CHARLOTTE — In an effort to eliminate Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Accessibility initiatives from the federal government, new EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin closed the agencies environmental justice offices and placed 171 federal workers on administrative leave.
Zeldin argues environmental justice unfairly factors race and background into federal funding decisions, but supporters of environmental initiatives say it’s about ensuring money goes where it’s needed most.
Shannon Binns, the executive director of Sustain Charlotte, points to Charlotte’s Historic West End Green District as an example.
“It’s looking at what are the discrepancies,” he said. “What is needed in one community or for one individual may not the be the same as what’s needed for another individual.”
The west Charlotte neighborhood has a history of poor quality due to nearby industry and highway pollution so CleanAire NC started the initiative to address the problems. In partnership with Mecklenburg County and the federal government, their efforts got an EPA air quality monitor in the neighborhood to provide real-time data on pollution while investment in greenspaces and strategic tree planting has helped them create more natural air filtration.
To Binns, environmental justice is a necessary framework that helps communities identify where communities are suffering most from pollution or face the highest risk from climate disasters. It also factors in the histories of those communities acknowledging that these are places that historically haven’t seen much investment at all, let alone for environmental mitigation. Lastly, he said it’s important to acknowledge these places tend to be low-income areas and, especially in Charlotte and across the Southeast, predominantly Black communities.
“The fact of the matter is that policies and budgets have discriminated against people of color over many decades and really centuries so that requires addressing if we want to give people equal opportunities,” he said.
That’s where Zeldin takes issue. He and the Trump Administration believe focusing on race and inequality adds an unnecessarily ideological spin to the work they do. In a statement regarding his decision to eliminate environmental justice initiatives and positions, he said, “We will be good stewards of tax dollars and do everything in our power to deliver clean air, land, and water to every American, regardless of race, religion, background, and creed.”
Meanwhile, Binns argues ignoring issues of inequality won’t make the issues go away, but if places like Charlotte want to make environmental justice a priority, funding, and support will likely have to come from state or local sources moving forward.
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