbors sue Texas Instruments over pollution by Jeff Bounds for the Dallas Business Journal
More than 100 African-Americans have quietly filed a lawsuit against Texas Instruments Inc., alleging that 129 properties they own in historic Hamilton Park have been contaminated by chemicals released by the semiconductor giant. The group of 111 represents ownership of about 17% of the 740-odd lots in Hamilton Park, which opened in North Dallas in the early 1950s as a housing development for blacks of all income levels. To view the full article please click HERE.

4/25/2007 Justice delayed: New report looks at 20-year span of environmental racism by Curt Guyette for the
Although its origins may be diffuse, a primary starting point can be traced to North Carolina, circa 1982, when the state opened a landfill for soil contaminated by the highly toxic compound PCB in rural Warren County. Area residents, predominantly African-American, organized in protest. That resistance attracted the attention of the United Church of Christ (UCC). Inspired by the struggle taking place in Warren County, the UCC in 1987 released "Toxic Wastes and Race in the United States," the first national study to show a correlation between the location of hazardous waste facilities and race. Its findings that race is "the most potent variable in predicting where commercial hazardous waste facilities were located in the United States ..." served as a catalyst. To view the full report please click HERE.

4/24/2007 Environmental Justice Stalled, Report Finds by Cindy Skrzycki, for The Washington Post
Federal regulations have an impact on the development of technologies, the finances of companies, the competitive playing field and how many lawyers are on a company's staff to interpret the rules. These are the practical, known effects of regulations on business. The rules also have an effect on communities when it comes to important decisions about where to locate a hazardous-waste facility, an industrial plant or a refinery, especially if race is involved. A recent report by the United Church of Christ in Cleveland suggests that decisions made by federal, state and local governments, as well as by companies, have penalized minority groups. The evidence: There are a disproportionate number of hazardous-waste facilities near where they live.
The report, a reprise of a 1987 examination of the problem, found that over the past 20 years, minorities have been subjected to excessive levels of toxic pollutants from sites that have negatively affected their health and, often, property values. To view the full article please click HERE.

4/16/2007 The Ten Best Cities for African Americans: May's BLACK ENTERPRISE Reveals the Top Places to Live, Work, and Play by PRNewswire
BLACK ENTERPRISE today revealed its most recent list of top cities for African Americans as featured in its May 2007 issue. The top picks were culled from more than 2,000 interactive surveys completed on http://www.blackenterprise.com and by editorial staff evaluation. The editors weighed the following criteria as it pertained to African Americans in each city: median household income, percentage of households earning more than $100,000, percentage of businesses owned, percentage of college graduates, unemployment rates, home loan rejections, and homeownership rates. To view the full article please click HERE.

4/12/2007 State has most minorities near toxic facilities by Janet Wilson, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
L.A. tops the nation's major urban areas with 1.1 million Latinos, blacks and Asians living within two miles of hazardous waste sites. California has the nation's highest concentration of minorities living near hazardous waste facilities, according to a newly released study. Greater Los Angeles tops the nation with 1.2 million people living less than two miles from 17 such facilities, and 91% of them, or 1.1 million, are minorities. Statewide the figure was 81%. The study, conducted by researchers at four universities for the United Church of Christ, examined census data for neighborhoods adjacent to 413 facilities nationwide that process or store hazardous chemical waste produced by refineries, metal plating shops, drycleaners and battery recyclers, among others. To view the full article please click HERE.

4/9/2007 Americans on the “Fenceline” Have No Defense: People of Color More Concentrated Near Hazardous Waste Facilities Than Twenty Years Ago by Robert D. Bullard for Dissident Voice
Recycling events, neighborhood cleanups, awareness festivals, lectures series, and other activities are slated throughout the nation to mark the 37th anniversary of Earth Day April 22.  While there is much to celebrate, there is also good reason to raise the red flag that all is not well in America.  This is especially true for the physical environments where people of color live, work, play, worship, and attend school.  Let us all celebrate Earth Day 2007, but let’s not forget that there is still much work to be done to ensure that the environment of all Americans is protected -- without regard to race, ethnicity, income, or the ability of individuals to  hire lawyers, technical experts, and  “vote with their feet” to escape unhealthy environments. To view the full article please click HERE.

4/4/2007 Wasted People: Environmental Racism, a 20-Year Saga by Dr. Robert D. Bullard for the Black Agenda Report
Back in 1987, the environmental racism movement won its first significant victory. Twenty years later, a cadre of Black and progressive scientists are calibrating the methodical harm that has been done to Black communities by a society that treats people of color as wasted human flesh. The Bush administration has done everything in its power to silence this growing environmental-racism resistance, cutting off funding to programs that could uncover crimes against whole communities perched on the cusp of disaster - chemical death. To view the full article please click HERE.

4/2/2007 – EJ Scholars Complete New Toxic Wastes and Race at Twenty, 1987-2007: Grassroots Struggles to Dismantle Environmental Racism Report.
This year, the United Church of Christ Justice and Witness Ministries commissioned a new report as part of the twentieth anniversary of the release of the landmark 1987 Toxic Wastes and Race in the United States report. The 2007 Toxic Wastes and Race at Twenty report uses 2000 census data. The new report chronicles important environmental justice milestones since 1987 and includes a collection of two-dozen “impact” essays from environmental justice leaders on a wide range of topics. It also examines the environmental justice implications in post-Katrina New Orleans and uses the Dickson County (Tennessee) Landfill case, the “poster child” for environmental racism, to illustrate the deadly mix of waste, race, and government inaction. The report is designed to facilitate renewed grassroots organizing and provide a catalyst for local, regional and national environmental justice public forums, discussion groups and policy changes in 2007 and beyond. Download the Toxic Wastes as Race at Twenty full report.

4/1/2007 Transportation Apartheid: Left Behind by Transportation Apartheid Before and After Disasters Strike by Robert D. Bullard for Focus Magazine (Vol. 35 , No. 2)
Transportation serves as a key component in addressing poverty, unemployment, and equal opportunity goals by ensuring access to education, health care, and other public services. Transportation equity is consistent with the goals of the larger civil rights movement and the emerging regional equity movement. American society is largely divided between individuals with cars and those without cars. e private automobile is still the most dominant travel mode of every segment of the American population, including the poor and people of color. Clearly, private automobiles provide enormous employment access advantages to their owners. Having a car can also mean the difference between being trapped and escaping natural and man-made disasters. To view the full article please click HERE.

3/26/2007 Report Sees Rise in Environmental Racism by Cheryl Corley for NPR
A new report says environmental racism is actually getting worse, not better. Two authors of the report, Robert Bullard (director of the Environmental Justice Resource Center at Clark Atlanta University) and Paul Mohai (professor of natural resources and the environment at the University of Michigan) speak with Cheryl Corley. To listen to the report please click HERE.

3/23/2007 Separate But Toxic: The Houston environmental magnet school that's an environmental catastrophe by Dave Mann
Climb into Juan Parras’ rickety Jeep Cherokee, and he’ll show you around the neighborhood. He calls it his “toxic tour.” Parras lives in Houston’s East End, the poorer, predominantly minority side of town that borders the Houston Ship Channel. A former union rep, he now heads an environmental nonprofit in the East End called Texas Environmental Justice Advocacy Services (TEJAS) that wants the roughly 30 refineries and chemical plants in the East End to reduce their emissions. Clad in a green vest and cap, Parras steers the Jeep through a maze of back streets and overpasses to the environmental hot spots that worry him the most: two federal Superfund sites—one with chemicals still leaking from barrels; the bayous flooded with trash; an elementary school three blocks from the steaming Valero Energy Corp. refinery the kids call “the cloud maker”; and of course, the acrid-smelling Ship Channel, where supertankers sidle next to refineries and factories. “All the things nobody wants in their neighborhood, we got here,” Parras says as we drive past a house bracketed on three sides by freight rail lines. The tour’s final stop is the site that angers him most of all—Cesar Chavez High School. Click HERE for full story.

3/22/2007 EcoWellness: Race and hazardous waste By Christine Dell'Amore, UPI
Twenty years after a landmark study proved a link between hazardous-waste sites and minority neighborhoods, the phenomenon has only settled deeper into U.S. towns and cities, a new report says. What's more, the racial differences are much greater than previously thought, according to "Toxic Wastes and Race at Twenty," a preliminary anniversary report released today. The updated report found more than 9 million Americans live in neighborhoods within about 2 miles of the 413 commercial hazardous-waste facilities in the United States. Click HERE for full story.

3/22/2007 Toxic Pollution and Health: An Analysis of Toxic Chemicals Released in Community Across the United States. U.S PIRG
Using the 2004 TRI data, PIRG examined releases of chemicals known or suspected to cause serious health problems and identified states and localities that are bearing the brunt of this pollution.

3/20/2007 A Well of Pain: Their Water Was Poisoned by Chemicals. Was Their Treatment Poisoned by Racism? by Lynne Duke, Washington Post Staff Writer
Sheila Holt-Orsted sits on the edge of a sofa in her mother's living room, digging through the large translucent plastic bins arrayed at her feet. The Holt family's fight is in there -- the contaminated water, the cancers, the allegations of racism, the lawsuit. A family's seeming devastation, documented in those bins. Papers are everywhere, spilling onto the sofa, the floor. Holt-Orsted, 45, burrows in deep. But the document she's looking for can't be found. Click HERE for full story.

3/20/2007 Environmntal Racism: It's the Real Thing by Oread Daily
The specific story below is not a new one even though it is just now getting some actual attention. It was back in 2003 that Holt family members filled the pews of the Dickson County, Tennessee courtroom one Tuesday night carrying signs to publicly charge county Landfill Director Jim Lunn of allowing their well water to be contaminated and then lying to them about the quality of their water. The family had been plagued with cancer and other illnesses and blames the health problems on contamination of their drinking water supply near the county landfill. Click HERE for full story.

3/2/2007 Port Cities Work to Rid Air of Pollutants by Saul Gonzalez, NewsHour Correspondent
Air monitoring stations in communities adjacent to California ports record dangerous levels of nitrogen oxide as well as fine soot and sulfur oxides. The NewsHour reports on how port cities are working to combat the pollution. To listen to the report please click HERE.

