1. Environmental Justice &
EJ Law In Oregon
ROBERT WILLIAM COLLIN, SENIOR RESEARCH
SCHOLAR,
CENTER FOR SUSTAINABLE COMMUNITIES
&

2. What is Environmental Justice?
 The United States Environmental Protection Agency
defines EJ as follows:
 "Environmental Justice is the fair treatment and
meaningful involvement of all people regardless of race,
color, national origin, or income with respect to the
development, implementation, and enforcement of
environmental laws, regulations, and policies. EPA has this
goal for all communities and persons across this Nation. It
will be achieved when everyone enjoys the same degree of
protection from environmental and health hazards and
equal access to the decision-making process to have a
healthy environment in which to live, learn, and work."

3. People of color –
African American,
Native American
and Latino --are
more exposed to
toxins and
hazardous
substances in the
environment It will be achieved when everyone enjoys
where they live, the same degree of protection from
work, play and environmental and health hazards and
learn. equal access to the decision-making
process to have a healthy environment in
which to live, learn, and work."

4. What characteristic predicts
exposures to toxic waste and
Is it Race? pollution?
1. Race/ethnicity - even when
Or income numerous potentially relevant
Or property variables are included, strong
values positive association with
environmental quality.
Or geology
2. Income – mixed
Or . . . . 3. Poverty - strong positive between
unemployment and pollution
4. Political Mobilization - consistent
relationship; owner occupied
especially.

5. Cerrell & Associates
 1984 California Waste Management Board commissioned a
study on how to site waste incinerators – called Political
Difficulties Facing Waste to Energy Plant Siting by Cerrell
Associates aka Cerrell Report.
 The consultants suggested targeting small rural communities
whose residents are low income, older people, or people with
a high school education or less, communities with a high
proportion of Catholic residents and communities who
engage in extractive industries such as agriculture, mining,
and forestry.
 Ideally, “officials and companies should look for lower
socioeconomic neighborhoods that are also in a heavy
industrial area with little if any commercial activity.”

6. “ fair treatment
and meaningful
involvement of all
people regardless
of race, color,
national origin, or
income with
respect to the
development,
implementation,
and enforcement
of environmental
laws, regulations,
and policies” If you’re not at the table, you’re
probably the meal.

7. Conclusion of Studies of Waste Streams
RACIAL BIASES IN THE DISTRIBUTION AND
DENSITY OF TOXIC RELEASE INVENTORY
FACILITIES
Even controlling for other factors,
African American and Hispanic
residential areas are more likely to
be exposed to environmental risks.
.

8. Cancer by Race from Environmental Stressors
For person of color risk of cancer
is almost 1 in 3, including
hispanic people
For Anglos that risk is about 1 in
7

9. Latinos and Air Pollution
 66 % of Latinos (25.6  Asthma contributes to more
million people)live in areas emergency room visits and
that do not meet the federal hospitalizations for
government’s air quality respiratory conditions.
standards  Pregnant women and
 NYC, San Diego, South children most vulnerable to
Phoenix, Chicago – Latino’s air pollutants– increases
in areas with air pollution risks of complications,
and high asthma rates; premature birth, low birth
sometime 4 times the rate, and cardiac defects in
national average and babies.
sometimes the demographic  Air pollution can worsen
group hit the hardest lung cancer, allergeries, and
(NYC). bronchitis.

10. Latinos and Safe Drinking Water
 Colonias along the US  California officials have
Mexico border lack potable closed about 800 wells
water and adequate waste because of high levels of
water treatment –leading to nitrates
waterborne diseases like  Nitrates come from
giardiasis, hepatitis, and pesticides, feces, and animal
cholera. manure)
 Arizona’ Maricopa County  Nitrogen interferes with
and much of Southern blood’s ability to carry
California (heavily Latino) oxygen to the brain, can be
take drinking water from fatal to infants.
the Colorado River which is
contaminated with
perchlorate, linked to
thyroid and cancer.

