2022 National Environmental Justice Conference and Training Program, Day 2
Register for The 2022 National Environmental Justice Conference and Training Program at the Washington Marriott at Metro Center
8:00 a.m.—4:00 p.m.
Exhibit Hall Open
Conference Facilitator Ms. Carolyn Sawyer Communications Strategist Tom Sawyer Company
8:30 a.m.—9:15 a.m.
PANEL: Community and College Partners Program (C2P2): Developing Alternative Energy Options for Indigenous People in Tyonek, Alaska
Michael Burns Founder/Executive Director C2P2
Margaret McCurdy Graduate Student, Peace Engineering Program Drexel University Philadelphia, PA
Joan Nguyen Graduate Student, Peace Engineering Program Drexel University Philadelphia, PA
Kate Ryan Graduate Student, Peace Engineering Program Drexel University Philadelphia, PA
9:15 a.m.—9:55a.m.
Introduction of Keynote Speakers
Dr. Melinda Downing Environmental Justice Program Manager U.S. Department of Energy
KEYNOTE REMARKS
The Honorable James E. Clyburn Majority Whip (Democrat, 6th District, South Carolina)
The Honorable Jennifer Granholm Secretary U.S. Department of Energy
9:55 a.m.—10:05 a.m.
BREAK
10:05 a.m.—11:15 a.m.
PANEL: Estimating Disproportionate Impacts of Climate Change on Childhood Asthma Rates Among Socially Vulnerable Populations in the U.S.
Margaret Black Abt Associates
Stefani L. Penn Industrial Economics, Inc. (IEc)
Lauren E. Gentile U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
Estimating the Benefits of Reduced Air Pollution During COVID-19 for Socially Vulnerable Populations in New York City.
David Cooley Abt Associates
11:15 a.m.—12:15 p.m.
PANEL: USDA Forest Service’s Environmental Justice and Climate Change Related Topics.
Elisabeth Grinspoon, Ph.D. Environmental Justice and Technology Transfer Specialist Office of Sustainability and Climate USDA Forest Service
Dixie Porter Deputy Director Office of Sustainability and Climate (OSC)
USDA Forest Service
12:15 p.m.—12:30 p.m.
BREAK
12:30 p.m.—1:45 p.m.
LUNCH
Introduction of Luncheon Keynote Speaker
Dr. Melinda Downing Environmental Justice Program Manager U.S. Department of Energy
KEYNOTE REMARKS
The Honorable David Turk Deputy Secretary United States Department of Energy Washington, D.C.
1:45 p.m. – 2:00 p.m.
BREAK
2:00 p.m. – 3:00 p.m.
PRESENTATIONS:
Approaches for Evaluating Environmental Justice Issues at the State Level
Lisa McDonald, PhD Senior Associate Abt Associates
Appliance Standards: The Best Climate Change Policy You’ve Never Heard Of
Madeline Parker Outreach & Coalition-Building Associate Appliance Standards Awareness Project (ASAP)
3:00 p.m.—4:00 p.m.
PRESENTATIONS:
Bridging America’s Outdoor Equity Gap
Diane Regas President and CEO The Trust for Public Land
In Defense of a Greenspace: Students Discover Agency in the Practice of Community-Engaged Technical Communication
Bob Hyland Associate Professor University of Cincinnati
DAY 2 – Thursday, March 10, 2022 TECHNICAL ASSISTANCE WORKSHOPS AND TRAINING PROGRAMS
Grand Ballroom Salon E
10:00 a.m.–-11:00 a.m.
What’s in My Neighborhood? How Communities Can Use EPA’s TRI Toxics Tracker to Identify Industrial Sources of Toxic Chemical Releases and Other Waste Management Activities.