3/2/2007 Environmental Justice Drives Push for Superfund Taxes, TRI Rules for Inside EPA
Key congressional Democrats and environmental justice advocates are pushing to reinstate the expired Superfund taxes and reverse an EPA toxic release reporting rule as a way to address concerns that minority and low-income communities are disproportionately harmed by hazardous waste. (Subscription Required)

2/26/2007 Nightmare on Eno Road (Dickson, TN): Environmental Racism Kills
Dickson County, Tennessee covers more than 490 square miles-an equivalent of 313,600 acres. However, for the past 40 years Dickson city and county officials have clustered their garbage dumps, landfills, other solid waste facilities just 54-feet from a 150-acre farm owned by the Harry Holt family, African American landowners that have lived in the mostly black Eno Road community for five generations-turning this family's American dream into a hellish nightmare. Click HERE for full story.

2/21/2007 NCC Gulf Commission gives governments low marks
On Ash Wednesday, when many Christians around the world begin the season of Lent, a time of self-examination, a special commission of the National Council of Churches of Christ in the USA (NCC) issued a report on how local, state and federal government in the Gulf Coast region have contributed to hardships for millions of victims of hurricanes Katrina and Rita. After more than a half a dozen post-Katrina trips to the Gulf Coast region and extensive on-the-ground analysis, the NCC's Special Commission on the Just Rebuilding of the Gulf Coast gave low marks across the board to local, state and federal governments. The report card reviewed response and rebuilding efforts in the city of New Orleans, the states of Louisiana, Mississippi, and the federal government in areas such as transportation, healthcare, housing, schools, insurance, and environmental justice. To view the full report please click HERE.

2/17/2007 Democrats Face Grassroots Push For Stronger Environmental Justice Plans for InsideEPA.com
Congressional Democrats, who are working to tighten federal environmental justice (EJ) and civil rights policies, are facing growing pressure from grassroots groups to strengthen legislative proposals that activists say do not go far enough to protect low-income and minority communities from pollution. Some grassroots sources are arguing that a draft bill prepared by House Democrats requiring EPA to “devote attention” to EJ concerns in its decisions does not require the agency to mitigate any harms. Meanwhile, one grassroots group, the Environmental Justice Coalition, is lobbying key lawmakers to back a draft bill that allows citizen suits to block construction of polluting facilities in minority or low-income neighborhoods. To view the full article please click HERE.

2/14/2007 Three Lawmakers Introduce Bill to Reverse EPA Changes in Toxic Reporting Requirements
U.S. Reps. Frank Pallone, Jr. (D-NJ) and Hilda L. Solis (D-CA) and U.S. Sen. Frank R. Lautenberg (D-NJ) today introduced companion bills in their respected chambers that will undo U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) regulations weakening toxic reporting requirements that have been in place nearly two decades. They announced the legislation at a news conference today on Capitol Hill. The Toxic Right-to-Know-Protection Act codifies the stronger reporting requirements that were in place before the Bush administration weakened them late last year. By codifying these requirements, neither the current administration nor future administrations could again change the guidelines without the approval of Congress. To view the Press Release please click HERE.

2/14/2007 Dying for a Home by Amanda Spake for The Nation
Along the Gulf Coast, in the towns and fishing villages from New Orleans to Mobile, survivors of Hurricane Katrina are suffering from a constellation of similar health problems. They wake up wheezing, coughing and gasping for breath. Their eyes burn; their heads ache; they feel tired, lethargic. Nosebleeds are common, as are sinus infections and asthma attacks. Children and seniors are most severely afflicted, but no one is immune. There's one other similarity: The people suffering from these illnesses live in trailers supplied by the Federal Emergency Management Administration. (Subscription Required)

2/5/2007 Lawsuit Aims to Speed Phaseout of Three Pesticides published by ENS
A government plan allowing six more years' use of a deadly pesticide it admits needs to be banned is being challenged by conservation and farmworkers' groups. The groups, represented by Earthjustice, reopened a lawsuit in federal district court aimed at speeding up the removal of azinphos-methyl, commonly called AZM or guthion.
The legal actions also take aim at two other deadly pesticides, phosmet and chlorpyrifos. All three were developed from World War I nerve toxins. AZM is used to kill insects on orchard crops such as apples, cherries, pears, peaches, and nectarines. The highest uses occur in Washington, Oregon, California, Michigan, Georgia, New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania. To view the full article please click HERE.

2/3/2007 Disaster's Consequences: Hurricane's legacy includes arsenic by Aimee Cunningham for Science News
Within the construction debris strewn across the Gulf Coast by Hurricane Katrina is a disturbing amount of arsenic, according to a new study. The tainted rubble, as it is currently managed, might contaminate groundwater, the researchers say. Before 2004, chromated copper arsenate (CCA) was the preservative most commonly used to prevent pest infestation of construction wood. Because of arsenic's toxicity, the Environmental Protection Agency has since banned use of the chemical for residential projects. However, many old utility poles, decks, and fences contain CCA-treated wood. To view the full article please click HERE.

2/3/2007 Disaster's Consequences: Hurricane's legacy includes arsenic by Aimee Cunningham for the Science News Online
Within the construction debris strewn across the Gulf Coast by Hurricane Katrina is a disturbing amount of arsenic, according to a new study. The tainted rubble, as it is currently managed, might contaminate groundwater, the researchers say.

2/1/2007 Still Toxic After All These Years: Air Quality and Environmental Justice in the San Francisco Bay Area. Center for Justice, Tolerance, and Community
The study documented environmental disparity by analyzing several different databases on toxic air emissions and concentrations from stationary facilities, such as factories and refineries, as well as mobile sources like traffic.

1/30/2007 Transcript for Paula Zahn Now Show with Dr. Robert D. Bullard and Sheila Holt-Orsted (Dickson County Landfill)
To view the transcript please click HERE.

1/18/2007 Study: Children living near Houston Ship Channel have greater cancer risk by Cindy Horswell, Houston Chronicle
The results of an 18-month study released today identify for the first time a link between cancer risks and hazardous air pollutants being released in Harris County. In particular, the study conducted by the University of Texas School of Public Health found that children living within two miles of the Houston Ship Channel had a 56 percent increased risk of contracting acute lymphocytic leukemia when compared to children living more than 10 miles from the channel. In addition, children who were living in areas with increased emissions of 1,3-butadiene from petrochemical industries were found to have an increased risk of developing any type of leukemia, acute lymphocytic leukemia and acute myeloid leukemia.

1/16/2007 Atlanta Named 2007 Asthma Capital
There is no place free from asthma triggers, and some cities are more challenging places to live than others. This year, Atlanta, Georgia, has been named the top "Asthma Capital" in our annual ranking of the 100 most challenging places to live with asthma.

12/26/2006 Wrong Complexion for Protection by Robert Bullard for The Next American City
In the real world, all communities are not created equal. If a community happens to be poor, black, or located on the "wrong side of the tracks," it receives less protection than communities inhabited largely by affluent whites in the suburbs. Generally, rich people tend to take the higher land, leaving the poor and working class more vulnerable to flooding and environmental pestilence. Race maps closely with social vulnerability and the geography of environmental risks.

12/26/2006 Showdown at South Central Farm By Robert Gottlieb for The Next American City
In 1991, Daniel Perez decided to "beautify" a median strip in Manhattan on a block of Broadway between 153rd and 155th streets. Perez, who grew up in a small farming village in the Dominican Republic and lived in an immigrant neighborhood between Harlem and Washington Heights, cleared land that had been filled with old newspapers, garbage, and weeds.

12/12/06 Urban Environmental Report 2006
Earth Day Network’s Urban Environment Report (UER) scores the current environmental performance of 72 of our nation’s cities based on over 200 indicators, taking into account those populations which may have greater sensitivity or susceptibility to environmental, health, and social problems.

12/5/2006 Activists use research to win pollution battles By Charisse Jones, USA TODAY
The buses idle along 146th Street, the faint smell of diesel exhaust in the air. The weathered brick bus depot sits across the street from day care and recreation centers for seniors and children.Millicent Redick raised a son and daughter here in Harlem, across the street from the city's Mother Clara Hale Bus Depot. She recalls how they both suffered from eczema and asthma. "I was always led to believe that I had to keep the dust out of my apartment, so I cleaned all the time," says Redick, 61, a retired accountant. "But I was never informed that the air we were breathing played a role. … I thought it was all me."

11/15/2006 Dickson City and County (Tennessee) Settle Leaky Landfill Lawsuits with White Families (But Not with Black Family) Are White Lives Worth More Than Black Lives? By Robert D. Bullard
Just a little over week ago, on November 6, in a special called meeting, Dickson County (Tennessee) Commissioners voted unanimously to settle lawsuits with several white families that had alleged ground water contamination from the leaky Dickson County Landfill located in the historically black Eno Road community. The city and county have now settled with all of the white families, but have refused to deal fairly with the Harry Holt family-an African American family whose wells were contaminated by the landfill.

10/17/2006 From rich to poor: Ivory Coast tragedy highlights hazardous waste trade on rise by The Associated Press
Not long after hundreds of tons of toxic waste was jettisoned around Ivory Coast's main city under cover of darkness, Jean-Jacques Kakou awoke like thousands of others here to an overpowering stench that burned his eyes and made it hard to breathe. Three weeks later, he was dead - one of at least 10 deaths authorities suspect were linked to a tragedy that has thrown light on a growing global trade in hazardous waste. Poison is still being shipped out of developed nations and dumped in the Third World despite international legislation. To view the full article please click HERE.

10/2/2006 Poisoned in Eno by Bob Herbert for New York Times
If you stand in front of the Holt family home late at night, after everyone has gone to sleep, with the sound of a soft wind drifting through the trees and the damp sweet smell of abundant grass heavy in the humid air, you can really imagine what this area was like in the days of slavery. And then the quiet is broken by the sudden eruption of dogs barking and howling on nearby property, and you are reminded that the tiny population of blacks in Dickson County, even after all these years, is still frequently treated - literally - like garbage. To view the full article please click HERE.