11. Latinos and Pesticide Exposures at Work
 Latino farmworker in  General health impacts of
California had a 59 – 69 exposure are skin rashes,
% greater risk of stomach, burning eyes, cough,
cervical, and uterine nausea, vomiting,
cancer, and some diarrhea, and difficulty
leukemias, compared with breathing.
other Latinos in
California.
 US Dept of Labor – water
for washing is unavailable
in 16 % of the fields

12. Latinos and Mercury Exposure
 Main exposure routes are  Released into air by power
through fish, cosmetics, and plants and chemical
cultural ceremonies. (Santeria companies, falls into the water
– sometimes sprinkles as a metal, working its way
Mercury) through the ecosystem until it
 Very few warnings on any of accumulates in fish.
these exposure vectors in
Spanish regarding dangers of
Mercury exposure.
 Mercury accumulates in the
body. Can affect the brain of
developing fetus in pregnant
mother.
 Latino children generally, have
higher Mercury levels than
Whites.

13. Latino Children and Lead Poisoning
 Latino children in general  In children, lead exposure
are twice as likely as non can cause neurological
Latino White children to problems even in tiny does.
have blood Lead levels  Associated with decline in
above the threshold IQ and learning disabilities,
established by the Centers hyperactivity, violence, and
for Disease Control for risk an increase in anti social
of lead poisoning. behavior.
 In Arizona in 2002 77 % of  Sources, lead paint, lead
children diagnosed with glazed pottery, traditional
lead poisoning were Latino, remedies as greta and
they make up 25.3 % of the azarcon, lead in land, air,
population then. and/or water.

14. Asthma and Children of Color
Asthma strikes
African-
American and
Latino youth more
often and much
harder.

15. Farmworkers
 Large issue in Oregon;
 1.2 billion pounds of pesticides for
$4.6 billion per year in US
 600 active chemical ingredients
combined with others to form
about 35,000 different chemical
formulations
 313,000 US farmworkers suffer
from exposure related illnesses;
800 - 1000 die.

16. Fish  Most studies of fish
consumption overlook
subsistence fishers;
 Different amounts of fish;
 plus different consumption
patterns (often culturally
based)
 yield larger exposure
vectors for certain
populations because fish
are highly contaminated.

17. Foundational Federal Law
In 1994
President Clinton
signed Executive
Order 12898,
charging all
federal agencies
with integrating
environmental
justice concerns
into their
operations.

18. EXECUTIVE ORDER NO. 12898
FEDERAL ACTIONS TO ADDRESS ENVIRONMENTAL
JUSTICE IN MINORITY POPULATIONS AND LOW-INCOME
POPULATIONS
Each Federal agency shall conduct its programs,
policies, and activities that substantially affect
human health or the environment, in a manner
that ensures that such programs, policies, and
activities do not have the effect of excluding
persons . . . from participation in, denying
persons . . . the benefits of, or subjecting
persons . . . to discrimination under, such
programs, policies, and activities, because of
their race, color, or national origin.

19. Executive Order 13166, "Improving Access to
Services for Persons with Limited English
The Executive Order requires Federal
agencies to examine the services they
provide, identify any need for services to
those with limited English proficiency
(LEP), and develop and implement a
system to provide those services so LEP
persons can have meaningful access to
them.

20. Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act
 Recipients of federal funding may not discriminate on the
basis of race.
 No requirement to prove intentional discrimination;
Disparate or disproportional impact by race is required.
DOJ’s Title VI implementing regulations prohibit not only
intentional discrimination but also facially-neutral
practices that have a discriminatory impact. The “failure
to ensure that LEP persons can effectively participate in
or benefit from Federally assisted programs and
activities” may constitute national origin discrimination.
 Remedies are loss of federal funds.

21. All Oregonians have a voice in
Environmental policies that affect where
they live, work, recreate and worship.
The Task force was created by the
legislature to safeguard all Oregonians.

