DeGette introduces legislation to promote Environmental Justice across U.S.

The measure would require the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to identify 100 low-income or predominantly minority communities in the U.S. that have been suffering from a disproportionately high number of environmental-law violations. Once identified, the legislation would require EPA to work directly with state and local officials in each of those communities to clean them up.

The legislation comes on the heels of a townhall meeting DeGette held last week with residents in Elyria-Swansea, one of two North Denver communities that has been disproportionately impacted by excessive amounts of pollution for decades. As the top Democrat on the House panel that oversees the nation's environmental policies, DeGette has made clear that delivering on the promise of environmental justice in communities across the U.S. remains one of her top priorities.

"While our nation's environmental laws were put in place to protect everyone in this country equally, they have certainly not been enforced that way," DeGette said. "For too long communities, such as Globeville and Elyria-Swansea, have suffered under a system that's failed to protect them, and it's incumbent upon all of us to correct that injustice as soon as possible. We can't allow environmental justice to become just a catchphrase people like to say, we have to make it our collective mission to deliver it in every community across this country."

Data shows that when our nation's environmental laws are not properly enforced it is often minority, low-income or otherwise disenfranchised communities that suffer the most as a result. While the federal government is responsible for setting the nation's environmental standards, it is often the state's responsibility to enforce them.

In addition to requiring EPA to identify, and then help clean up, 100 of the most heavily polluted communities in the U.S., the legislation would also - for the first time ever - require EPA to consider how multiple sources of pollution in, and around, a particular community can impact the health of residents there.

Elyria-Swansea and Globeville, for example, are located in close proximity to several sources of pollution - including a busy railyard, multiple major highways and several major industrial facilities. While current EPA regulations require the agency to consider how each one of these sources, by itself, could impact the health of residents living nearby, it is not required to consider the potential cumulative negative health effect that all of these sources of pollution operating together can have on those living nearby.

DeGette's legislation would change that and would require EPA to start addressing the cumulative impact that multiple sources of pollution are having on an area.

Text of DeGette's legislation is available here.