9/29/2006 And (Environmental) Justice for All The Tavis Smiley Show
Robert Bullard, Ware Professor of Sociology and Director of the Environmental Justice Resource Center at Clark Atlanta University and Sheila Holt-Orsted discuss Holt-Orsted's family's fight against cancer and environmental racism as they participate in the nationwide Environmental Justice bus caravan tour To listen to the full interview please click HERE.

9/29/2006 National Public Radio's Living on Earth Air Date: Week of September 29, 2006
A fight's brewing over the Bush administration's choice for the Inspector General of the Environmental Protection Agency. Washington correspondent Jeff Young tells us why this little-known position has a big impact. To listen to the full article please click HERE.

9/25/2006 Environmental Justice for All: Tour '06 Videos
Environmental Justice for All: Tour '06 brings together environmental justice, social justice, public health, human rights, and workers' rights groups from all over the country to host a national tour of communities directly impacted by industrial pollution to meaningfully link these communities together in a public call for safe solutions to unnecessary toxic contamination. To view the videos from the tour please click HERE.

6/27/2006 The Health Consequences of Involuntary Exposure to Tobacco Smoke: A Report of the Surgeon General
U.S. Surgeon General Richard H. Carmona today issued a comprehensive scientific report which concludes that there is no risk-free level of exposure to secondhand smoke. Nonsmokers exposed to secondhand smoke at home or work increase their risk of developing heart disease by 25 to 30 percent and lung cancer by 20 to 30 percent. The finding is of major public health concern due to the fact that nearly half of all nonsmoking Americans are still regularly exposed to secondhand smoke. The report, The Health Consequences of Involuntary Exposure to Tobacco Smoke, finds that even brief secondhand smoke exposure can cause immediate harm. The report says the only way to protect nonsmokers from the dangerous chemicals in secondhand smoke is to eliminate smoking indoors. To see the report please click HERE.

6/23/2006 From landfills to freeways: Movement links ecology, justice By Rich Heffern Originally published in National Catholic Reporter issue of 06/16/2006
There's the environment, and then there are justice and human rights. It seems that these realms are separate, the former concerned with wetlands and wilderness while the latter is all about public policies or insuring equal protection under the law. For Robert Bullard, director of the Environmental Justice Resource Center at Clark Atlanta University in Georgia, the two are intimately connected and he has played a major role in organizing and mobilizing the environmental justice movement over the past two decades.

5/17/2006 Report profiles data on industrial releases and children's health
The Commission for Environmental Cooperation (CEC) released a "call for efforts to determine the sources, levels of exposure, and risks that industrial chemicals pose to children's health." The appeal is made in a report entitled Toxic Chemicals and Children's Health in North America, which uses for the first time a recognized methodology (toxic equivalency potentials—TEPs) to describe the relative hazard of industrial chemical releases in North America.
The report focuses on the releases of carcinogens, developmental and reproductive toxicants, and suspected neurotoxicants, as reported by the national pollutant release and transfer registers (PRTRs) of Canada and the United States in 2002. It finds that lead, mercury, PCBs, dioxins and furans, phthalates and manganese are substances of either significant or emerging concern. To see the report please click HERE.

4/14/2006 LET THEM EAT DIRT: Will the "Mother of All Toxic Cleanups" Be Fair to All NOLA Neighborhoods, Even When Some Contamination Predates Katrina? By Robert D. Bullard
Hurricane Katrina has been described as a one of the worst environmental disasters in U.S history. A September Business Week commentary described the handling of the untold tons of "lethal goop" as the "mother of all toxic cleanups." However, the billion dollar question facing New Orleans is which neighborhoods will get cleaned up and which ones will be left contaminated. Sediments of varying depths were left behind by receding Katrina floodwaters primarily in areas impacted by levee overtopping and breaches. More than 100,000 of New Orleans 180,000 houses were flooded, and half sat for days or weeks in more than six feet of water. Returning residents are getting mixed signals from government agencies when it comes to contamination and potential public health threats. Government and independent scientists remain worlds apart and offer divergent interpretations of what contamination is in the ground, how harmful it is to returning residents, and the appropriate remediation plan. Just this past week, a multi-agency task force issued a press release, Release of Multi-Agency Report Shows Elevated Lead Levels in New Orleans Soil, Consistent with Historic Levels of Urban Lead, that appears to endorse the notion that it's acceptable for New Orleans residents to return to neighborhoods with elevated lead if those same neighborhoods were polluted before Katrina. The federal EPA and the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality recommend that "residents in the vicinity protect themselves and their children from potential exposure to lead in the home and in the surrounding soil of their neighborhoods." Instead of cleaning up the mess, government officials appear to be taking the position that "dirty neighborhoods should stay dirty forever." The Deep South Center for Environmental Justice at Dillard University (DSCEJ) in partnership with the United Steelworkers (USW) have undertaken A Safe Way Back Home pilot neighborhood clean-up project-the first of its kind in New Orleans. Click HERE to view the full article.

4/5/2006 Deadly "Tennessee Two-Step" Keeps Leaky Landfill Away from Officials' Homes by Robert D. Bullard
Dickson, Tennessee elected officials are faced with a moral test of deciding whether to burden a black family with health risks that they are unwilling to bear themselves. Dickson County is less than five percent black. Local government officials are using tax dollars to fight a black family whose wells were contaminated with trichloroethylene (a suspected carcinogen) by the county-run landfill. The family's homestead is just 54 feet from the landfill property line. Where do the locally elected officials live? Only one Dickson City council member's home is within a one-mile radius of the landfill. Five of the eight city council members' homes are more than two miles from the landfill. The Dickson Mayor lives nearly four miles from the landfill. Dickson County officials live even further away from the leaky landfill than their Dickson City counterparts. Two county commissioners' homes are within two miles of the landfill; three commissioners live three to four miles from the landfill; and seven of the twelve commissioners' homes are six or more miles from the landfill. Two of the commissioners live more than fifteen miles from the landfill. The county mayor lives three miles from the landfill. On average, the twenty Dickson City council and County commissioners live nearly 5.5 miles from the controversial landfill and for years have had access to clean City tap water. It is unlikely that any of these men and women would allow their mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, spouses, and children to drink contaminated well water for one day-and certainly not for twelve years-as in the case of the black family. Click HERE to view the full story and maps.

3/14/2006 Justice in Time: Meet Robert Bullard, the father of environmental justice BY GREGORY DICUM
Robert Bullard says he was "drafted" into environmental justice while working as an environmental sociologist in Houston in the late 1970s. His work there on the siting of garbage dumps in black neighborhoods identified systematic patterns of injustice. The book that Bullard eventually wrote about that work, 1990's Dumping in Dixie, is widely regarded as the first to fully articulate the concept of environmental justice. Grist caught up with Bullard as he took a break from working on a Ford Foundation-funded study of how government actions have endangered the health and welfare of African Americans over the past seven decades. Most recently, this work has turned Bullard's attention to the area devastated by Hurricane Katrina, which he describes as the latest urban environmental sacrifice zone. For the full interview please click HERE.

2/22/2006 Toxic Terror in a Tennessee Town Government Makes Black Family Wait for Clean Water by Robert D. Bullard
What would you call an individual who climbs the water tower in Dickson, Tennessee and deliberately dumps deadly chemicals in the town's drinking water supply that ultimately makes local residents sick? Most of us would label that person a toxic terrorist. We would certainly expect to see the Office of Homeland Security, the FBI, the EPA, state and local officials, and a host of other government agencies with strange initials deployed to the small town in warp speed. We would expect the emergency response to be swift and thorough. If such an unthinkable event happened, there is a good chance that the culprit would be hunted down, tried, and mostly likely convicted and sent straight to jail. What would you call government officials who knew about this unthinkable act, covered it up, twisted the facts, and penalized the victims who got sick from drinking the contaminated water? We would mostly likely label the officials incompetent and their response as bordering on the criminal. We have other names for people like this, but they are not fit to print. The actions would likely prompt government hearings, investigations, and lots of media coverage.

1/1/2006 The Affordability Index: A New Tool for Measuring the True Affordability of a Housing Choice by the Center for Transit-Oriented Development and the Center for Neighborhood Technology
This brief describes a new information tool developed by the Urban Markets Initiative to quantify, for the first time, the impact of transportation costs on the affordability of housing choices. This brief explains the background, creation, and purpose of this new tool. The Housing and Transportation Affordability Index is a groundbreaking innovation because it prices the trade-offs that households make between housing and transportation costs and the savings that derive from living in communities that are near shopping, schools, and work, and that boast a transit-rich environment.

1/1/2006 An Inherent Bias? Geographic and Racial-Ethnic Patterns of Metropolitan Planning Organization Boards by Thomas W. Sanchez
Metropolitan planning organizations (MPOs) are often the conduit through which billions of federal and state transportation dollars flow for regional transportation investments. Decisions by MPOs have important ramifications for metropolitan growth patterns and, by implication, social and economic opportunity. Yet, the decisions are made by boards whose members are generally not elected to serve on the MPO. Further, MPOs are not required by law to have representational voting. The potential exists, therefore, for MPO decisions to be biased toward certain constituencies or locales at the expense of others. This policy brief reviews MPOs generally and discusses the variation in MPO voting structures—with implications for potential bias—in 50 large metropolitan areas.

12/23/2005 KATRINA AND THE SECOND DISASTER: A Twenty-Point Plan to Destroy Black New Orleans By Robert D. Bullard-EJRC
As reconstruction and rebuilding move forward in New Orleans and the Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama Gulf Coast region, it is clear that the lethargic and inept emergency response after Hurricane Katrina was a disaster that overshadowed the deadly storm itself. Yet, there is a "second disaster" in the making-driven by racism, classism, elitism, paternalism, and old-fashion greed. The following "Twenty-Point Plan to Destroy Black New Orleans" is based on trends and observations made over the past three months. Hopefully, the good people of New Orleans, Louisiana, the Gulf Coast, and the United States will not allow this plan to go forward-and instead adopt a principled plan and approach to rebuilding and bringing back New Orleans that is respectful of all of its citizens.

