The purpose of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s newly created Office of Environmental Justice and External Civil Rights is to solve environmental challenges in underserved communities.
The new office will be made of over “200 EPA staff in EPA headquarters and across 10 regions,” a news release said. The new office merges three existing programs: the Office of Environmental Justice, Conflict Prevention and Resolution Center and External Civil Rights Compliance Office.
EPA Administrator Michael Regan announced the new national office while he was in Warren County, N.C., “the site of protests 40 years ago that launched the environmental justice movement.”
“From day one, President Biden and EPA have been committed to delivering progress on environmental justice and civil rights and ensuring that underserved and overburdened communities are at the forefront of our work,” Regan said in the release. “With the launch of a new national program office, we are embedding environmental justice and civil rights into the DNA of EPA and ensuring that people who’ve struggled to have their concerns addressed see action to solve the problems they’ve been facing for generations.”
A U.S. Senate-confirmed assistant administrator, to be determined, will lead the office. Among several duties, the office will ensure that EPA funding recipients comply with civil rights laws and work to discover the needs of communities with environmental justice concerns.
“President Biden and I have been clear: we must ground our work to address the climate crisis and our greatest environmental challenges in justice and equity,” Vice President Kamala Harris said in the release. “The establishment of a new office dedicated to advancing environmental justice and civil rights at EPA will ensure the lived experiences of underserved communities are central to our decision-making while supporting community-driven solutions.”
The new office will oversee the implementation and delivery of the Inflation Reduction Act’s $3 billion climate and environmental justice block grant program.
“The office also will ensure EPA’s implementation of other funding programs provided by the Inflation Reduction Act, Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, and regular appropriations meet or exceed the President’s Justice40 Initiative,” the release said.
