BP BHEAD INT S

AN ACT Relating to environmental equity; and creating new sections.

BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF WASHINGTON:

NEW SECTION. Sec. 1. The legislature finds and declares that each community in the state should equitably share the responsibilities, burdens, and benefits of managing and solving the state environmental problems, and the facilities necessary to remedy such problems. The legislature also finds that an inequitable distribution of environmental risks across different population groups has been demonstrated in other areas of the United States. In many of these areas, environmental facility siting and toxic chemical releases have had a disproportionately negative or discriminatory impact on racial minority and low-income communities. In order to determine whether such inequities exist within Washington state, the legislature seeks to (1) identify those areas of the state that are subject to the highest concentrations of toxic chemicals; (2) identify those areas of the state in which the greatest number of environmental facilities have been sited; and (3) collect data on the environmental health effects associated with toxic chemical releases and environmental facilities so that impacts on different individuals and groups can be better understood.

NEW SECTION. Sec. 2. Unless the context clearly requires otherwise, the definitions in this section apply throughout sections 1 through 3 of this act.

(1) "Environmental facility" means a facility that stores, uses, processes, treats, disposes, or releases a toxic chemical and that is subject to a permit, inspection, review, reporting, or registration requirement under state law or under one or more of the following federal laws: The Solid Waste Disposal Act; the Clean Water Act; the federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act; the Occupational Safety and Health Act Hazard Communication Standard; or the Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know Act.

(2) "Low-income community" means any census tract or subdivision thereof in which thirty percent or more of the population lives below the federal poverty level.

(3) "Minority community" means any census tract or subdivision thereof that includes twenty-five percent or more of any ethnic group. (4) "Toxic chemicals" means any substance subject to reporting requirements under the federal Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know Act (42 U.S.C. Sec. 116) on the effective date of this section.

(5) "Tract" means any census tract or block numbering area identified and designated in the state by the United States census bureau in the latest census available.

NEW SECTION. Sec. 3. By June 30, 1995, the department of ecology and the department of health shall jointly prepare a report to the legislature providing information on the distribution of environmental risks in relationship to minority and low-income communities and environmental health effects. The report shall include the following elements:

(1) A breakdown of the population by race and ethnicity, and the percentage of persons below the federal poverty level for each census tract;

(2) A survey indicating the location and types of permitted environmental facilities located within each census tract in the state;

(3) A list of tracts ranked in order of the amount of toxic chemicals released during the most recent five years based on information reported in the toxic release inventory required under the federal Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know Act. For the purposes of this study, the fifty tracts with the highest total toxic releases shall be referred to as "environmental high impact areas";

(4) A description of the nature and extent, if any, of acute and chronic impacts on human health occurring within such environmental high impact areas as compared to other tracts throughout the state. These impacts shall include but not be limited to cancer, birth deformities, elevated infant mortality rates, and respiratory diseases;

(5) A ranking of the relative risks posed by toxic chemicals present in such environmental high impact areas, and by the varied sources of toxic chemicals, both individually and cumulatively;

(6) Identification of any other issues relating to environmental equity that need further study; and

(7) Recommendations on policy options for ensuring fairness in the distribution of environmental risks throughout the state.