12/19/2005 More Blacks Overburdened with Dangerous Pollution: AP Study of EPA Risk Scores Confirms Two Decades of EJ Findings By Robert D. Bullard-EJRC
This past week the Associated Press released results from its analysis of an EPA research project showing African Americans are 79 percent more likely than whites to live in neighborhoods where industrial pollution is suspected of posing the greatest health danger. Using EPA's own data and government scientists, the AP More Blacks Live With Pollution study revealed that in 19 states, blacks were more than twice as likely as whites to live in neighborhoods where air pollution seems to pose the greatest health danger.

12/13/2005 More Blacks Live With Pollution: AP Analysis of U.S. Research Shows Blacks More Likely to Live With Dangerous Pollution By David Pace The Associated Press Writer
An Associated Press analysis of a little-known government research project shows that black Americans are 79 percent more likely than whites to live in neighborhoods where industrial pollution is suspected of posing the greatest health danger. Residents in neighborhoods with the highest pollution scores also tend to be poorer, less educated and more often unemployed than those elsewhere in the country, AP found.

11/10/05 Will "Greening" the Gulf Coast after Katrina Help or Hurt Blacks? by Robert D. Bullard and Monique Harden.
There is no question that rebuilding the Gulf Coast region after Hurricane Katrina should employ the best green technology available and should employ practices that are sustainable. However, it is imperative that rebuilding, green or otherwise, is fair, just, equitable, inclusive, and carried out in a nondiscriminatory way.

10/3/2005 Signs of Environmental Hazards Dampen Katrina Homecoming by Michelle Chen for The NewStandard
City officials urging residents to repopulate select parts of New Orleans know little about the storm's ecological impact, leading critics to question the sensibility and motives of the effort.

9/26/2005 HIGH WATER: How Presidents and citizens react to disaster by DAVID REMNICK for the New Yorker
On September 10, 1965, President Lyndon Johnson had lunch in the Roosevelt Room—the "Fish Room," as F.D.R. called it—with several aides and half a dozen ambassadors of modest-sized countries. Then he returned to the Oval Office for a routine round of meetings and telephone calls—a fairly ordinary, crowded day amid the growing crisis of the war in Vietnam. At 2:36 P.M., according to copies of Johnson's daily diaries, the President took a call from Senator Russell Long, of Louisiana. The day before, Hurricane Betsy had made landfall on the Gulf Coast. Storm gusts were up to a hundred and sixty miles an hour, and in New Orleans levees had been breached, causing much of the city to flood overnight.

9/26/2005 An Unnatural Disaster: The Aftermath of Hurricane Katrina by the Center for Progressive Reform
In the weeks since Hurricane Katrina devastated the Gulf Coast, much attention has been paid to the manifest failure of government rescue efforts. The searing images on Americans' television screens, persisting for days after the storm had passed, demanded as much. But as cleanup and rebuilding commence, a broader view is in order, one focused less on the apparent incompetence and unpreparedness of the government officials charged with managing such emergencies, and more on the failures of policy-making and resource allocation leading up to the disaster. An examination of those failures leads to a simple conclusion: the hurricane could not have been prevented, and some flooding may have been inevitable, but at least some, and perhaps much, of the damage visited upon New Orleans by Hurricane Katrina could have been prevented by wiser public policy choices.

9/23/2005 Blacks Left Behind in Deadly Chlorine Gas Leak -- Graniteville, SC: Interview with Pamela Hall - By Robert D. Bullard
On the early morning of Jan. 6, 2005, two Norfolk Southern Railway Company trains crashed into each other releasing deadly chlorine gas in Graniteville, SC killing nine people, injuring 240, and forcing the evacuation of nearly 5,500 residents. Three of the Norfolk Southern Railway Company tank cars carried ninety tons each of the deadly chlorine gas. Days after the wreck, the railway company had still not been able to control the leaking chlorine gas. Eight of the nine victims of the crash died within the first hours after impact. The ninth victim, the train's engineer, died the next day in the hospital. To explore the fairness issue, an in-depth interview was conducted with thirty-two year old New Hope resident Pamela Hall.

9/16/2005 New Orleans' Dispossessed Reach for Cohesion and Clout by Jonathan Tilove-Newhouse News Service
Cast to the four winds, the populace of New Orleans -- especially the black and poor -- grows more dispersed by the day. In theory, this remains the citizenry of the Crescent City. And amid the chaos of recovery and relocation, activists, organizers, clergy, elected officials, urban planners and political thinkers are struggling to make that citizenship real -- to bind Hurricane Katrina's diaspora so its people can influence the decisions that determine their city's fate.

9/8/2005 Race to the Bottom Slow Katrina evacuation fits pattern of injustice during crises By Liza Featherstone
Much of the world -- including white America -- has been shocked by the devastation in New Orleans, and by the ongoing failures it has exposed at every possible level of government. Even normally unflappable TV news anchors and politicians have been moved to outrage, asking why those left behind were mostly black, poor, disabled, elderly. Veterans of the environmental-justice movement, especially those working in New Orleans, are just as appalled -- but they are less surprised. Indeed, they're finding their most chilling fears confirmed.

9/7/2005 The fatal mix of environmental damage, poor resource allocation, inequality By Hari Osofsky
In 1968, the Kerner Commission report found that the United States "is moving towards two societies, one black, one white - separate and unequal." In 2005, those seeking refuge in the New Orleans Superdome, weeping over drowned relatives, and wading through toxic water were predominantly African-American Hurricane Katrina's aftermath demonstrates this country's crisis of environmental justice. As the endless images cruelly reveal, the effects of this hurricane were not distributed randomly. Low-income people of color lived in more vulnerable situations and had fewer options. Last Friday's New York Times quoted one man who stood waiting in front of the Superdome as saying, "We're just a bunch of rats."

9/2/2005 Gulf 's Toxic Stew Adds to Crisis for Black Residents, by Mary M. Chapman, BET, News Report
Weary, anxious and in shock, Thomas Reed is doing the only thing he can do – wait. He's sitting in a hotel room 400 miles from his drowned hometown, fielding calls from worried loved ones, one eye on the TV set. He can barely believe what he's seeing. "I have never, ever seen anything like this," says Reed, a Black group insurance salesman who fled New Orleans with his two kids Sunday for Greenville, Miss. "I even see some faces I recognize." Most of them Black faces.

7/15/2005 EPA's Environmental Justice Strategic Plan Described as "Giant Step Backward"
Robert Bullard described EPA's Environmental Justice Strategic Plan as a "Giant Step Backward." His evaluation is part of public comments submitted to EPA. To view a summary of the comments please click HERE. To view full text of Professor Bullard's comments click HERE.

6/19/2005 Families endure long wait for good water, Staff Writer for the Greenville News
Tracy Riner would risk kidney damage if she drank tap water from the kitchen sink of her mobile home. She is among the residents of a rural area west of Simpsonville whose wells contain uranium, the radioactive element used to fuel nuclear reactors. Four years after the discovery of tainted water, some residents still don't have clean water flowing to their homes. And they have been left on their own to figure out the long-term health consequences. The lines carrying clean water from mountain reservoirs should reach the last of the affected homes in the next few weeks. But access isn't guaranteed because residents must pay $1,305 to tap into the system. To view the full article please click HERE.

6/4/2005 Pollution, poverty link on agenda Talk, rally to focus on inner-city minorities' plight - Jane Kay, San Francisco Chronicle Environment Writer
Representatives from 60 citizens' groups are in San Francisco today to tell global mayors here for World Environment Day that they're sick of pollution in poor city neighborhoods. A coalition of grassroots groups from the San Joaquin Valley, Oakland, East Palo Alto, Daly City, Richmond and as far away as Alaska is raising the issue that poor racial minorities in urban centers are the most likely victims of power plant toxic plumes, poisonous traffic fumes and lead paint in older rental apartments. To view the full article please click HERE.

6/3/2005 "Bianca Jagger, Mayor Gavin Newsom (San Francisco), Dr. Robert Bullard Speak at UN World Environment Day Event Saturday, June 4" by Forbes.com
Bianca Jagger will join politicians and leaders in the environmental and social justice movements to unveil "Reclaim the Future," the Ella Baker Center's innovative program to bring green jobs to urban areas, on Saturday, June 4th, from 2:30 to 4:30 p.m. The day's events begin with Social Equity And The Environment: Eco-Equity Or Eco-Apartheid? at The Metreon, 101 4th Street, Second Floor from 2:30 to 5:00 p.m. Ella Baker Center for Human Rights Executive Director Van Jones, international human rights advocate Bianca Jagger, acclaimed activist Rev. Marta Benavides, San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, and Ross Mirkarimi, San Francisco City Supervisor, District 5, will talk about the program's vision of creating green jobs, not jails. Ms. Jagger is a recent winner of the prestigious Right Livelihood Award for her longstanding commitment to human rights. To view the full article please click HERE.

5/28/2005 Coalition of Black Trade Unionists.
Watch the highlights of the 2005 CBTU Convention in Phoenix, Arizona-the most diverse, progressive and rejuvenating event in the labor movement. See for yourself why CBTU is shaking up the political establishment and firing up black workers from Savannah to Soweto. To view the webcast please click HERE.

4/6/2005 Brownfields Eyed for Low-cost Housing by Hugh Son, Staff Writer for the New York Daily News
Dozens of contaminated lots in Brooklyn's former industrial neighborhoods could one day have apartments, retail shops and parks built on them - but dangers can remain even after environmental cleanup, experts warned. Neighborhood groups in East New York, Red Hook, and Sunset Park are identifying potential brownfields - empty lots and abandoned factories that are polluted with chemicals - with an eye for badly needed housing. To view the full article please click HERE.

