WEI EMPOWERING and WORKING WITH COMMUNITIES DISPROPORTIONATELY EXPOSED TO ENVIRONMENTAL TOXINS
• The Phillips Neighborhood Environmental Justice Education and Advocacy Collaborative (Phillips EJEAC)
is focused on researching the connection between known environmental
toxins and public health problems in this low-income, Indigenous and
community of color neighborhood in South Minneapolis. A toxic site
mapping phase has been completed and a door-to-door health survey is
being conducted by 10 neighborhood-based workers hired and trained by
WEI. The community-based steering committee, Phillips Environmental Steering Committee Initiative ( PESCI)
has grown to represent the broad base of community, including
individuals and organizational stakeholders that have been with it for
two years. PESCI developed the survey and is providing the remarkably
strong and creative grass-roots leadership and guidance for this
on-going project. WEI’s ultimate aim is to support and empower this
community in its efforts to create a safe and healthy living
environment for all of its residents, in particular its treasured
children.
• WEI's PESCI also led the advocacy effort that created unprecedented and historically far-reaching public policy. The 2008 MN Legislature passed legislation which requires that a "cumulative health impact analysis" be
done by the MN Pollution Control Agency before a polluting industry can
be sited in the Phillips Neighborhood. The Neighborhood;s environmental
injustice burdens were identified in detail and mapped out on a GIS
format as the criteria to be consider. Residents testified and learned
about policy-making processes. This victory created a new policy model
to challenge environmental justice issues in the state and the U.S. WEI
continues to receive inquiries from other states and communities
seeking to replicate our success.
• After an initial 11-month organizing effort, WEI's East Metro EJEAC is
now poised for the shift from strategic planning to implementation of a
right-to-know initiative that will serve and be guided by Hmong,
Latino, Indigenous and other East Side communities of color. WEI's
initial collaboration with Hmong community leaders resulted in the
creation of culturally appropriate educational materials about toxic
environmental exposures and in well-attended environmental justice
training sessions for the Hmong community, including clan leaders and
youth participants. It is clear that East Metro resident's awareness
about toxic exposures in their own East Metro urban neighborhoods is
being raised and there is particular concern about the impact on
children, pregnant women and elders The materials include substantive
information about the recently revealed perfluroro-chemical (PFC)
contamination about which those communities have received little or
no culturally appropriate information from public health or pollution
control agencies. A strong community-based steering committee has
been created and is providing consistent leadership and guidance to
WEI's principle investigator, Fardin Oliaei. WEI is seeking funding to
hire a project coordinator as the collaboration expands and moves
forward. Working with the East Side Neighborhood Economic Development
Company;s Latino and Native American outreach workers, the project has
begun to develop the culturally specific materials needed as these
community representatives. have become part of the Steering Committee
and its strategic plan for community outreach, education and civic
engagement.
WEI's Climate Justice Collaboration with the Environmental Justice Advocates of MN (EJAM) initially focused on developing culturally
appropriate community education materials and convenings to explore the
disproportionate impact of global climate change on several local low-
income, Indigenous and comunities of color. That has led to a strong
focus on "green jobs" strategies aimed at ensuring these same
communities will fairly share in benefits from the new "green energy
development" opportunities. WEI's priority is rooted in our Phillips
EJEAC
comnunity base and as steering committee members of Winona LaDuke's "Green Jobs for Brown People" Working Group in Minnesota.
