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The roots of Environmental Justice (EJ) trace back to the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Under Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, each Federal agency is required to ensure that no person is excluded from participation in, denied the benefit of, or subjected to discrimination under any program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance on the basis of race, color, or national origin. FHWA's Title VI Program expands this protection against discrimination to include age, sex, disability, and low-income; limited English proficiency is covered under the Title VI statute within the national origin protected class.
Historically, communities of color, which were often poor, have served as sites for facilities that have negative environmental impacts. Such facilities include landfills, industrial plants, and waste treatment facilities. Siting of these facilities near minority and low-income populations helped fuel the EJ movement and served as a means by which to bring attention to and address the inequity of environmental protection within their communities. The implementation of The National Environmental Policy Act of 1969 (NEPA) helped address some of the concerns identified by this movement, as it stressed the importance of providing all Americans "safe, healthful, productive, and esthetically pleasing surroundings," and provided a requirement for taking a "systematic, interdisciplinary approach" to aid in considering environmental and community factors in decision-making.
The concept of EJ was further developed in the 1980s as The Civil Rights Restoration Act of 1987 clarified the intent of Title VI to include all program and activities of Federal-aid recipients, sub-recipients and contractors whether those programs and activities are federally funded or not. In 1992, responding to the growing attention on EJ, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) established the Office of Environmental Equity, later renamed the Office of Environmental Justice. In 2011 the National Environmental Justice Advisory Council formed as a Federal advisory committee to EPA. Since then the Council has provided advice and recommendations to all stakeholders involved in the EJ dialogue.
On February 11, 1994, President Clinton signed Executive Order 12898 - Federal Actions to Address Environmental Justice in Minority Populations and Low-Income Populations. The Executive Order requires that each Federal agency shall, to the greatest extent allowed by law, administer and implement its programs, policies, and activities so as to identify and address "disproportionately high and adverse human health or environmental effects" on minority populations and low-income populations. Following issuance of Executive Order 12898, U.S. DOT established the U.S. DOT EJ Strategy in 1995, and U.S. DOT and FHWA issued EJ Orders in 1997 and 1998, respectively, establishing EJ policies and procedures related to their activities. The executive order also established an Interagency Working Group on Environmental Justice (EJ IWG) chaired by the EPA Administrator and comprised of the heads of 17 Federal agencies and White House offices. This working-group was established to guide, support, and enhance Federal EJ and related community-based activities.
In 2000, President Clinton signed Environmental Justice Executive Order 13166, Improving Access to Services for Persons with Limited English Proficiency. This Order directs Federal agencies and recipients of Federal funds to improve access to services for persons who do not speak English as their primary language and have limited ability to read, speak, write, or understand English. This Order references Title VI and is also relevant to EJ because some minorities and low-income communities may not speak English proficiently enough to have access to public services, including meaningful involvement in public outreach activities for transportation planning, programming, and highway project development.
The support of Environmental Justice has continued as Federal agencies signed a Memorandum of Understanding on Environmental Justice and Executive Order 12898 (EJ MOU) in August 2011, reinforcing and reinvigorating the Federal Government's commitment to EJ. The new EJ MOU requires Federal agencies to revise their EJ strategies, as appropriate, and to publicize the revisions. Each agency under the MOU is required to complete an annual implementation report. To fulfill this obligation, the U.S. DOT) developed a new EJ Strategy in 2015 and a revised EJ Order in 2012, and the operating administrations developed compatible guidance. EPA manages a list of EJ Strategies published by DOT and other members of the EJ Interagency Working Group (IWG).
Rosa Parks and the Montgomery Bus Boycott: Rosa Parks is known as "the mother of the civil rights movement." On December 1, 1955, she refused to give up her seat for a white man on a Montgomery, Alabama, bus. Parks was arrested for her defiance. After she challenged the local segregation ordinance and lost, Parks and others organized the Montgomery bus boycott: "For a little more than a year, we stayed off those busses. We did not return to using public transportation until the Supreme Court said there shouldn't be racial segregation." Parks and others lost their jobs, and she was harassed and threatened. The boycott raised an unknown clergyman named Martin Luther King, Jr., to national prominence and resulted in the US Supreme Court decision outlawing segregation on city buses. Learn more about Rosa Parks and the Montgomery bus boycott.
Freedom Rides: In the Spring of 1961, bus loads of people waged a cross-country campaign to try to end the segregation of bus terminals. The nonviolent protest, however, was brutally received at many stops along the way. The US Supreme Court had already ruled that desegregation of interstate travel was unconstitutional. However, most of the southern interstate bus stations and transportation were segregated.
Baton Rouge Bus Boycott: Baton Rouge was the site for the first successful bus boycott in the 1950s. This boycott became a blueprint for the more publicized boycott in Montgomery, Alabama, in 1955, and set the stage for desegregation in the Deep South.
