Biden administration launches office of environmental justice

WARRENTON, North Carolina

President Joe Biden’s top environment official traveled to what is widely considered the birthplace of the environmental justice movement on Saturday to unveil a national office that will distribute $3 billion in block grants to burdened underserved communities. by pollution.

Forty years after a predominantly black community in Warren County, North Carolina rallied against the hosting of a hazardous waste landfill, Michael Regan, the first black man to serve as a trustee of the ‘Environmental Protection Agency, announced that it is dedicating a new level of leadership to the environmental justice movement they have sparked.

The Office of Environmental Justice and External Civil Rights — made up of more than 200 current staff in 10 regions across the United States — will merge three existing EPA programs to oversee part of the Democrats’ $60 billion investment in environmental justice initiatives created by the Inflation Reduction Act. The president will appoint a deputy administrator to lead the new office, pending Senate confirmation.

“In the past, many of our communities had to compete for very small grants because the EPA’s pot of money was extremely small,” Regan said in an interview. “We’re going from tens of thousands of dollars to developing and designing a program that will distribute billions. But we are also going to make sure that this money goes to those who need it most and to those who have never had a seat at the table.

Biden has championed environmental justice as a centerpiece of his climate agenda since his first week in office, when he signed an executive order pledging 40% of the aggregate benefits of certain federal clean energy investments to underprivileged communities overwhelmed by pollution.

Now, Regan said, this new office weaves environmental justice into the fabric of the EPA’s core, equating it with other higher offices like air and water, and cementing its principles in a way that will survive administration.

In 1978, North Carolina designated Warren County, a small, predominantly black farming community along the Virginia border, as a disposal site for dirt trucks containing highly carcinogenic chemical compounds that subsequently contaminated the water supply.

When the first trucks arrived in town in 1982, hundreds of residents flooded the streets, blocking their way to the dump. Although they were unable to end the operation after six weeks of nonviolent protests and more than 500 arrests, their efforts were hailed by civil rights leaders as the impetus for an uprising. against environmental racism in minority communities.

Wayne Moseley, 73, was one of the first protesters arrested on the first day of the protest. The Raleigh resident traveled to Warren County to walk on behalf of his mother, whose health prevented her from participating. He called Saturday’s ceremony a “homecoming” for himself and many other protesters he hadn’t seen in 40 years.

“We became one family, neither black nor white, neither rich nor poor – we were all one,” Moseley said. “The state was determined to put this dump here. I knew we couldn’t stop it, but we could raise the consciousness not only of the state but also of the nation.

Dollie Burwell, a protest leader known in the community as ‘the mother of the movement’, has paid tribute to the bravery of her late daughter Kimberly Burwell, who was just 8 when she joined her mother on the frontline .

“She stood up and led so many children in the protests,” Burwell said of her daughter at the ceremony. “She was not afraid of being arrested. But she was afraid that her family and friends would get cancer” because of the carcinogenic compounds in the soil.

Government officials have routinely targeted low-income communities of color like Warren County for hosting hazardous waste facilities since the early 1900s. And the neglect of critical infrastructure in predominantly Black communities, ranging from Flint, Michigan , in Jackson, Mississippi, led to problems still visible today.

An April study by the University of California, Berkeley and Columbia University found that the majority of black and Latino neighborhoods that scored low in a discriminatory federal housing program known as redlining were home to two times as many oil wells as majority white communities. According to the Clean Air Task Force, black Americans are 75% more likely than white Americans to live near a plant or factory and nearly four times more likely to die from exposure to pollutants.

The Reverend Dr William Barber II, a prominent social activist and campaign leader for the poor, said he saw Regan’s announcement as “a great starting point” and would continue to demand more of the Biden administration.

“Our votes are not support. Our votes are our demands,” Barber said in an interview. “It’s not about right versus left, it’s about right versus wrong. It’s about lifestyle versus disability, because when you poison the land and water, you harm to people’s daily lives.

Regan, a native of Goldsboro, North Carolina, said he grew up listening to local civil rights leaders like Barber and Burwell — early inspirations for his work at the EPA.

“I take all of these experiences (from my childhood) and relate them to the president’s vision,” Regan said. “We take this opportunity not only to pay tribute to those who came before us, but we build on the work they started. We stand on their shoulders and strive for greater heights.

With just 45 days to go until the midterm elections, Regan is among several Cabinet members visiting North Carolina this month to promote the president’s accomplishments, including visits by Vice President Kamala Harris on Sept. 1 and Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen next Tuesday in Durham. Democrats have set their sights on the Southern swing state as a potential revival in the tightly divided U.S. Senate and other key offices.

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This version has been updated to clarify that Regan is the first black male to serve as an EPA Administrator.

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Hannah Schoenbaum is a member of the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places reporters in local newsrooms to report on underreported issues. Follow her on Twitter @H_Schoenbaum.

This story was originally published September 24, 2022 3:04 p.m.