Michael Livermore 0:11
Welcome to the free range podcast. I’m your host, Mike Livermore. This episode is sponsored by the program on law communities in the environment at the University of Virginia School of Law. With me today is Gerald Torres, who’s a professor of environmental justice and a professor of law at Yale University. He’s also the director of the Yale Center for Environmental Justice. And Gerald’s really one of the folks especially amongst legal academics, who has been thinking in a deep way about the connection between environmental law and social justice for a long time, both from a scholarly and from a practical perspective. Gerald, thanks so much for joining me today.
Gerald Torres 0:47
Well, thank you, Mike, I’m really grateful for you to give me the time.
Michael Livermore 0:53
So maybe just to kind of start us off, I would love to hear about some of the work that the center has been up to what what kind of things does the the Yale Center for Environmental Justice do?
Gerald Torres 1:06
Well, one of the things we’ve been trying to do, or one of the things, we’re gonna do a number of things, the first thing is to try to link together all of the initiatives across the university that are working in environmental justice, whether or not they characterize as environmental justice, in our view, if it if it is work that can be addressed to the issues that are raised by environmental justice concerns, I want to have those faculty affiliated with the center. So the first thing was to get as many faculty across the university affiliated with center as possible. The second was to work closely with local, regional and state, environmental justice groups, and just do outreach. And so what we did as we met with, with groups and, and just like, when we were working on the executive order in the Clinton administration, what we did is we wanted to take some leadership from the people who are actually out there in the field and doing experiencing the environmental injustice and trying to understand how they characterize us. So that’s the second thing we’re doing. The third thing we’re doing is reaching out to, to tribes. So one of the things we want to do is we want to have a much deeper connection with American Indian Native nations, both to incorporate their concerns into the environmental justice calculus, but also to to try to explicate how they’re different from kind of ordinary environmental justice. And the last thing is to have a clinic, where we’re working on code management issues, and and to get students involved through internships with state, local, regional, and actually national organizations. So we’re, we’re trying to do a lot of things. But but that’s our those have been our main areas of concentration.
Michael Livermore 3:10
Wonderful. Yeah. So it’s such incredibly interesting and important work, you know, in your description of that. And actually think at some point, we need to probably take a step back and explain, you know, what some of these terms are, but just right out of that, right out of the gate, there’s something that I think is really interesting that maybe worth exploring a little bit. So you’ve worked at a several different institutions over the course of your career you’ve been at Yale for for several years now. But But you, you are Texas, you you’ve been at other institutions. And one question I have, as you mentioned, kind of working with with tribes working with tribal governance, presumably, is something that has always struck me and I just be curious about your perspective on this. So I grew up in upstate New York. And on the East Coast, there just seems to be a very different relationship between environmental groups and state, local governments and so on and kind of tribal governance versus out in the west coast, not really even the West Coast, just kind of throughout the rest of the country, the western portion of the country with Northwest and on the coast. And I’m curious, what if you just in your experience working on these issues over the years, and now that you’re on the East Coast, kind of on the ground working with some of these with some of these groups? What what you think about the originality of, of that particular set of issues?
Gerald Torres 4:35
Well, there’s a couple of points that are really important one is most of the, the territory that is trust land, and or under tribal ownership or control is is off the east coast, right? So it’s you when you think of when you think of the larger reservations or land bases for the tribes you think mainly of Western tribes. So that’s one thing. The second thing is a lot of the resource issues
that tribes deal with are treaty based. So if there is not a treaty that speaks directly to to resource management, then then it really does emerge through the cooperation between state and local government, governments and tribal governance. Now, one of the things that’s just true, and it’s true in the east, and it’s true in the West, is that the the issues well, you can think of tribal issues as being in some measure, really fundamental that is there, they they emerged when the nation emerged. They they manifest as local issues. So you know, in the year from, from your part of the world, right, you’re from upstate New York or Central New York, really, I think, aren’t you? You know, they’re, you know, the fishing issues, and trust land issues were were big, and the Finger Lakes, you know, remain at a place where so this, these resource issues relating to kind of Aboriginal land that is not technically under tribal control still remain live. So that’s the one big difference where you have a treaties, like say, the Stephens treaties, this tribe in the Pacific Northwest, there you have specific obligations to that govern, you know, fishery resources, whether shellfish or finned fish, land and water usage, a lot of timber issues. So you have those kinds of issues. And when I say West, I actually, you know, in my imagination, I’m thinking from the Midwest, West, Mississippi, West Mississippi West. Exactly. But that doesn’t mean that these issues aren’t live in the east. One of the things that’s emerged, and you probably you’re probably sensitive this action down in Virginia, is there are tribes with Aboriginal claims that are not within the legal control of tribes or the federal government? Sometimes they’re in control of the state government, a lot of times are in private hands. And so one of the questions for the Eastern work is how do you navigate those those issues? I think that’s, that’s one of the things that makes it considerably different.