22. SB 420: It’s
The Law
Oregon SB 420
created the
Environmental
Justice Task Force,
to ensure
environmental
justice for all
Oregonians.

23. Oregon Environmental Justice Defined
Environmental justice is
equal protection from environmental
and health hazards, and meaningful
public participation in decisions that
affect the environment in which people
live, work, learn, practice spirituality
and play.

24. Environmental Justice Defined in Oregon
Environmental justice is
equal protection from
environmental and health hazards,
and meaningful public participation
in decisions that affect the
environment in which people live,
work, learn, practice spirituality and
play.

25. National Award Winner, 2010
EPA is pleased to recognize the Oregon Environmental Justice Task
Force for effective implementation of the State’s environmental justice
legislation and its ability to incorporate environmental justice
considerations into State agencies’ programs.
The Oregon Environmental Justice Task Force has achieved several
significant milestones, including
 unprecedented cooperation and relationship-building between Task
Force members and Oregon state agency representatives;
 the creation of a “Your Voice for Environmental Justice” document
outlining citizens’ rights to be involved in decisions that affect their
quality of life;
http://www.epa.gov/compliance/ej/resources/publications/awards/
2010/oejtf.pdf

26. Cultural Competency: New Legislation
Monday April 25, 2011the Oregon Senate
passed Senate Bill 97, which directs the
Oregon Health Authority and 18 health
professional regulatory boards to
develop guidelines and standards for
providing culturally competent care to
minority groups. It now moves to the
House for consideration.

27. Go to
www.scorecard.org
Type in your zip code to
discover what toxic
emissions occur in your zip
code

28. New Coalitions
Many Separate Paths to Justice:
Housing,
Education,
Employment ,
Spirituality
ONE ENVIRONMENT

29. “truth crushed to earth will
rise again.”
“the arc of the moral
universe is long, but it
bends toward justice.”
What we have done to the People
of the Earth, we have done to
the Earth, but the Earth doesn’t
lie. People do.

30. Find Out More
America’s Migrant Farmworkers, National Center for Farmworker Health www.ncfh.org/.
Citizens Clearinghouse for Hazardous Wastes www.chej.org.
Collin, Robert William. Environmental Justice in Oregon: It’s The Law, online at http://
legacy.lclark.edu/org/envtl/objects/38-2_Collin.pdf.
…….BATTLEGROUND:ENVIRONMENT(Greenwood Press 2008)
…….and Collin, ENCYCLOPEDIA OF SUSTAINABILITY (ABC –Clio Press 2010).
……."Environmental Equity: A Law and Planning Approach to Environmental Racism"
University of Virginia Environmental Law Review, Vol. 11, No. 4, summer 1992.
Reprinted in "Law and the Environment" edited by Robert V. Percival & Dorothy C.
Alevizatos (Temple University Press Philadelphia).
…….. "Where Did All The Blue Skies Go? Sustainability and Equity:" with Robin Morris
Collin, 10 Journal of Environmental Law and Litigation, winter 1995.
………and Collin. Sustainability and Environmental Justice: Is the Future Clean and
Black?” Environmental Law Reporter June 2001.
Environmental Justice for All: A 50 State Survey – www.uchastings.edu/site_files/plri/
EJ2007.pdf.

31. More Environmental Justice Resources
Fish Advisories - www.epa.gov/waterscience/fish/advisories. or for state information -
http://.epa.gov/waterscience/fish/promo.
Indigenous Environmental Network – www.ienearth.org/.
Northwest Center for Alternatives to Pesticides - http://www.pesticide.org.
Oregon Toxics Alliance - http://www.oregontoxics.org/.
Oregon Environmental Justice Task Force website: http://governor.oregon.gov/Gov/
GNRO/environmental_justice.shtml.
Pineros y Campesinos Unidas del Noreste, Northwest Treeplanters and Farmworkers
United – www.pcun.org.
TRI - TOXICS RELEASE INVENTORY - go to www.scorecard.org. type in a zip code per
their instructions and discover what toxic emissions occur in that zip code..