12/29/2004 Identities, Conflict and Cohesion Programme Paper 8: Environment and Morality: Confronting Environmental Racism in the United States by Robert D. Bullard
Environmental racism refers to any policy, practice or directive that differentially affects or disadvantages (whether intended or unintended) individuals, groups or communities based on race or colour. It combines with public policies and industry practices to provide benefits for corporations while shifting costs to people of colour. Government, legal, economic, political and military institutions reinforce environmental racism, and it influences local land use, enforcement of environmental regulations, industrial facility siting and the locations where people of colour live, work and play. Environmental decision making mirrors power arrangements of the dominant society and its institutions. It disadvantages people of colour while providing advantages or privileges for corporations and individuals in the upper echelons of society. The question of who pays and who benefits from environmental and industrial policies is central to the analysis of environmental racism. To view the full article please click HERE.

7/1/2004 "USA Tomorrow: Election 2004,' Paul Rauber, Sierra Magazine
What if George W. Bush wins a second term? At the time of this writing the president's popularity is at a historic low, yet because of the stark polarization of the nation's voters he remains neck and neck with John Kerry. A turn of fortunes in the war in Iraq, a few good economic reports, and a handful of voters opting for Ralph Nader could easily lead to the reelection of the most anti-environmental president in American history. Sierra persuaded several eminent environmental and political observers to contemplate just what a second Bush administration might hold in store. Their predictions turn out to be pretty much in tune with the old song: "Do you think you've hit bottom? Oh no. There's a bottom below." To view the full article please click HERE.

8/28/2004 "Center Aims to Link Minorities, Environmental Groups," by Greg Bluestein, Associated Press, Atlanta Journal-Constitution
When Robert Bullard started an environmental justice center in Atlanta, minority groups who rely on the MARTA system had never joined forces to protest the agency's policies. People in predominantly black south Atlanta were upset their heavily used bus routes were being served by polluting diesel vehicles while less-traveled routes in the area's majority white northern suburbs used cleaner-burning natural gas-fueled buses. "People would say, 'Why do we always get the run-down dirty buses?' but they didn't do anything about it," said Bullard, director of the Environmental Justice Resource Center at Clark Atlanta University. So the professor stepped in to tackle what he said no mainstream environment group would do: unite 13 separate groups upset with the agency's policies. To view the full article please click HERE.

7/1/2004 Faced with Court Order, EPA Reconsiders Plant Rules by Planet Ark
The Environmental Protection Agency will reconsider part of a controversial change to the Clean Air Act that would allow U.S. utilities and refiners to upgrade aging plants without installing costly new pollution controls. The EPA said it would take another look at equipment replacement provisions included in the changes to the air pollution rule which affects coal-fired power plants, oil refineries and other industrial facilities. To view the full article please click HERE.

3/1/2004 EPA Needs to Consistently Implement the Intent of the Executive Order on Environmental Justice
This new report by the EPA's Office of the Inspector General tries to determine how the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is integrating environmental justice into its day-to-day operations. Specifically, it answers the following questions: How has the Agency implemented Executive Order 12898 and integrated its concepts into EPA's regional and program offices,? and how are environmental justice areas defined at the regional levels and what is the impact? To view the full report please click HERE.

1/1/2004 Environmental Justice for All: A Fifty-State Survey of Legislation, Policies and Cases
The third edition of CSLGL's fifty-state Environmental Justice survey. This version for the first time includes writeups of EJ cases before the courts and administrative judges, in addition to setting out relevant legislation, polices and initiatives.

10/22/2003 U.S. COMMISSION ON CIVIL RIGHTS ADVANCES ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE WITH APPROVAL OF NOT IN MY BACKYARD REPORT
The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights at its October meeting approved its report entitled "Not in My Backyard: Executive Order 12,898 and Title VI as Tools for Achieving Environmental Justice." The report finds that the EPA, HUD, DOT, and DOI have failed to fully implement the Executive Order signed in 1994 by President Clinton mandating that federal agencies incorporate environmental justice into their work and programs.

10/20/2003 Children's School Bus Exposure Study by the California Environmental Protection Agency.
The Children's School Bus Exposure Study was conducted to characterize the range of children's exposures to diesel vehicle-related pollutants and other vehicle pollutants during their commutes to school by school buses. It was the most comprehensive school bus exposure study ever conducted. Researchers at the University of California's Riverside and Los Angeles campuses, measured pollutant concentrations inside five conventional diesel school buses while driving actual school bus routes in Los Angeles. For comparison, a diesel bus equipped with a particulate trap and a bus powered by natural gas were also included.

9/29/2003 Excavation turns up anger Residents near airport fight proposal to turn runway dirt site into landfill By Kevin Duffy - AJC Staff
Community residents around the Hartsfield International Airport's show their opposition to plans to turn the fill dirt excavation site into a landfill after the airport's runaway is completed.

8/19/2003 Clearing the Air: Public Health Threats from Cars and Heavy Duty Vehicles - Why We Need to Protect Federal Clean Air Laws by the Surface Transportation Policy Project
Nearly half of all Americans are breathing unhealthy air, and air quality in dozens of metropolitan areas has actually gotten worse over the last decade according to a new report from the Surface Transportation Policy Project. The study names transportation as a major contributor to air pollution nationwide, and calls on Congress to protect and strengthen clean air laws and funding. Lawmakers will soon vote on legislation that could undermine clean air protections and slash funding for transportation alternatives that reduce traffic and air pollution including rail, buses and bikeways.

5/13/2003 Genetic Engineering and Environmental Racism by Don Fitz, Synthesis/Regeneration
As drought plagued southern Africa in the summer of 2002, biotech companies lost no time in exploiting hunger for profit. The US offered to "help" by donating food from GMO (genetically modified organism) crops. But African scientists knew there was a catch. They had seen demonstrations showing that Europe wanted no part of the technology. They knew that GMOs were associated with health and environmental dangers. Worst of all, the Percy Schmeiser case suggested that if GMO seed was planted in Africa, the next generation of GMO plants could result in farmers owing "technology fees" to biomaster Monsanto.

4/6/2003 Minority Groups Mobilize on Pollution: Alabama Town's Battle for PCB Cleanup Reflects Fight Against 'Environmental Racism' By Dave Bryan - Associated Press
Often citizens in many poor, black communities around Alabama and the South in recent years have fought companies that have located pollution-spewing industrial plants, hazardous landfills and waste incinerators near homes and schools.

1/31/2003 Second National Report on Human Exposure to Environmental Chemicals
This report by the CDC is the second in a series of publications that provide an ongoing assessment of the exposure of the U.S. population to environmental chemicals using biomonitoring. Biomonitoring is the assessment of human exposure to chemicals by measuring the chemicals or their metabolites in human specimens such as blood or urine.

11/25/2002 New Civil Rights Battlegrounds by Robert D. Bullard
Upon his return from a recent environmental justice summit, Dr. Robert D. Bullard considers the progress and remaining challenges in the effort to equitably protect the natural environment in poor and minority communities.

10/24/2002 Minority groups fight environmental racism: Leaders call meeting in Washington by Melanie Eversley - AJC Staff
Asthmatic children with oxygen tanks and hazardous waste dumps in minority communities are among the ills that Robert Bullard of Clark Atlanta University and other leaders in the environmental justice movement want to fix. That is why Bullard and his fellow advocates have organized the largest environmental justice gathering in more than a decade. About 1,000 academicians, activists, scientists and students began meeting Wednesday in the nation's capital to figure out how to press the federal government to provide a clean, safe environment for all races.

8/27/2002 Blacks Call for Environmental Reparations at World Summit by Robert D. Bullard
More than three hundred environmental justice leaders from around the world gathered at the Shaft 17 Education Center in Johannesburg to participate in the Environmental Justice Forum. The four-day forum, sponsored by the South African-based Environmental Justice Networking Forum (EJNF), served as a pre-summit kick-off to the opening of the World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD) and the Global People's Forum-a meeting of nongovernmental organizations that run parallel to the official government meeting.

4/25/02 Environmental Justice 2002: Saving Black Lives and Land by Frank Dexter Brown for Seeingblack.com
This article reviews the step that the environmental justice movement has taken since the groundbreaking "The First National People of Color Environmental Leadership Summit" in October, 1991 in Washington, DC.

Spring 2002 Trading Human Health For Profit by Nicole L. Warren for Dialogues@RU
This article examines the problem of environmental degradation and its relationship to impoverished urban areas in ways that contribute to our understanding of environmental racism.

3/10/2002 Latinos take lead on Environmental Justice by Paul Rogers
Driven by a yearning for clean water, reduced smog and more places for kids to play, Latino voters are turning out to be the most devoted environmentalists in California. The latest illustration came last week, when exit polls showed that 74 percent of Latino voters approved Proposition 40, a $2.6 billion parks and open space bond measure on the statewide ballot that won by 57 to 43 percent.

2/27/2002 The Environmental Movement -- Part 5: White Privilege Divides The Movement by Peter Montague
The environmental justice movement appeared spontaneously in different places during the 1980s. In their book, FROM THE GROUND UP, authors Luke Cole and Sheila Foster compare the movement to a series of streams coming together to form a river. They see the movement encompassing civil rights and environmental racism; the anti-toxics (environmental health) movement; native American struggles for land, sovereignty and cultural survival; the labor movement for a safer workplace; a group of academics who began researching the disproportionate contamination of certain communities based on race and class; and a few traditional legal/scientific environmentalists.

12/11/2001 Polluting Our Future: Chemical Pollution in the U.S. that Affects Child Development and Learning
The following report became the first ever to document the exact scope, nature, and sources of chemical pollution in the U.S. Using industry data reported annually to the federal government, this report estimates total likely emissions of developmental and neurological toxins in the U.S., identifies geographical hotspots for reported emissions, and identifies the most polluting industries.

11/19/2001 Pollution: Dumping on the Poor? by Lorraine Woellert
In March, 2000, New Jersey Governor Christine Todd Whitman attended the ground- breaking ceremony for a $50 million cement manufacturing plant in Camden. It was a momentous occasion-the first economic investment the troubled city had seen in decades. "Company officials had their pick of a number of sites along the East Coast, but they chose Camden," Whitman boasted at the dedication ceremony.

10/8/2001 Backyard Blues by Marcia Coyle
In closely watched federal litigation, South Camden Citizens in Action charges that the method used by the DEP to grant air-emission permits to cement manufacturer violates Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and that the operation of the facility will have an adverse disparate impact on residents of this New Jersey community.