Michael Livermore 7:56
Yeah. And it’s a fascinating set of issues. And and we could probably spend the whole podcast talking about those. But maybe, maybe just to take a step back, what you were mentioning that part of the work of the center is pulling together work that’s happening across the university that is kind of related to environmental justice. And I know universities, in many places, including here, you know, often have lots of different work, but people aren’t necessarily coordinating with each other and communicating. But one of the things that occurs to me is, I don’t know, maybe an initial challenge, or an initial opportunity of doing that kind of work is, is having a chance to reflect on what do we mean, when we think about environmental justice? What makes someone’s work kind of environmental justice, adjacent or related, or are in the core versus worked in my head to do with environmental science or some other broadly environmental or sustainability? But maybe, you know, doesn’t fit cleanly under the rubric of environmental justice? Is there a mental model that you have when you’re kind of thinking about how, you know, presumably, you’re casting a relatively wide net, but how do you say kind of what’s, who are the people that we and what’s the kind of work that we want to make sure that we bring into the ambit of environmental justice?
Gerald Torres 9:06
Well, the one group I clearly wanted to to work with is the School of Public Health, because the School of Public Health, while they may not conceive of the work they’re doing as environmental justice work, of course, it you know, of course, it is coming, because what they’re concerned about are the problems of health related issues. And then the the, the social mechanisms that produce the harms, and the extent to which they, you know, affect identifiable communities. So, the School of Public Health, for example, is a big one. Well, one of the things that’s emerged when you think about casting the mental net is and I think perhaps COVID accentuated this is the impact of lack of access to environmental amenities, the impact that that has on on mental health and stress, and then the related physical infirmities that are tied to excess stress. And so you see things that people wouldn’t think of as being strictly environmental, but they’re tied to the way we manage our resources and our environmental amenities. So that’s one. The second thing, of course, is to, is to work with people who are doing environmental science, and to ask questions about the application of the work they’re doing to a particular communities. So the the work in, in working in the natural sciences, but also in the work in economics, how do you, how do you apply discount rates? How do you, you know, think about regulatory issues? And should the disparate impacts of one strategy or another, affect the way they they think about this? Now, the last thing I’m gonna say, which is, is probably not thought of as an environmental justice issue exactly. But I think it’s coming more and more to broad awareness is the impact of migration that is driven by environmental issues, primarily climate migration, but in fact, migration around the country, and what impact that has on both located people and recognizing that, that the environment has something to say about about all this. Now, one of the interesting things about that, is I’ve been able to work with some of the local land trusts who, you know, did not conventionally view their work as environmental justice work, but now see that one of their missions, right is to make green space more broadly available. And in In fact, I have worked with, with a couple of land trusts, not local, but land trusts across the country, who are interested in exploring kind of land back issue. So that means, you know, you could think of land use people in the law school, for example, actually been involved in environmental justice issues, you can think of finance people, right? How are how is property finance? What is the impact of the wealth disparities that have been historically built up? And how should you think about that in the context of environmental justice issues? So there are a lot of things that faculty members are doing across the university, that are even to use your term environmentally adjacent, not strictly speaking, environmental, but have consequences on the way in which we, you know, we, we think about the place we live and the kinds of, you know, access to the amenities that a lot of us take for granted, but in fact, often on the border, and apologize for yakking on and on, but, you know, the, the, the impact of heat stress is not evenly pushed across communities. And so you want to work with people who are looking at at, you know, climate issues, and how those climate issues have a, a kind of local impact.
