Brownfields and Environmental Justice Timeline
The EPA Brownfields Program has a rich history rooted in environmental justice.
The Brownfields Program and the environmental justice movement
have evolved over a similar timeline, fueling one another and helping to build
strong communities.
Residents of Warren County, NC protest construction of a hazardous waste
landfill in the predominantly African-American community, bringing environmental
justice issues into the national spotlight
The United Church of Christ publishes Toxic Waste and Race in the United States
The First National People of Color Environmental Leadership Summit is held
Cuyahoga County Community College Environmental Justice Grant
Cuyahoga County Planning Commission receives first EPA Brownfields Pilot
Executive Order 12898 requires that each federal agency make achieving
environmental justice part of its mission
EPA awards additional Brownfields Pilots to 22 communities
EPA and NEJAC convene public dialogues to provide stakeholders an
opportunity to express concerns related to brownfields and public health
NEJAC publishes EnvironmentalJustice, Urban Revitalization, and Brownfields:
The Search for Authentic Signs of Hope highlighting recommendations to EPA
raised through the public dialogues on how to develop the Brownfields Program
The Puyallup and Navajo Nation become the first Tribes to receive
Brownfields funding
EPA awards first Job Training Pilots
First 16 Brownfields Showcase Communities are designated, providing
resources and support from more than 15 federal agencies to address local
revitalization issues
EPA develops Civil Rights Act Title VI Case Studies report
"Brownfields Law" signed; statute includes requirements to address
environmental justice; nonprofit organizations are eligible to receive funding
EPA brings environmental justice and community representatives together to
develop the All Appropriate Inquiry Final Rule
EPA awards Job Training grants to Mississippi DEQ and Southern University to
recruit and train residents in areas affected by Hurricane Katrina
Brownfields Program begins providing Targeted Brownfields Assessment funding
to EPA's Community Action fora Renewed Environment (CARE) grantees
NEJAC publishes Unintended Impacts of Redevelopment and Revitalization
Efforts in Five Environmental Justice Communities highlighting concerns of
gentrification and displacement in brownfield communities
Brownfields Program contributes to EPA Office of Solid Waste and Emergency
Response EnvironmentalJustice Action Plan
EPA awards first round of Training, Research, and Technical Assistance grants
focused on environmental justice issues
EPA convenes nonprofit cleanup roundtables to assist nonprofit organizations in
building capacity to address environmental issues
To date, 78 Tribes and 90 nonprofit organizations have received
Brownfields funding
Redevelopment for
Affordable Housing
Using EPA funding to help provide
affordable housing helps to prevent
displacement of current residents. The
Redevelopment Agency of the City
of Oakland, California used an EPA
Brownfields Cleanup grant to help turn a
former commercial and industrial property
into 80 units of affordable housing for local
residents. The complex integrates green
building design and eco-friendly materials. ?H_
Future Opportunities to Measure and Promote
Environmental Justice
The data presented in this brochure affirm efforts by EPA's Brownfields
Program to serve communities most in need. However, additional data and
analysis are needed to gain a clearer understanding of how the demographic
and socioeconomic composition of communities has evolved as a result of
Brownfields funding. Ultimately, this analysis is a first step in determining if the
program is serving low-income and minority communities, as it was designed to
do. EPA hopes to conduct future analyses of communities that have received EPA
funding to correlate 2000 census data with 2010 census data. This information
collection will help OBLR determine ways to enhance the program to better serve
the American public.
EPA Cleanups in My Community:
Mapping and listing tool that shows sites where pollution is being
or has been cleaned up:
iaspub.epa.gov/Cleanups/
EPA Contact:
Joseph Bruss
Environmental Justice Coordinator
Office of Brownfields and Land Revitalization
(202) 566-2772
Addressing
Environmental
Justice in EPA
Brownfields
Communities
I
Brownfields and Environmental Justice:
A Demographic Analysis of Brownfields
Communities
Solid Waste
and Emergency
Response (5105T)
EPA-560-F-09-518
November 2009
www.epa.gov/brownfie/ds
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"In communities that are under economic stress, particularly low-income
areas that have experienced long periods of disinvestment and decay,
successful revitalization takes more than a focus on individual properties.
Revitalization requires a hard look at the surrounding area in order to establish
a comprehensive area-wide plan that identifies reuses that both meet the needs
of the local community and that incorporate the elements of public improvements
and infrastructure that are necessary to attract private investment."
—Mathy Stanislaus
Assistant Administrator
for Solid Waste and Emergency Response
Demographic Analysis of EPA Brownfields Communities
Census Block Groups with EPA-funded
Brownfields Properties (2000) Census Block Groups Nationwide (2000)
"Brownfields Law" Aims to Serve Communities in Need
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA's) Brownfields Program
provides funding to help communities revitalize their contaminated lands.
