Issues of Classification in Environmental Equity: How We Manage Is How We Measure
![handle is hein.journals/frdurb21 and id is 643 raw text is: ISSUES OF CLASSIFICATION IN
ENVIRONMENTAL EQUITY: HOW WE
MANAGE IS HOW WE MEASURE
Rae Zimmermant
I. Introduction
Environmental equity' is an increasingly urgent issue on the na-
tional agenda.2 Although legislation is being formulated, numer-
ous administrative actions have placed a high priority upon
environmental equity.3 These efforts have been in response to ob-
servations of the racial, ethnic, and economic inequities throughout
the 1980s.4
The underlying forces contributing to this interest in environ-
mental equity and its origins are numerous and complex. They in-
clude the role of the civil rights movement in environmental
justice, the shift toward grass roots environmentalism, widespread
t Professor of Planning and Public Administration, New York University, Rob-
ert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Service. B.A., University of California
(Berkeley), 1965; Master of Urban Planning, University of Pennsylvania, 1969; Ph.D.,
Columbia University, 1972.
1. A distinction is made here between environmental equity and justice. Equity
typically refers to the distribution of amenities and disadvantages across individuals
and groups. Justice, however, focuses more on procedures to ensure fair distribution.
Fairness refers to where one group or individual disproportionately bears the burdens
of an action.
2. Several bills introducing an Environmental Justice Act have appeared before
Congress over the past couple of years. See, e.g., S.1161, 103d Cong., 1st Sess. (1993);
H.R. 2105, 103d Cong., 1st Sess. (1993). A final version is expected to be passed in
the near future. On February 11, 1994, the President signed Executive Order 12898,
59 Fed. Reg. 7,629 (1994), which called for environmental justice to be addressed in
certain federal actions (federally funded and affecting human health or the
environment).
3. At the federal level, see, for example, U.S. ENVTL. PROTECTION AGENCY, EN-
VIRONMENTAL EQUITY: REDUCING RISK FOR ALL COMMUNITIES (June 1992). The
United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has established an internal
Office of Environmental Equity and has formed environmental justice task forces to
participate in a number of EPA initiated comparative risk projects.
4. U.S. GEN. ACCOUNTING OFFICE, SITING OF HAZARDOUS WASTE LANDFILLS
AND THEIR CORRELATION WITH RACIAL AND ECONOMIC STATUS OF SURROUNDING
COMMUNITIES (June 1, 1983); COMM'N ON RACIAL JUSTICE, UNITED CHURCH OF
CHRIST, TOXIC WASTES AND RACE IN THE UNITED STATES (1987) [hereinafter UCC
REPORT]; Marianne Lavelle & Marcia Coyle, Unequal Protection: The Racial Divide
in Environmental Law, NAT'L L.J., Sept. 21, 1992.
633](ViewImageLocal?handle=hein.journals/frdurb21&div=30&collection=&method=preview&ext=.png&size=3)
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Issues of Classification in Environmental Equity: How We Manage Is How We Measure
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