Michael Livermore 14:08
Yeah, you know, so as we’ve kind of so that’s a big is kind of, you know, that’s a big net, right, there’s a lot, you know, there’s a lot there’s a lot of different kinds of work happening there. And one question that I sometimes ask my students, I would just be curious what your what your thinking is on this is, when you think about environmental justice, environmental justice issues, do you think of these as kind of a subset of a kind of broader social justice set of claims or just justice claims more generally? And then we’re asking, Okay, we have a social justice mindset and we’re interested in applying that to to land or to property kind of real property or to environmental pollution or pollution control, etc, etc, kind of stuff that’s broadly environmental, but we’re applying a social justice frame the same way that we could apply a social justice frame to ask about policing or about education or about healthcare disparities or kind of whatever else we might be interested in. And so is it is it a subset of that kind of broader concern? Or do you see environmental justices, kind of somehow distinct and different? So it’s not like kind of parallel to justice, in the housing context or in the policing context or in the educational context or whatever else? It has something that kind of a special sauce, in some sense that separates it or makes it distinctive from these other areas?
Gerald Torres 15:38
Well, the I think the, you know, the one thing that I would say, that makes it distinctive, is that when you, you know, study the environment, and you know, this as well as anyone, one of the things that immediately emerges is the the linkages across media across, you know, areas of interest. So, for example, let’s take housing, the you might think of that as your main, mainly issues of social justice, but then you think about, okay, that what’s the impact of poor housing on energy use? How is that going to drive issues of energy efficiency, or, you know, people are now talking about, you know, energy transition? How should we understand the linkage between housing and energy? And what’s the, what’s the impact of that, on justice issues? And that’s, I think, you know, so it’s sort of a subset, but it’s also driven by the special concerns that that the environment raises. So I mean, you could think of, of say, toxics regulation. You know, broadly speaking, one of the things you want to do is, you know it through environmental regulations is to limit the the number and kinds of toxins that that people are exposed to. So then you you have to ask, Are there issues with the regulatory structure, that mean that certain communities are going to be more subjected to the hazards of toxins than than others? Now, is that just a social justice spraying? Sort of, but it’s also a question about regulatory structure? That is, what were we trying to achieve with this regulation? And does the regulation actually do it? So it it actually provides a lens on the way law works completely apart from the social justice part of it on on whether the law is doing the kinds of things that we intended them to do? So it’s, you know, I think the short answer to your question is, is yes, it’s in some parts it’s a it’s a subset. So things like participant participation. That’s a clear social justice issue. But it’s also a general issue related to governance, and how–and to regulation. And you know, who should have a say, how do we make decisions? So those are, in some ways derivative of social justice claims, but I think the the environment, what it does is it asks you to take a broader look, and sometimes a deeper look at particular issues. So you know, the the impact of heat, for example, that I talked about earlier, what the if you look at the the the public health research these days, what you’re discovering is, again, it has significant psychological and mental health impacts. Well, what is the effect of those, what are the effects of those impacts on other aspects of social behavior? And how should we be thinking about that, to build the kind of society we want to live in? So yes, it’s it’s adjacent, but it’s not just a subset.
Michael Livermore 19:29
Yeah, I mean, that makes that makes perfect sense to me. And I, it’s interesting that so when I think of the distinction between environmental justice and there’s a, you know, another, you know, there’s lots of different ways of kind of slicing and dicing these issues. I also think of kind of distribution like concerns about the distribution of, you know, the cost of of environmental harm, right. And the ways that exactly he stresses inequitably distributed, or exposure to pollutants is our inequity in that globally distributed. And and that’s that kind of concern is an environmental justice concern. But what you were just mentioning, I’ve always been impressed by and just noticed, and it’s, I think, just an important part of the movement, that it does have this process orientation, who’s at the table, who gets to say, who’s been consulted. And I’ve always thought that was, that was a very distinctive feature of the environmental justice movement is that it wasn’t just or wasn’t exclusively focused on outcomes, right, even if somehow we were to reduce and eliminate all those disparities, that wouldn’t be sufficient if the, you know, the process was a kind of top down process where the communities weren’t consulted, and all those kinds of things. I wonder if you you agree that that’s something that’s kind of distinctive about the environmental justice movement?