10/4/2001 UNEP 2001 Our Planet Magazine focuses on Poverty, Health and Environment
The 2001 issue of the UNEP Our Planet Magazine is devoted to Poverty, Health and the Environment. To view Robert D. Bullard's article "It's Not Just, Pollution,", click HERE.

7/3/2001 New Book Profiles Work of EJ Activist Robert D. Bullard
John Mongillo and Bibi Booth's book "Environmental Activist" (Greenwood Press, 2001) profiles the work of environmental activist and scholar Robert D. Bullard. Click HERE to order book from amazon.com. To view the writeup on Bullard click HERE.

6/11/2001 Dismantling Institutional Racism: Lessons From the Environmental Justice Resource Center Clark Atlanta University
This page showcases some of the works originated at the Evironmental Justice Resource Center.

5/22/2001 Abuse of Power: Southern Company's Campaign to Weaken Life Saving Pollution Rules
The Southern Company spent more than $48 million in 1999 on public relations efforts and political activities, in large part to avoid having to clean up its old, dirty power plants, according to a new report released today by the U.S. Public Interest Research Group and the Clean Up Southern Company campaign. The report finds that Southern Company spent more money lobbying Congress than any other utility company, and was the second highest donor to federal political candidates among all energy companies, including Exxon-Mobil and BP Amoco.

4/11/2001 Reactions to EPA's Interim Guidance: The Growing Battle for Control over Environmental Justice Decisionmaking by June M. Lyle
University of Indiana's Law Review article reviewing EPA's Interim Environmental Justice Guidance.

4/3/2001 Southern Company: A Giant Among Polluters by the Clean Up Southern Company Campaign
Southern Company was the most polluting utility company in 1999, emitting more sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, carbon dioxide than any other power company. In 1998 Southern Company emitted more toxic pollution to the air, land and water than any other utility company. While the company argues that its pollution levels are simply a function of its large size, it is actually far more a function of the company's reliance on old, coal-burning power plants. In fact, Southern Company's subsidiaries in the Southeast, including Georgia Power, Alabama Power, Mississippi Power, Gulf Power and Savannah Electric, generate the vast bulk of their electricity from old, coal-burning power plants.

3/13/2001 Law Professor Examines Environmental Racism by Elizabeth Pokempner
Rutgers law professor Sheila Fosterand and Luke Cole have chronicled the problems in Chester and discuss the movement against environmental racism in a new book, "From the Ground Up: Environmental Racism and the Rise of the Environmental Justice Movement."

3/1/2001 Dear Mr. President National Audubon Society
Sixteen environmental leaders and scientists outline key policy areas for the new Bush administration in Audubon's "Dear Mr. President"

2/12/2001 Environmental Justice in the 21st Century by Robert Bullard
The environmental justice movement has changed the way scientists, researchers, policy makers, and educators go about their daily work. This "bottom-up" movement has redefined environment to include where people live, work, play, go to school, as well as how these things interact with the physical and natural world. The impetus for changing the dominant environmental protection paradigm did not come from within regulatory agencies, the polluting industry, academia, or the "industry" that has been built around risk management. The environmental justice movement is led by a loose alliance of grassroots and national environmental and civil rights leaders who question the foundation of the current environmental protection paradigm.

12/4/2000 Climate Justice and People of Color by Robert D. Bullard
Numerous studies document that the poor and people of color in the United States and around the world have borne greater health and environmental risks than the society at large when it comes to workplace hazards, pollution from chemical plants, municipal landfills, incinerators, abandoned toxic waste dumps, lead smelters, and emissions from clogged freeways. The environmental and economic justice movement was born in response to these injustices and disparities.

11/16/2000 Study Disproves "Jobs vs. Environment" Myth; States Ranked on Economic & Environmental Health
States with the best environmental records also offer the best job opportunities and climate for long-term economic development. That's the conclusion of a study released today by the Institute for Southern Studies, a non-profit research center in Durham, North Carolina.

10/9/2000 Environmental Racism in the Alabama Blackbelt by Robert D. Bullard
Alabama is a major "dumping ground" for garbage. The state's 25 dumps take in over 31,500 tons of waste daily. Alabamans generate only about one-third of the landfills' capacity. The other two-thirds come from out-of-state garbage. Because Alabama uses garbage as a revenue generator, it has done a lousy job in addressing environmental justice and equity issues.

8/30/2000 EPA Draft Titile VI Guideance Misses Mark by Robert D. Bullard
In the real world, all communities are not created equal. Some are more equal than others. If a community happens to be poor, powerless, or inhabited largely by people of color, it receives less protection than the affluent white suburbs. Congress enacted the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Title VI, which prohibits recipients of federal financial assistance from discriminating against persons on account of race, color, or national origin. This law covers the U.S. EPA, established in 1970, and all fifty states. The agency issued Title VI implementing regulations in 1973 and amended them in 1984.

8/26/2000 Atlanta's most toxic spot by Dan Chapman
As pollution grew, Blair Village died.

7/23/2000 Landfill May Settle Alongside History By Marlon Manuel - Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Proposed dump beside civil rights trail upsets many. But backers insist it won't be noticeable.

5/2000 Environmental Racism: Old Wine in a New Bottle By Dr Deborah M. Robinson for the WCC
This short article reviews the history of the environmental justice movement in the United States, provides examples of environmental racism in the US as well as globally, and concludes with a discussion of the World Conference Against Racism and the opportunity it provides to place firmly this newer manifestation of racism on the international agenda.

10/19/1999 1,500 expected at peace meeting; An idea exchange in Wilmington by Richelle Thompson The Cincinnati Enquirer
In the midst of a busy world where priority is tagged to things, not ideas, more than 1,500 people are expected to take a break Wednesday and talk about one of life's intangibles. Peace. For the ninth year, people from around the Tristate will gather at Wilmington College for the Westheimer Peace Symposium. During the daylong series of seminars, visitors will exchange ideas, challenge beliefs and work toward some common goals of social justice and equality. This year, the focus is on environmental stewardship. "Peace and the environment are very connected," said Randy Sarvis, the college's director of public relations.

5/19/1998 Children's Health and the Environment: A New Agenda for Prevention Research, Environmental Health Perspectives, Supplement 3 Patterns of illness in American children have changed dramatically in this century. The ancient infectious diseases have largely been controlled. The major diseases confronting children now are chronic and disabling conditions termed the "new pediatric morbidity" -- asthma mortality has doubled; leukemia and brain cancer have increased in incidence; neurodevelopmental dysfunction is widespread; hypospadias incidence has doubled. Chemical toxicants in the environment as well as poverty, racism, and inequitable access to medical care are factors known and suspected to contribute to causation of these pediatric diseases.

12/15/1997 Race, Racism, and Race Relations: Linkage with Urban and Regional Planning Literature by June Manning Thomas, with the assistance of John Metzger, Marsha Ritzdorf, Catherine Ross, and Bruce Stiftel

9/16/1997 Environmental Racism? PBS Newshour Transcript
A neighborhood in Houston is suing the oil giant Chevron for $500 million. According to the community's lawyer, the company used the land that was later developed into their neighborhood as a dumping ground. Betty Anne Bowser reports on their legal fight.

8/1997 The Good Housekeeping Award Women Heroes of Environmental Activism by Rose Marie Berger for Sojourners Magazine
While women have had to fight their way to the top of the Sierra Club, Greenpeace, and The Wilderness Society, history shows that almost all the major grassroots environmental movements in the United States were started and led by women. The quality of their daily lives and the lives of their children was shaped by the health or filth of their neighborhoods.

1994 On the Road from Environmental Racism to Environmental Justice
Villanova Environmental Law Journal Volume V 1994 Number 2

SPRAWL AND SMART GROWTH

3/1/2006 Diversity Spreads Out: Metropolitan Shifts in Hispanic, Asian, and Black Populations Since 2000 by William H. Frey
Analysis of Census Bureau population estimates detailing the distribution of racial and ethnic groups within and across U.S. metropolitan areas since Census 2000 reveals that Hispanic, Asian, and black populations continue to migrate to, and expand their presence in, new destinations. They are increasingly living in suburbs, in rapidly growing job centers in the South and West, and in more affordable areas adjacent to higher-priced coastal metro areas. The wider dispersal of minority populations signifies the broadening relevance of policies aimed at more diverse, including immigrant, communities. For the full report please click HERE.

1/1/2006 An Inherent Bias? Geographic and Racial-Ethnic Patterns of Metropolitan Planning Organization Boards by Thomas W. Sanchez
Metropolitan planning organizations (MPOs) are often the conduit through which billions of federal and state transportation dollars flow for regional transportation investments. Decisions by MPOs have important ramifications for metropolitan growth patterns and, by implication, social and economic opportunity. Yet, the decisions are made by boards whose members are generally not elected to serve on the MPO. Further, MPOs are not required by law to have representational voting. The potential exists, therefore, for MPO decisions to be biased toward certain constituencies or locales at the expense of others. This policy brief reviews MPOs generally and discusses the variation in MPO voting structures—with implications for potential bias—in 50 large metropolitan areas.

6/23/2005 Homes may be 'taken' for private projects: Justices: Local governments can give OK if it's for public good
AP: The Supreme Court on Thursday ruled that local governments may seize people's homes and businesses "even against their will" for private economic development. It was a decision fraught with huge implications for a country with many areas, particularly the rapidly growing urban and suburban areas, facing countervailing pressures of development and property ownership rights. As a result, cities now have wide power to bulldoze residences for projects such as shopping malls and hotel complexes in order to generate tax revenue. To view the full article please click HERE.

6/7/2005 In County Made Rich by Golf, Some Enclaves Are Left Behind, New York Times
Moore County, NC, is made up of booming towns that are mostly white and impoverished areas that are almost all black; area has been made rich by golf; United States Open will be held at Pinehurst, one of county's 43 courses; developers rush to provide 'resort quality' amenities in newest subdivisions, while some neighborhoods are without sewers, police service, garbage pickup or even, in some cases, piped water; residents of three black neighborhoods near Pinehurst, and their advocates, are making concerted effort for first time to win more services, holding news conferences and giving tours; County Comr Michael Holden says residents' request for services puts county in 'delicate situation' in part because of competing demands for resources.

