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Building social resilience in Great Lakes areas of concern communities
Citation:
Josephs, J., T. Hollenhorst, M. Wick, AND T. Angradi. Building social resilience in Great Lakes areas of concern communities. St. Louis River Virtual Summit, Duluth, MN, March 01 - 03, 2021. https://doi.org/10.23645/epacomptox.14135822
Impact/Purpose:
This presentation will provide an overview of the relationship between AOC contamination, clean up, and social justice. This information is highly transferable to other AOC, communities, and decision contexts
Description:
For decades, the EPA has been working to integrate environmental justice (EJ) and equity through developing guidance materials, programs, tools and research initiatives to protect vulnerable and marginalized populations from the harmful effects of environmental contamination. Fully integrating EJ and equity is a work in progress, but the unified calls from marginalized communities for racial justice and equity indicates an opportunity to significantly advance EPA’s EJ and equity priorities, including support for marginalized communities impacted by AOC contamination. It is well known that marginalized populations are disproportionately exposed to environmental contaminants and bear inequitable health consequences. It is also well known that marginalized populations are confronted with institutional barriers that inhibit equitable access to resources that enable health, wealth and well-being. Marginalized populations are calling on dominant communities to engage with them to identify, recognize and break down the barriers of access and institutional racism and to confront sanctioned practices of racial injustice, discrimination and inequity. Communities impacted by sustained institutional racism and discrimination may experience trauma that contributes to a cycle of disparity and diminished resilience. We will examine the effects of adverse community experiences and illustrate the connection between institutional racism and discrimination, and how those factors impact marginalized community capacity to not only obtain a higher level of resilience to physical, social and environmental challenges, but also to engage in and benefit from AOC projects. This research will identify the need to integrate innovative strategies that extend AOC collaborations beyond the standard boundaries of the water and nearshore remediation, restoration and revitalization activities to effectively and sustainably address SHC goals for equitable community benefit, well-being and social resilience. The contents of this abstract neither constitute nor necessarily reflect US EPA policy.