Gerald Torres 20:51
I absolutely agree with that. I mean, one of the, you know, the, the, it, depending on where you date, you know, the origins of the environmental justice movement. Early on, it was concerned primarily with distribution, but the distributive impacts of pollution, who is going to carry the burden of our, you know, modern industrial economy? And are there communities that are more heavily, you know, freighted with, with the burden of our industrial economy? That’s one, but simultaneously, early on. And this arose in the context of kind of what used to be called the environments for full employment, which were union based environmental justice groups, where they clearly early on said, you know, one of the things we’ve got to be concerned about is the impact of the decisions we make on the economy, and making sure that, that we take kind of economic benefits, broadly speaking into account one, and second that we take, you know, exposure in the workplace as an environmental issue, and often an environmental injustice, that ought to be, you know, fitted within the, the environmental justice rubric, as the as the movement went forward, the question of how decisions get made, became central. And I think, I don’t think there’s anybody in the environmental justice movement today, who would say that, you know, equally distributing the pollution load, it means that we’re, we’ve achieved justice, they want to say, first of all, we want to look at how those decisions are made, who’s at the table, and we’ve got to be committed to a reduction of exposure for all people. So so it’s, you know, it’s, it’s definitely moved beyond that. But the process piece has has and early on, emerged as a really critical piece, because without people being at the table, or being aware of how decisions are getting made, they wouldn’t feel that that their issues and their interests have been adequately protected.
Michael Livermore 23:37
You know, speaking of the, thinking about the kind of longer scope of environmental justice, and just over the course of the time that the movements been active, you mentioned earlier, executive order 12 898, which was Bill Clinton’s executive order, as you will know, on environmental justice, we’re, we’re coming up on the 30th anniversary of that document. And I’m curious about, you know, both kind of whether you see that executive order, I think many people do as an important inflection point in this history that we’ve just been kind of, you know, briefly surveying and, you know, looking back at that executive order, you know, what do you if you have it just thoughts on on its importance, and, you know, if some of the or, you know, promises that haven’t been fulfilled, or just, you know, yeah, just reflections on that, that important document.
Gerald Torres 24:31
Well, I, you know, having, you know, worked very hard on that document. I shouldn’t let you know, pride of authorship, interfere with my judgment, you know, in some ways, we it was a, it was a first cut of the federal level. And what we were attempting to do initially was to get the federal house in order. And so, besides doing an important thing, which was creating some definitions for environmental justice communities so that we would know who we’re talking about. I mean, that was the first thing. I think that’s been refined and the most recent efforts at incorporating environmental justice into environmental policy take a hard look at that. That’s one. Second, it was to ask how can the agencies themselves start to incorporate environmental justice concerns in their basic processes? Now, the problem we face way back when right was that that many agencies, you know, initially considered that beyond their mandate. But what President Clinton required was for the agencies to begin to structure a strategic plan for integrating environmental justice concerns in their decision making. Now the the, the theory behind the executive order, I think was was important. You know, it, looking at it, looking back now 30 years, could we have done a better job? Absolutely. Do I wish we knew then what we know now? Absolutely. Right. But the theory, I think, is probably still a good theory. I don’t know, when you teach NEPA, the National Environmental Policy Act, I’m not sure, I’m not sure if you teach it, but when you can teach it. Right. You know, it’s, it turns out, it’s one of the, you know, the most important environmental statutes that people use both to get information about projects, but also to intervene in processes where they can but remember, initially, or maybe you’re too young to remember this, you’re not an old guy like me. When it was adopted, early environmentalists basically thought, Oh, this is meaningless. Right? There’s no substantive law to apply here. You know, this is just this is this is not going to be an effective statute that we can’t enforce it. But in fact, what it did do, is it integrated environmental thinking into the decision making processes of government agencies. And when I went back and looked at NEPA decisions, you know, NEPA has not substantively stopped any project. But what it has done is to improve the decision making of government so that the government now takes environmental issues at the beginning of a project rather than as an add on at the end. The Environmental Justice Executive Order was designed to try and do the same thing. What we want to do is to put environmental justice, the calculus of environmental justice, in the initial thought processes of agencies, so that over time, we would improve the decision making from the perspective and environmental justice of agencies that are undertaking activities that have an impact on environmental justice communities. I think that has hasn’t been a, you know, a rip roaring success. But it has been more than just window dressing. And I think that’s important.
