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APHA Scientific Session and Event Listing

Henry Topper¹, Lawrence Weinstock², and Marva King². (1) Office of Prevention, Pesticides, and Toxics, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, 1200 Pennsylvania Ave. NW, Washington, DC 20460, 202-564-8534, topper.henry@epa.gov, (2) Office of Air and Radiation, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, 1200 Pennsylvania Ave. NW, Washington, DC 20460

This presentation will describe the Community Action for a Renewed Environment (CARE) program, sponsored by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). CARE is a new competitive grant and technical support program that offers an innovative way for communities to take action at the local level to reduce toxic pollution. Through CARE, communities create local collaborative partnerships that implement local solutions to reduce releases of and minimize exposure to a variety of toxic pollutants. To meet its goals, the CARE program has established multimedia teams to join local community-based partnerships. The CARE teams educate and support communities by helping them assess toxic risks, while also providing funding and access to EPA's and other voluntary programs designed to address local environmental priorities. In addition, EPA offers support for communities to develop their own approach to reducing toxics. Examples of some of the EPA voluntary programs that reduce exposure to toxics and create safer communities include programs that: reduce emissions from diesel engines, reduce waste from toxic chemical use, reduce emissions from small business operations while reducing costs, improve the indoor environment in schools, and protect drinking water supplies through pollution prevention. The four step CARE process helps communities join together, identify problems and solutions, implement solutions and reduce risks, and ultimately become self-sustaining. This presentation will summarize EPA's experiences and lessons learned from the first two years of this new community-based program, as well as describe future plans for the program.

Learning Objectives:

• Describe the goals of EPA's new community-based environmental health program.
• Recognize an EPA CARE community-based partnership.
• Identify practical steps community-based partnerships can apply at the local level to reduce environmental health risks.
• Discuss several ways community-based partnerships can overcome challenges in reducing local environmental health risks.

Keywords: Community-Based Partnership, Environmental Health

Related Web page: www.epa.gov/CARE

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Any relevant financial relationships? No