10/8/2003 Travel and Environmental Implications of School Siting
New study evaluates the relationship between school location, travel choices and the environment. "Travel and Environmental Implications of School Siting," released by the EPA, is the first study to empirically examine the relationship between school locations, the built environment around schools, how kids get to school, and the impact on air emissions of those travel choices. Over the next few decades, communities making decisions about the construction and renovation of thousands of schools will be challenged to meet multiple goals -- educational, fiscal, and environmental.

6/29/2001 Taming Urban Sprawl by Valerie Gregg
The way society uses land is no longer of interest only to developers, politicians, architects, road builders, and urban planners.When preventable illness and death are involved, it becomes a matter of public health. Howard Frumkin, his RSPH colleagues, and collaborators from other universities are at the forefront of this new frontier in public health.

5/22/2001 How Smart Growth Can Address Environmental Justice Issues by Joel Hirschhorn
Environmental justice seeks to ensure that everyone enjoys a thriving, healthy community, regardless of race or income level. Both share a common goal - helping local residents exert a greater degree of control over the future of their neighborhoods.

1/22/2001 Bullard details Social, Economic Consequences of Sprawl by Joanne Nesbit, News and Information Services
Robert D. Bullard, director of the Environmental Justice Resource Center (EJRC) at Clark-Atlanta University, stunned his Hale Auditorium audience Jan. 17 with hard facts about and examples of the social, economic and environmental consequences of urban sprawl.

1/4/2001 Collapse of Atlanta Talks Keeps Road Builders Idle by David Firestone NYTimes
When environmental groups last month reached a tentative agreement with the state that would allow road building to resume in the Atlanta area after two years of legal delays, one could almost hear the revving of the paving machines.

9/19/2000 Race, Equity and Smart Growth: Why People of Color Must Speak for Themselves by Robert D. Bullard, Glenn S. Johnson, and Angel O. Torres

7/23/2000 Disclosure: Key Weapon for Neighborhoods by Neal R. Peirce Washington Post
Could the clean light of disclosure provide more equity in highway and public transportation spending -- just as it helped stamp out discrimination in home mortgage lending?

7/1/2000 Judge halts Lindbergh plan
In theory, the restraining order that a Fulton County Superior Court judge granted Monday should temporarily stop construction of a 47-acre office, retail and residential project that will include two BellSouth office buildings at MARTA's Lindbergh station.

6/7/2000 Latest Foe of Sprawl: Minorities in City Core by Craig Savoye, Special to The Christian Science Monitor

6/5/2000 'Smart Growth' Movement a Matter of Social Justice by Ron Terwilliger Special To Houston Business Journal

3/31/2000 Latest foe of sprawl: minorities in city core by Craig Savoye Special to The Christian Science Monitor
Black civic leaders are joining forces with farmers and environmentalists to oppose development of 'exurbs.'

9/1/1999 Atlanta Megasprawl by Robert D. Bullard, Glenn S. Johnson, and Angel O. Torres
In the fastest growing human development in history, the burden of sprawl falls heaviest on the disadvantaged.

6/3/1998 Charles W. Schmidt. "The Specter of Sprawl." Environmental Health Perspectives Vol. 106, No.6, June 1998: A274-279. This author examines the causes of sprawl, sprawl impacts on rural areas and provide solutions to sprawl. Contact National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, National Institutes of Health (919) 541-3841 or http://ehpnet1.niehs.nih.gov/docs/1998/106-6/focus-abs.html

TRANSPORTATION

8/30/2007 Road to Jobs: Patterns of Employment in the Construction Industry in Eighteen Metropolitan Areas by The Transportation Equity Network
The study is the first of its kind, using census and other government data to examine the employment of African Americans, Hispanics, and women in the construction field in 18 metropolitan areas, most of which are Midwestern and Northeastern cities that have seen most industrial jobs disappear. The study found that African-Americans, Latinos and women are underrepresented compared to whites in every one of the 18 metropolitan areas.

8/19/2007 Evaluating Transportation Equity: Guidance For Incorporating Distributional Impacts in Transportation Planning by Todd Litman, Victoria Transport Policy Institute
This paper provides guidance on incorporating equity impacts into transportation planning. It defines various types of equity, discusses ways of evaluating equity, and describes practical ways of incorporating equity objectives into decision-making. “Equity” refers to the fairness with which impacts (benefits and costs) are distributed. Transportation decisions often have significant equity impacts. Transport equity analysis can be difficult because there are several types of equity, numerous impacts to consider, various ways to categorize people for analysis, and many ways of measuring impacts. Equity analysis should usually consider a variety of perspectives and impacts.

6/4/2007 The Los Angeles Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) Approves Racist Fare Increases Despite Unprecedented Public Opposition, Where Does the Bus Riders Union and the Movement Go from Here? Commentary by Eric Mann and Manuel Criollo
On Thursday, May 24, 2007, despite 1,500 angry bus riders taking time off work to come demand that fares not be increased but decreased, 9 out of 13 MTA Board members voted for a major increase in bus fares, led by board members Gloria Molina and Yvonne Braithwaite Burke. The monthly bus pass will go from $52 to $62 as of July 1, 2007, to $75 on July 1, 2009 and $90.00 on July 1, 2011. Thus, two years from now, bus fares will increase by 42% while working people’s salaries will likely not rise at all. The daily bus pass, presently at $3, will raise to $5 on July 1, 2007-an increase of 67%. To view the full article please click HERE.

5/24/2007 L.A. Metro to raise fares 72% in 4 years: Board cites deficit but bus riders consider suit, saying the plan hurts minorities, poor. By Sue Doyle, Staff writer for the Long Beach Press Telegram
The Los Angeles Metro Transportation Authority board Thursday voted to raise bus and train fares by an average 72 percent over the next four years - a move decried by critics as a blow to the poor and ethnic communities that depend on public transportation the most. The plan gradually increases fares every two years, beginning July 1, when day passes rise to $5 from $3, weekly passes jump to $17 from $14 and monthly passes spike to $62 from $52. One-way fare hikes won't come until July 1, 2009, rising from the current $1.25 to $1.50.

5/23/2007 Evaluating Transportation Land Use Impacts by Todd Litman, Victoria Transport Policy Institute
This paper examines ways that transportation decisions affect land use patterns and resulting economic, social and environmental impacts. These include direct impacts on land used for transportation facilities, and indirect impacts caused by changes to land use development patterns. In particular, certain transportation planning decisions tend to increase sprawl (dispersed, urban-fringe, automobile-dependent development), while others support smart growth (more compact, infill, multi-modal development). These development patterns have various economic, social and environmental impacts. This paper describes specific methods for evaluating these impacts in transport planning.

5/18/2007 Evaluating Rail Transit Criticism by Todd Litman, Victoria Transport Policy Institute
This report evaluates criticism of rail transit systems. It examines claims that rail transit is ineffective at increasing public transit ridership and improving transportation system performance, that rail transit investments are not cost effective, and that transit is an outdated form of transportation. It finds that critics often misrepresent issues and use biased and inaccurate analysis. This is a companion to the report “Rail Transit in America: A Comprehensive Evaluation of Benefits.” To view the full report please click HERE.

1/8/2007 MARTA Board Gives Green Light To Rail And Inman Park On Beltline by Mary Swint for GoDeKalb.com
Passengers on Atlanta's Beltline will go by train, not bus. The MARTA Board of Directors apparently heeded the comments of the public and adopted a resolution on Jan. 8 approving the use "of unspecified rail technology" following the B3 Alternative route that passes through the Inman Park-Reynoldstown area and follows the entire Beltline teardrop shape route, starting and ending at the Lindbergh station. The study released last summer showed BRT had about $270 to $300 million less in capital costs than streetcars or light rail on the same routes but several people at the August public meetings objected to the BRT, saying they did not want to jog or bike on a trail next to buses emitting fumes and that residents in their neighborhoods would not ride buses.

10/1/2005 End funding discrimination in public transit by Juliet Ellis for the San Francisco Chronicle .
Fifty years ago, Rosa Parks did not give up her seat on a bus in Montgomery, Ala. Public transportation, and more specifically buses, became the stage from which the civil-rights movement was launched. This act of courage is fresh in our minds due to the recent passing of Mrs. Parks. Viewed as a national hero, her body was placed in the rotunda of the U.S. Capitol -- the first woman ever accorded such a tribute. The irony is that today, discrimination is alive and well in mass-transit bus service. In the Bay area, for instance, a federal civil-rights lawsuit is pending in the U.S. District Court in San Francisco, charging that the Bay Area's Metropolitan Transportation Commission -- which plans and allocates funding for the area's transit needs -- supports a "separate and unequal transit system" that discriminates against poor transit riders of color.

8/9/2005 2005 Urban Mobility Study Report by the Texas Transportation Institute
According to the latest Urban Mobility Study Report, despite slow growth in jobs and travel, traffic congestion continues to worsen, researchers say, costing Americans $63.1 billion a year. The 2005 Urban Mobility Report measures traffic congestion trends from 1982 to 2003, reflecting the most recent data available. If today's higher fuel prices are factored in, the cost jumps another $1.7 billion. To view the full report please click HERE.

2/20/2005 No Buses, No Peace! by Ansje Miller for Grist Magazine: Environmental News & Commentary
Driving down California's Interstate 5 from Oakland to Los Angeles, the need for a new vision for the future of transportation was clear. The pouring rain transformed the usual L.A. gridlock into nothing short of a parking lot, with no other mass transportation options in sight. Six lanes of traffic full of cars carrying one person; in that moment, I understood the meaning of the phrase "road rage." But my rage turned to excitement as I entered a room full of 300 environmental-justice activists, transportation activists, and concerned Los Angeles residents ready to challenge the auto culture and build a movement for public transportation.