Michael Livermore 28:35
Yeah, and it was, I mean, thinking back, it was also just the recognition that this was a real movement, and it was in a had, you know, as an important constituency, and that it was something that it needed to be addressed. I mean, they just hadn’t been at the federal level. Any statement along those lines. It’s certainly not at the same, the same level of provenance before the executive order.
Gerald Torres 29:01
Oh, absolutely. I mean, one of the there’s two things. One is what I teach environmental justice, what I like to tell people, and it’s probably true about the environmental movement, too, but certainly true about the environmental justice movement, is that it was it was movement based. It grew out of, of social activism, of communities of non experts, right mobilizing to try to address harms that they were experiencing, and to get people to be held accountable for those harms. So it was it was the initial process was to take what people were experiencing that lived experience translated into legal principles and legal mechanisms that would address those, those concerns, and then to refine in those, those legal tools, as we gained more experience and more understanding, but it really fundamentally, was movement based, and but for the environmental justice movement, Bill Clinton would never have have, you know, initiated an executive order to process for environmental justice. And I think that, that, that that needs to be underlined, because it’s, you know, I hate to joke about, but politicians, but the, you know, the one thing that every politician can do is count. And when you have a expanding constituency for a particular issue, it starts to matter. And I think that’s what environmental justice did.
Michael Livermore 30:47
Yeah, and, you know, that’s just absolutely, absolutely right. And I–or strikes me as absolutely right. One, or the one kind of question, I think, is thinking about the environmental justice movement, and kind of, as you said, like a, like a real movement that kind of comes in has grassroots foundations, and, you know, isn’t driven by funders, in fact, you know, they scraped for funding for a very long time, before the scraping for funding, but that’s right. That’s absolutely right. And so, and just the broader political world. So one of the things just thinking of 1994, as an inflection point, 1994 was also I pin, the kind of the origins are an important inflection point anyway, I don’t know if origins is the right word in the way the situation we find ourselves in now of kind of hyper partisanship over environmental issues, right around 1994. And contract with, with America election, which was, which was actually after the executive order, and they’re not really related, but just they happen in the same year. But you know, these days, the one of the biggest challenges that that we face in dealing with environmental policy, is just this extraordinary partisanship over pretty much every environmental issue. And that’s not something that’s not the way things always were there was always differences between the parties. But there was a lot of overlap, and a lot of disagreement within the parties and things are just more polarized now. And one of the things that has struck me about these two things that have been unfolding simultaneously, is that, you know, greater attention to environmental justice, at a policy level, and also within environmental organizations, again, slow, hesitating, but, you know, but growing, and environmental polarization. And you also, you mentioned that kind of the Union connection, as well as the environmental justice groups, and, you know, have been an important point of contact, I think, in a way between, you know, that constituency of the Democratic Party and environmental groups more, you know, kind of more traditional environmental groups. And I wonder if you have any, just any thoughts about the fact that these two things have unfolded simultaneously? Is there is there a causal connection there? I’m not sure. I’m not sure which way it would run. But it seems striking to me that as the environmental movement has become, you know, somewhat more diverse and somewhat more oriented towards environmental justice concerns in its advocacy and its emphasis that, but at the same time that’s been happening, we’ve kind of, there’s just been this ever ratcheting up of polarization over environmental issues. And I wonder if there’s any deeper connection there. It’s also possible it could just be happenstance.