The Program's grants and technical assistance give communities, states,
tribes, and other stakeholders the resources they need to prevent, assess,
safely clean up, and sustainably reuse brownfields. The Brownfields Program
is authorized under the Small Business Liability Relief and Brownfields
Revitalization Act, which amended CERCLA. The "Brownfields Law" is one
of the few environmental statutes, if not the only, that specifically addresses
environmental justice in plain terms. The law requires that during the grant
evaluation process, EPA take into consideration "the extent to which the
grant would facilitate the identification and reduction of threats to the health
or welfare of children, pregnant women, minority or low-income communities,
or other sensitive populations." Additionally, EPA must consider "the extent to
which a community that has an inability to draw on other sources of funding
for environmental remediation and subsequent redevelopment of the area
in which a brownfield site is located because of the small population or low
income of the community."
Job Training Programs Train Residents
of Brownfield Communities
The Brownfields Job Training Program seeks to
ensure that the economic benefits derived from
brownfields redevelopment remains with affected
residents. The Absentee Shawnee Tribe successfully
developed a brownfields job training program. More
than 100 students have learned the skills necessary
to obtain employment in local brownfield assessment
and cleanup projects and many have been placed in
remediation jobs cleaning up tribal land.
Attribute
Poverty Rate Percentage
Minority Population Percentage
Vacant Residential Unit Percentage
Per Capita Income
Average
20.1%
37.9%
11.5%
$16,693
Average
12.4%
30.9%
9.0%
$21,587
Table 1: EPA grants are awarded to communities with higher poverty rates,
minority populations, and vacancies and lower incomes than the national average.
The Unintended Impacts of Brownfields Revitalization
In 2006, EPA, in coordination with the National Environmental Justice
Advisory Council (NEJAC) Waste and Facility Siting Subcommittee,
published a report entitled Unintended Impacts of Redevelopment and
Revitalization Efforts in Five EnvironmentalJustice Communities. This report
examined concerns that EPA's Brownfields Program may unintentionally
exacerbate historical gentrification and displacement of low-income and
minority communities through the cleanup of brownfields. This report and
the dialogue it created was important because it raised new concerns and
brought this issue to light. It led EPA to more carefully consider unintended
impacts of redevelopment during its evaluation of cleanup grant proposals
and to be more conscientious of potential unintended impacts throughout the
brownfields revitalization process.
Measuring Success
Many communities lack the resources needed to initiate brownfields cleanup
and redevelopment projects, so EPA funding helps build project momentum
where communities can leverage additional funding and resources to
revitalize their brownfields. A unique aspect of the Brownfields Program is that
it empowers local communities to address economic, environmental, public
health, and social issues associated with brownfields from a cross-disciplinary
approach. Serving low-income and minority communities is done in part by
providing funding to underserved communities. In order to determine if EPA
Brownfields grants have been awarded to the intended communities, OBLR
compared four demographic attributes of Brownfields grant communities to
those of the national average (see table 1).1 This analysis illustrates and
confirms that EPA Brownfields grants go to the types of communities the
program was originally designed to help. Demographic data from the 2000
U.S. Census, the most recent complete Census data available, was used
in this analysis. EPA used the LandView tool to obtain Census Block Group
data2 based on geographic information in the EPAACRES database for more
than 3,000 properties that were reported by grantees to have benefitted from
EPA Brownfields funding as of January 2008, including assessment,
cleanup, and revolving loan fund grants, as well as targeted brownfields
assessment resources.
During both the evaluation of grant proposals and when working with
communities throughout their cooperative agreements, EPA helps to
educate staff and communities on the importance of integrating principles of
equitable development into the cleanup and redevelopment of brownfields.
Some of these principles include: the creation of affordable housing,
working with minority- and women-owned businesses and environmental
contracting firms, creating first source hiring ordinances, ensuring jobs
with living wages, partnering with local land trusts, creating commercial
linkage strategies, redeveloping brownfields into nonprofit purposes such
as clinics and parks, and developing resident shareholding models. These
principles help to ensure that low- and moderate-income families are
not displaced following redevelopment and that communities historically
plagued with blighted properties and environmental contamination reap the
benefits of environmental cleanup. With technical assistance from EPA,
communities across the country are beginning to realize that incorporating
principles of equitable development provides a more socially, economic,
and environmentally sustainable future for the community while oftentimes
preserving critical aspects of American heritage and culturally diverse
neighborhoods.
1 For an additional description of Census data, and to see the original data in its entirety, please visit
www.census.gov/main/www/cen2000.html
2 For a definition of Census Block Group, please visit www.census.gov/prod/cen2000/doc/sf1 .pdf, page A-8
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