Law Commons^™

Environmental Burdens And Democratic Justice, Gerald Torres

Fordham Urban Law Journal

To date, however, there has been relatively little academic discussion about how EPA and other federal agencies can achieve environmental justice. In addition, most legal academic literature has focused either on simply identifying the legal issues associated with race and environmental law or on developing a litigation strategy for remedying “environmental racism.” None of the legal academic literature has focused on the benefits of using an administrative framework to define or develop sustainable solutions to the distributional inequities of environmental laws. The purpose of this Article is to explain the benefits of pursuing an administrative model for change. Unlike other …

The Role Of Existing Environmental Laws In The Environmental Justice Movement, Michael B. Gerrard

Faculty Scholarship

I will focus on what can and cannot be done under the existing statutory and regulatory structures and the common law to protect minority communities from environmental hazards. I will highlight some of the current holes in the legal system to suggest areas where statutory reform might be useful. Fights against these facilities break down between future unbuilt facilities, on the one hand, and existing facilities on the other hand.

A broad array of statutes regulates future facilities, such as landfills, incinerators, interstate highways, and polluting factories. Some of these laws are aimed at providing information and requiring the decision …