Gerald Torres 33:35
Yeah, you know, I, I would hesitate to to suggest that there’s a direct link, you don’t remember the, the the main point of contestation, certainly, at one juncture, and around this around the time, that same time, what were the the certainly actually probably dating back to Reagan was the the the the elevation of property claims to kind of a central point in the environmental debate. And I think that that that then ignited a parallel kind of grassroots movement. That is not, you know, not necessarily were responsive to the environmental justice concerns, but responsive to what they thought were what some critics thought, were an over overly aggressive environmental state, let’s call it now. So having said that, it’s important to step back a little bit further, right? And remember that that that you know, environmental protection is one of those issues that really had traditionally been bipartisan. You know, the original earth day was and I think still remains the largest single civic mobilization moment in American history. I mean, 20, over 20 million people gathered in their communities across the country on Earth Day leading, you know, Richard Nixon that you know, whose people don’t think of Richard Nixon has been the environmental president. But they shouldn’t, to a certain extent, because, you know, he, in fact, led him to create the Environmental Protection Agency, and to lead the Congress to adopt what we now think of as the the landmark environmental bills, the Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act list in their amended their modern initial modern form. And then to pay more attention to, to issues related to toxics, but also, you know, to build building on, you know, one of the things that emerged from LBJ’s presidency, which was the, the cleaning up of roadsides and the beautification of America, as it was called. So you know, the there the environmentalists, in fact, the conservation movement, right, historically, was, had firm kind of Republican roots. If I can use partisan language. Now, the the the environmental justice movement, I don’t think I really don’t think it is played a role in the, in the way that environmentalism has become so partisan, I think it really is tied more closely to the idea that, that environmental protection requires a strong regulatory hand. And it’s a you know, it’s a debate about about the extent of regulation and what kind of regulation ought to to be to be put in place. So I mean, you know, the one area where I guess where you could say, the environmental justice movement, got kind of crossways with the mainstream environmental movement, right was with AB 32 in California, the cap and trade plan, where, you know, the environmental justice community said, Look, you know, we’re all for reducing greenhouse gases and other airborne pollutants. But you can’t do it in a way that creates environmental hotspots. That is to make the older plants which were located primarily in environmental justice communities, to enable them to continue to pollute at higher levels. And so what that ended up resulting in is the community benefit fund, which would take some of the funds generated by the cap and trade program, and reinvested in environmental justice communities. And so so, you know, the the I don’t think the environmental justice movement itself has contributed to the, in any significant way to the kind of kind of bare knuckles partisanship that we were seeing these days.
Michael Livermore 38:31
Yeah, I mean, I don’t want to be hurt to say that I blame the environmental justice movement.
Gerald Torres 38:36
Mike, don’t worry, that’s not I wasn’t, I wasn’t, I was trying to put words in your mouth. But I was I wanted to be clear that, that the opposition to environmentalism is–as a partisan issue, I think is tied much more to the regulation of business enterprises than anything else.
Michael Livermore 38:58
Yeah, no, it’s very interesting. I think, you know, I have a very hard time thinking about the degree of partisanship that we have over environmental issues these days, what the causes are, and, you know, it does strike me there’s almost something irrational about it where I think in the I like that idea that you’re offering, which is, I find it hopeful that it’s mostly about environmental regulation and concerns about over, you know, overly intrusive government influence on the economy. And that’s the kind of the reason I find that hopeful is because I think that’s the kind of thing that could potentially be addressed. Smarter policy, you know, you know, you know, I tend to favor market based mechanisms when they’re designed properly. Those kinds of concerns. I guess the the worry that I have is that that doesn’t seem to have satisfied anybody on the in the Republican Party these days that it’s not like what we the current debate is over. Oh, should we have command and control style, you know, more of a heavy handed government approach versus more of a light touch market based approach. I think that’s the way the debate used to shake. And now it’s more between the Democrats’ approach whatever that looks like. And no, we just aren’t going to do anything on the other side.
