188999 Inter-Agency Policy Changes for Environmental Justice: Goods Movement Impacts Low-Income Minority Communities and Tribal Territories

Monday, October 27, 2008: 11:10 AM

Omega Wilson, BA, MA, LUTCF , West End Revitalization Association - WERA, Member of U.S. EPA National Environmental Justice Advisory Council, Mebane, NC
The U.S. EPA's National Environmental Justice Advisory Council (NEJAC) is developing recommendations for new policies to address the impacts of air, water, and soil contamination on low-income minority communities and tribal territories. The reduction of pollution levels that will improve the quality of life and public health must be primary concerns for the 2008 presidential administration and congress. These NEJAC efforts include increased funding, public awareness, and community action related to: a) goods/freight movement at ports and rail terminals, b) new tools to assess health impacts, c) integration of environmental justice policies throughout federal and state agencies, and d) proactive and voluntary compliance by business and industry through environmental management systems.

A series of NEJAC workgroups promotes “community perspectives” in new and revised policies at the national level and implementation in the impacted site-specific communities. In order to actualize new policies at all government levels, environmental justice communities and the community-based groups must develop the capacity to lead collaboration with government representatives, researchers, and business/industry stakeholders.

NEJAC's Community Involvement Plan (CIP) incorporates the EPA's internal, inter-agency, and community outreach policy, funding, staffing, and procedural guidelines for implementation of public health, civil rights, and environmental justice. NEJAC's Community Facilitated Strategy (CFS) empowers impacted communities to access remedies through the legal action, monitoring, and alliances for community-based facilitation and management of improved: a) equity in funding, b) public health monitoring, c) basic amenities and infrastructure for the sustainability of quality of life in air, water, earth, and human and animal life.

Learning Objectives:
1. To increase understanding of legal, voluntary, and proactive environmental policy compliance to public health statutes. 2. How to implement environmental policy changes at the federal, state, and local government levels to improve public health of low-income minority and indigenous people. 3. How grassroots community facilitated strategies requires equity in funding and parity in management of health assessment research, exposure monitoring, and corrective programs.

Keywords: Environmental Health Hazards, Policy/Policy Development

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Qualified on the content I am responsible for because: Member of the U.S. EPA National Environmental Justice Advisory Council; President/Project Manager of West End Revitalization Association; Project manager for environmental justice community-based research studies - EPA Region-4 Environmental Justice Small grants, U.S. EPA Collaborative Problem-Solving Agreement, and pilot study at the School of Public Health at University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill; advisory committee member for the Environmental Leadership Program's Southeast Region; APHA presenter in 2004 and 2005 on collaborative problem solving and community-owned and managed research with related articles published by John Hopkins University's Progress in Community Heath Partnerships Journal.
Any relevant financial relationships? No

I agree to comply with the American Public Health Association Conflict of Interest and Commercial Support Guidelines, and to disclose to the participants any off-label or experimental uses of a commercial product or service discussed in my presentation.