White House Forum on Environmental Justice

Audience Comments
Legal Framework for Advancing Environmental Justice Session
December 16, 2010

Robert Bullard, Clark Atlanta University (audio)

Good morning. My name is Robert Bullard, and I direct the Environmental Justice Resource
Center at Clark Atlanta University. I think this is historic in having this meeting, but history can
only take us so far. I think the frustration that was voiced by Suzie Canales from Corpus Christi
is the lingering frustration that exists in many communities that are impacted directly by
environmental assault. Since the panel was on energy, on green jobs and clean energy and
sustainability, I think it’s important to understand that while the nation and our policymakers talk
about going green and clean energy, communities like Corpus Christi and other communities are
still being bombarded with dirty industry. [Applause] As the nation goes green, communities of
color are getting, are being pushed on with dirty coal-fired power plants that are on the drawing
boards, that are being proposed, as we talk about renewables and green. As we talk about green
energy, TVA and other power companies are pushing toxic coal ash in communities of color and
low-income communities. This is real, while we’re talking about this stuff.

So we should emphasize the fact that this is a very important meeting, but while these folks go
back home, they’re having to deal with these proposals and fighting these state agencies,
environmental agencies, that don’t protect them [applause], and so a lot of the communities are
looking to the federal government to do the things that our state environmental agencies won’t
do. Let’s be real. I’m not a lawyer so you don’t have to rein me in. I don’t have any minutes, and
I’ve got a chance this afternoon to say the same thing. But I just couldn’t sit here while things
were not said, you know.

I am strong supporter of the EPA, and the EPA has done a great job in moving the environmental
justice agenda where it was not being dealt with before.

But I do think, if this forum was organized by EPA, and EPA had the lead in organizing, I think
it would be very different. Not to be too critical, but I am going to be critical. CEQ has no
experience in working with our communities, and justice communities, and they should have
known, you should have known, that if you get us in a room, that we will flip the agenda.
[laughter, applause] You should have known that. Thank you very much.

Oh, one last point. Green jobs, that should be expanded beyond “green collar” to talk about green
careers. We need to be training young people, people of color, to do the technology, the science
and math and those new jobs that are going to be created so we can compete with the rest of the
jobs. Green collar jobs are great, but we need to have the science and the high-powered kinds of
training. I worked on a HBCU, Historically Black College and University, and we have been
doing that for a long time, with little money, little money.

Sacoby Wilson, University of South Carolina (audio)

Good morning. My name is Dr. Sacoby Wilson, University of South Carolina. I’m here on behalf
of one of my mentors, Mr. Omega Wilson, who is unable to be with us today. He’s with the West
End Revitalization Association, the community-based organization in Mebane, North Carolina,
that submitted an administrative complaint to block the 118 Bypass, in Mebane, North Carolina,
over 10 years ago.

And the issue that I want to raise is: How is the EPA in regards to Omega’s communities, and
other communities that are impacted by environmental justice. And actually, I’d like to present a
couple of other terms. I think EJ is too nice of a term. Can we use the “impact of environmental
slavery?” Can we use “the impact of environmental oppression?” Who’ve been bombarded, as
Dr. Bullard said, who’ve been burdened by these issues? What legal frameworks are going to be
really be implemented to take these administrative complaints that are backlogged right now, that
haven’t been addressed in the last 10 years or so, 12 years, and what other sort of legal
frameworks going beyond sort of the national frameworks that we have, using some of the
human rights frameworks that are out there, too, because we’re not even talking about that body
of law that’s out there that would allow us to really get these issues. These are human rights
issues. It’s not just civil rights, it’s human rights. So we have to really to fight environmental
oppression, to fight environmental genocide, to fight environmental slavery, we need to take
Title VI [of the Civil Rights Act of 1964)], this executive order [1994’s Executive Order (E.O.)
12898], this human rights frameworks out there to really get at these issues.

Like I said, we made progress, I don’t want to be too critical, but I think there needs to be more
work done to do that.

And also, as relates to having lawyers involved in the process, there are many community groups
who don’t have access to lawyers. So when you have government agencies, industries, that have
their lawyers, when community groups are going to the meeting, they’re naked. They need
lawyers, too. So if you’ve got your lawyers, where are my lawyers?

So what efforts are the EPA going to take, what efforts are the DOJ to take, to make sure
communities have their lawyers too, who can be the soldiers, and be on the front lines to help
those communities be able to activate, to engage, and be able to stop, block and improve, prevent
and mitigate – whatever verb you want to use – to make sure they have sustainability and help
the community. So that’s my question, comment, thank you.
Beverly Wright, Dillard University (audio)

I’m Dr. Beverly Wright, director of the Deep South Center for Environmental Justice at Dillard
University in New Orleans, Louisiana, and I just wanted to raise something that’s of real concern
for those of us who live in the Gulf Coast, but specifically, to the city of New Orleans, where
we’re watching what we call “disaster capitalism” really take hold and is oppressing our people
in all kinds of ways, but specifically, as it relates to environmental pollution.

We’re now being faced with having to fight a gasification plant that they want to put of course in
the neighborhood that’s 85 percent African-American, right under the high rise, where we hear
there could be vapor plumes and all kinds of other things happening. We’re starting to feel like
we might have a hard time fighting this. We’ve asked EPA, for example, to look into the
permitting process and see if we can get some response from them on whether or not, you know,
this thing is safe. All of our research basically shows that it isn’t, but there’s so little research out
there, that it’s almost as if EPA can’t make a statement because they don’t have data. So we
become the guinea pigs for something that’s extremely dangerous.

We don’t know how to fight this. We’re trying to fight it through the city. They’re talking about
waste to energy, that kind of process, where they’re going to turn waste to energy, which of
course sounds good, if it’s brought in as an alternative energy kind of facility. We are just
extremely concerned. We need some help in fighting this kind of unproven technology that they
want to put on us. Of course, the reason for this – Katrina, and the debris, and we don’t have a
comprehensive waste management plan in the city.

Transcribed by Carter Wood