10/1/2003 Improving Metropolitan Decision Making in Transportation: Greater Funding and Devolution for Greater Accountability by Robert Puentes and Linda Bailey
This policy brief by the Brookings Istitution summarizes the extent of funding and program authority metropolitan areas are currently afforded under TEA-21. This brief does so by examining the evolution of metropolitan transportation decision making and the role of metropolitan areas under current law. In the end, it argues that federal transportation law needs to expand existing funding sources and decision making to allow metropolitan areas to fulfill the promises of previous reform efforts and to maintain a transportation system that works for 21st century metropolitan America.

9/11/2003 Misssing the Bus: How States Fail to Connect Economic Development with Public Transit by Today Good Jobs First
This report is a 50-state study which finds that not one single state coordinates its economic development spending with public transportation. It also finds that 46 states fail to even collect data on subsidized corporate relocations and therefore cannot determine if their economic development incentives are undermining job access for low-wage workers.

7/2/2003 Coordinating Transportation for Disadvantaged Populations by the General Accounting Office
A General Accounting Office report recommends that the Departments of Health and Human Services, Labor, Education, and Transportation take steps to improve interagency coordination on programs designed to provide transportation services to disadvantaged populations.

6/16/2003 Moving to Equity: Addressing Inequitable Effects of Transportation Policies on Minorities by Thomas W. Sanchez, Rich Stolz, and Jacinta S. Ma
This report prepared by the Civil Rights Project at Harvard University and the Center for Community Change identifies surface transportation policies' inequitable effects. It examines existing research in the area and highlights the critical need for more research and data collection related to the impact of transportation policies on minority and low-income communities. It also makes recommendations to address the racial injustices created by transportation policies.

1/28/2003 Environmental Justice & Transportation: A Citizen's Handbook by Shannon Cairns, Jessica Greig, and Martin Wachs
The concept of environmental justice is an increasingly important component of transportation policy and planning. It is fundamentally about fairness in transportation decision making and in allocating scarce transportation resources. This report was prepared in order to help people better understand the basic components of environmental justice and how it can affect transportation policy

7/29/02 Automobile Exhaust Linked to Heart Attacks By Steve Sternberg, USA TODAY
A preliminary study prepared by the American Heart Association is the first to link highway pollution with exercise-induced oxygen starvation, which can bring on a heart attack in people with heart disease.

1/1/2002 MARTA'S Service Cuts Could Spell Doom for Many by Dr. Robert D. Bullard
Hundreds of transit riders packed the Atlanta City Hall chamber a little over a week ago to voice their opposition to MARTA's latest budget crisis "fix." Speaker after speaker expressed outrage over MARTA's plan to cut service. The most gripping testimony came from low-income, transit dependent, disabled, and elderly MARTA customers who view MARTA as a necessity, not a luxury. Several elected officials even questioned MARTA sensitivity and sincerity.

11/01/01 Mapping transport and social exclusion in Bradford by Friends of the Earth
Traffic is a growing problem in the United Kingdom. To solve the crisis the government plans to spend billions on new roads over the next few years. Meanwhile the railway system is close to collapse especially affecting those without cars. In this report the Government is asked to take a long hard look at the alternatives.

6/26/2001 Disabled riders criticize MARTA by Kelli Esters - AJC Staff
Inadequate lift-equipped buses, costly van service and broken seat belts were some of the complaints raised at a public hearing Wednesday night by MARTA's handicapped riders

5/31/2001 Riders grade MARTA stops from arty to dingy by Stacy Shelton
A recent unscientific AJC Horizon survey indicates that riders rate MARTA stops from "arty" to "dingy." Atlanta's minority riders have been saying this for years. This past winter, a coalition of civil rights groups filed a Title VI administrative complaint with the US Department of Transportation charging MARTA with discrimination in delivery of transit services to its minority communities. Click HERE to view the complaint.

5/14/2001 MARTA to raise some parking rates Plan would hike overnight rates at 4 sites by Stacy Shelton
MARTA plans to raise overninght parking fees at College Park and three other stations hoping that the higher fees will send airport travelers to stations with more available parking spaces.

5/11/2001 Berkeley's pedestrians to wave way across street Flags at crosswalks provide cheap safety by Charles Burress
An innovative, and low-cost, pedestrian safety project in Berkeley will utilize colored flags on both sides of the sidewalk to be used by the general public as they cross the street.

4/18/2001 City accused of backing out of downtown project By Kelly Simmons
Plans for a downtown train station in Atlanta, critical to commuter rail service in the area, have been suspended as the city's $16 million commitment did not materialized.

2/25/2001 Moving Art, MARTA's new rail station in Sandy Springs soothes riders starting a trip into the city --- or calling it a day.
Glistening white tile and shiny chrome make the Sandy Springs MARTA station, bathed in artificial light, feel like the top of the world, though it's as underground as any of MARTA's 37 stations. Once I stepped off the train onto the platform, my eyes automatically followed the geometric modules of Katherine Mitchell's 12-foot-high "ziggurats" upward --- the colorful pyramidlike art that adorns the station's mammoth architectural space. The stepped forms, characteristic of the Georgia artist's paintings, are the modern-day gates of Babylon, said Mitchell, who met me at the train.

2/16/2001 Black leaders teach history they made, Alabama students hear of bus boycott
Montogomery --- The Montgomery bus boycott --- and the spirit and stories of the civil rights movement that it set in motion 45 years ago --- must not be allowed to fade into history, warned a distinguished panel discussing the boycott at Alabama State University on Thursday.

2/13/2001 MARTA examines its image problems, Chairman willing to change name, logo
Long confined to two core counties, metro Atlanta's mass transit system is expanding. But the MARTA brand name apparently won't be because it has an image problem

7/28/2000 Ten years ago, Congress passed the Americans With Disabilities Act, which helps millions . . .'Just keep moving'

4/9/2000 Like Atlanta, most major U.S. cities have developed a socio-geographic chasm, with south siders trailing northern counterparts.  

2/25/2000 The LA-Atlanta Transit Connection
The Environmental Justice Resource Center at Clark Atlanta University hosted a premiere showing of Academy Award cinematographer Haskell Wexlers' Bus Riders Union, a new documentary that traces three years in the life of the Los Angeles Bus Riders Union's frontal assault on transit racism in the nation second largest city.

11/4/1998 The Connection between Public Transit and Employment by Thomas W. Sanchez
Paper prepared for presentation at the Association of Collegiate Schools of Planning Annual Conference in Pasadena, California.

Spring-Summer/1996 Just Transportation: New Solutions for Old Problems
For more than a century, people of color have struggled to end transportation discrimination, linking unequal treatment on buses and trains with violation of constitutionally-guaranteed civil rights. History has shown that the stakes are high.

2/5/1996 Freedom Riders (The Sequel) by Robin D. G. Kelley Excerpts printed in The Nation
Four decades ago Mrs. Rosa Parks of Montgomery, Alabama, became a household name. On December 1, 1955, she was arrested for refusing to give up her seat at the front of the bus to make room for white passengers. The rest, as they say, is history. After veteran black labor organizer E.D. Nixon bailed her out, church and community leaders met, called a boycott, and looked to a young, handsome new pastor of Dexter Avenue Baptist Church to guide them.

HEALTH

5/17/2006 Report profiles data on industrial releases and children's health
The Commission for Environmental Cooperation (CEC) released a "call for efforts to determine the sources, levels of exposure, and risks that industrial chemicals pose to children's health." The appeal is made in a report entitled Toxic Chemicals and Children's Health in North America, which uses for the first time a recognized methodology (toxic equivalency potentials—TEPs) to describe the relative hazard of industrial chemical releases in North America.
The report focuses on the releases of carcinogens, developmental and reproductive toxicants, and suspected neurotoxicants, as reported by the national pollutant release and transfer registers (PRTRs) of Canada and the United States in 2002. It finds that lead, mercury, PCBs, dioxins and furans, phthalates and manganese are substances of either significant or emerging concern. To see the report please click HERE.

5/5/2005 Health, Equity, and the Built Environment by Howard Frumkin
The modern era of environmental health dates from the publication of Silent Spring in 1962. In her classic book, Rachel Carson warned of the effects of pesticides on wildlife ecology, invoking a nightmarish die-off of songbirds in the book's title. However, she also warned of human health effects, both acute and chronic, from liver damage to neurotoxicity to cancer (Carson 1962). In the ensuing decades, environmental health essentially became synonymous with the recognition and control of chemical exposures. Environmental health scientists were toxicologists and epidemiologists, specializing in pesticides, metals, solvents, asbestos, or persistent organic pollutants. At least two paradigm shifts have revolutionized the field since Rachel Carson's day. One occurred when environmental health encountered civil rights, forming the environmental justice movement. We are in the midst of the second, as environmental health reunites with architecture and urban planning. To view the full article please click HERE.

2/9/2005 Urban residents more likely to get exercise Janet Frankston, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Urban dwellers are more physically active than their suburban counterparts, mainly because many of their daily chores - such as going to the grocery store, dropping of dry cleaning or dining - involve walking to places closest to them, researchers have found. Researchers measured the physical activity of 357 adults in 13 metro Atlanta counties and found those who lived in neighborhoods with nearby shops and services were 2.4 times more likely than suburbanites to meet government recommendations of 30 or more minutes of physical activity. To view the full article please click HERE.

3/7/2004 Top Causes of Death Preventable by Amanda Werner, Iowa State Daily Staff Writer
According to this article health experts daid that the most common killers in the United States are preventable with some slight lifestyle changes. The top three leading causes of death in 2000 were heart disease, cancer and stroke. The top three actual causes of death -- the activities leading to these causes -- were tobacco use, poor diet with physical inactivity and alcohol consumption. To a related factsheet from the CDC please click HERE.

12/14/2004 University At Albany Researchers Link PCBs To Respiratory Diseases
University at Albany researchers have found a link between respiratory diseases and New York State residents who live in or near hazardous waste sites containing polychlorinated biphenyls (PCB) and persistent pesticides. The report, published in Environmental Toxicology and Pharmacology studied diseases of hospitalized patients who live near hazardous waste sites containing persistent organic pollutants (POP), which include PCBs and persistent pesticides. UAlbany scientists discovered that the rates of hospitalizations due to chronic bronchitis and other infectious respiratory diseases from those sites exceeded that of the general New York State population by some 20 percent.