Reyna Lee (she/her) 

ELR Staffer, Class of 2026

Environmental justice is the fair treatment and meaningful involvement of all people–regardless of race, color, national origin, or income–with respect to the development, implementation, and enforcement of environmental laws, regulations, policies and activities, as well as the distribution of environmental benefits.

In its latest study released in April of 2024, The NYC Mayor’s Office of Climate and Environmental Justice (EJNYC) identified several environmental inequities, including access to resources, exposure to polluted air, exposure to toxic and hazardous materials, access to safe and healthy housing, polluted water, and exposure to climate change (i.e., extreme heat, extreme rainfall, and coastal storm surge). These environmental inequities create economic, social, and health disparities, mainly in low-income communities and communities of color.

The EJNYC identifies “environmental justice areas”–geographic areas that experience disproportionate negative impacts from environmental pollution due to unequal protection and enforcement of environmental laws and regulations–in their report using the New York State’s Disadvantaged Communities (DAC) designation. The NYS Climate Act created the Climate Justice Working Group (CJWG) and charged it with the development of DAC identification criteria “to ensure that frontline and otherwise underserved communities benefit from the state’s historic transition to cleaner, greener sources of energy, reduced pollution and cleaner air, and economic opportunities.” The DAC designation uses a scoring system based on 45 indicators describing various socio-demographic and environmental conditions across New York State to identify communities burdened by environmental inequities. Examples of scoring indicators used in DAC designation include proximity to active landfills, housing vacancy rate, and driving time to hospitals or urgent care. Based on this methodology, 44 percent of New York City census tracts–containing 49 percent of the city’s population–are DACs. Further, residents of NYC’s DAC census tracts are predominantly Hispanic or Latino (43 percent, compared to 29 percent citywide) and Black (27 percent, compared to 21 percent citywide). Additionally, 24 percent of residents in these areas live below the federal poverty line, compared to 17 percent of residents citywide. These numbers illustrate how communities of color and low-income communities are disproportionately affected by environmental inequities. 

The root cause of many environmental disparities is the unchecked concentration of polluting facilities in historically marginalized DACs. In an effort to combat these environmental inequities, NYS passed the Environmental Justice Siting Law (EJ Siting Law) of 2024. It requires companies and individuals seeking necessary environmental permits from the State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)–the lead agency for reviewing environmental permits for potentially polluting facilities–to consider how their environmental decision-making may pollute disadvantaged communities. The law aims to reverse the trends of environmental injustice that reflect the decades of discriminatory land use policies, redlining, and zoning practices by applying an environmental justice lens to the state’s environmental permitting and land use review processes.

The EJ Siting Law builds on two state legal frameworks: the Uniform Procedures Act (UPA) and the State Environmental Quality Review Act (SEQRA). The UPA standardizes the agency environmental permit review procedures, imposes deadlines for action on reviewing permit applications, and considers permit applications incomplete until all SEQRA requirements have been satisfied. SEQRA requires all local, regional, and state agencies to evaluate the environmental impacts of specific proposed projects like rezonings, large-scale developments, or the siting of industrial facilities. Furthermore, SEQRA requires state agencies to prepare an environmental impact statement that assesses adverse environmental impacts and outlines ways to minimize them.

The EJ Siting Law’s environmental review requirements directly impact New York City DACs by shaping how city projects subject to state review are assessed and influencing how local agencies implement CEQR. In doing so, the EJ Siting Law looks to hold polluters accountable for the environmental damage their projects impose on disadvantaged communities. However, the law’s success depends on how overseeing agencies interpret and enforce its provisions.