EPA’s Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) Program provides a detailed, multimedia dataset covering annual releases and other waste management activities from over 20,000 facilities in the United States for hundreds of different toxic chemicals. EPA makes these data available to the public, which can help inform decision-making by government agencies, community groups, companies, and other stakeholders. This training workshop will provide users with a basic introduction to the TRI Program and what types of data and information are collected by the EPA, as well as a live demonstration of the online TRI Toxics Tracker tool. TRI Toxics Tracker can be used to answer a variety of questions all in one place, such as what toxic chemical releases are occurring in a particular community with EJ concerns and which facilities might be contributing to disproportionate releases potentially affecting nearby residents.
T.J. Pepping Abt Associates
11:15 a.m.—12:15 p.m.
Pragmatic Approaches: Reaching Students in Areas with Limited Broadband to Access College Education
Lack of broadband access is a limiting factor to academic advancement of a remarkable number of youths in rural areas in America and worldwide. It has been documented that in rural areas, nearly one-fourth of the population – 14.5 million people lack access to this service. In tribal areas, nearly one-third of the population lacks access. Even in areas where broadband is available, approximately 100 million Americans still do not subscribe (FCC 2022). Consequently, an outreach was conducted in a rural area (Marion) of South Carolina with ineffective or no access to broadband. Parents and their high schoolers were invited. During this event, we had on board from Allen University, officials from the admission office, financial aid office, the university counsellors, a faculty and one junior student from Allen University.
Application forms were already printed out and handed over to high schoolers during this outreach. Seven high school students completed the application form on the spot. The financial aid officer succeeded in assisting one of these seven students to complete her FAFSA right on the spot using our personal hotspot internet access provided at the outreach site. Application forms were given to the high school students that attended with the promise to share with their friends. It is uber-important for colleges to make concerted efforts in reaching suburbs with limited broadband access. Such that youths in these areas will not be left behind. This workshop intends to shed more light on pragmatic approaches employed to forestall bottlenecks encountered during the outreach.
Oluwole Ariyo, PhD Principal Investigator, Environmental Justice Institute Allen University
2:00 p.m.—4 p.m.
EJ & NEPA Workshop: Considering Cumulative Effects and EJ in the NEPA Process
Increasingly, decisionmakers are recognizing the importance of looking at projects in the context of prior impacts and developments within the community or region. Direct effects continue to be most important to decisionmakers, in part because they are more certain. Nonetheless, the importance of other environmental stressors requires the need to address cumulative impacts on environmental justice (EJ) populations. The purpose of the workshop is to increase understanding of cumulative effects consideration of environmental justice (EJ) populations in the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) review process. The specific focus is the importance of understanding cumulative effects are caused by the aggregate of past, present, and reasonably foreseeable future actions that, for many EJ populations, may last for many years beyond the life of the action that caused the effects. The goal is to provide an understanding of the principles of a cumulative effects analysis within Environmental Justice (EJ) communities.
The Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) published their Phase 1 revisions to the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) Regulations which focused on a narrow set of changes to the 2020 regulations that restores some of the regulatory provisions from the 1978 NEPA Regulations. One of the changes restores the definition of “effects,” including use of the terms “direct,” “indirect,” and “cumulative” and removed potential limitations on effects analysis.
The NEPA Subcommittee of the White House Interagency Environmental Justice Council (WHEJAC) formally known as the Federal Interagency Working Group on Environmental Justice (EJ IWG), produced the “Promising Practices for EJ Methodologies in NEPA Reviews” (Promising Practices Report) and address various methodologies for addressing effects within an EJ analysis and will be utilized in this session.
The workshop is designed to address the changes in NEPA regulations, provide expectations for cumulative effects analysis and provide case study examples for cumulative effects.
Denise C. Freeman Co-chair, NEPA Committee, WH EJ Interagency Council Senior Advisor/Communications Liaison Office of Legacy Management U.S. Department of Energy
Jomar Maldonado Director for NEPA Council on Environmental Quality Executive Office of the President
Carolyn L. Nelson, P.E. Co-chair, NEPA Committee, WH EJ Interagency Council Sr. Project Development/Environmental Specialist Office of Project Development and Environmental Review USDOT-Federal Highway Administration