Gerald Torres 40:18
It’s actually really disheartening to me too, because if you could point to to successes we’ve had, that have benefited everyone. It’s been the improvement of the environmental quality. The I mean, the the the improvements we’ve made in clean water, Jackson, Mississippi, not to the contrary, notwithstanding the improvements nationally that we’ve made to the accessibility of clean water is been dramatic. When you look at the reduction in air pollution it has been dramatic. Everyone has benefited from that, in some ways, you know, I used to joke that I want to talk to teach a course sometime called called memory. Right, because, you know, people forget what the baseline quality of the environment was before the environmental movement. And what they take for granted now is the relatively clean baseline, relatively clean baseline is the result of environmental activism and environmental work, both inside and outside of government over the last two generations. So it’s, you know, people, I worry that, that the partisan nature of the debate, we will obscure the the successes that have actually been achieved.
Michael Livermore 42:03
Yeah, yeah. And it’s sad, because as you said, this is something that we all appreciate that we all collectively did together, and it wasn’t a single party, and it wasn’t a single actor, and it’s an incredible accomplishment. And it’s, it’s sad, in a way if we, if we forget about that, or if we, you know, downplay it for whatever kind of partisan reasons that we have today–
Gerald Torres 42:24
Complete–completely agree with you, I completely agree with you the, you know, the the, the the loss of the momentum for improving the environment, environmental conditions within which we live, the if it’s permitted to be viewed as a purely partisan issue, we’re going to lose sight of the what I can only say are the empirics of the challenge, and the empirics of the regulatory approach. So has it been uneven? Yes, that’s what the environmental justice move–one of the things environmental justice movements told us, look, the overall progress has been good, but it’s been uneven. Let’s see if we can get more people to benefit from the improvement in environmental quality. That’s a good thing. Right. Second, how should we make these decisions? We think that the people who are affected by the decision should have some impact. That’s a good thing. The idea that the either of those issues can be used as partisan cuddles would be is heartbreaking in some ways.
Michael Livermore 43:47
Yeah. Yep. Absolutely. So maybe just to turn switch gears a little bit to something that we we popped on earlier in the conversation, which is, which is NEPA. Obviously, there’s, you know, quite a bit of talk of NEPA reform, and there that which periodically comes up, but it does seem to be maybe even more part of the conversation in the last six months. And part of that and something that when I teach NEPA and when people talk about NEPA, there’s this potential tension these days, between steps that we want to take to address climate change. And we might think of as kind of traditional environmental law or traditional environmental law approaches like the National Environmental Policy Act. And just to be clear, you know, this is the rule. This is the law that then sets up the requirements that federal agencies identify and understand the impacts the environmental impacts of their decisions before they make, you know, major, major important, impactful decisions. And some of the tensions just to kind of get it on the table that, you know, you’ll you’ll know well, is between environmental impact assessment and renewable energy development, the concern that you know that having these environmental assessments is going to slow down our ability due to transition to clean energy, more at a local level, but if you take the state of California and other places that have state environmental protection or environmental policy act kind of NEPA analogues, there’s a concern around, say, housing density that people use NEPA as a protectionist, essentially to protect, quote, unquote, protect their neighborhoods from high density housing from low income housing that people could afford. And that very low income is not even what we’re even talking about that like anyone who’s not super rich could afford. But then at the same time, you know, so there’s these kind of pushes for reform, but you–NEPA, as you noted, has been an incredibly important tool over the years, and including for environment, in the environmental justice context, and local fights about specific, you know, like, factories or, you know, citing decisions that are going to gonna have negative impacts for local communities. So I’m curious if you’ve got any thoughts about this general question of how we, you know, think about these, perhaps, I mean, they are older in the sense of they’ve been around for longer environmental statutes. Are they still, are they still important? Is there a place for reform, and then this kind of tension between look, and this a bigger tension, as you noted, with respect to California, between the local impacts of transitioning to clean energy, and the kind of broader need to decarbonize the economy? That’s a big question. But yeah, just wanted to hear your thoughts on that.
Gerald Torres 46:35
Which part of that you want me to address?
Michael Livermore 46:38
Maybe the part you think is interesting.
Gerald Torres 46:41
I agree. I mean, one of the things, you know, now, I’m gonna sound like the, you know, I don’t know what but but, you know, one of the complaints that has always been lodged, right, is that the procedural parts of environmental protection, slow down decision making, such that it increases the cost of projects, and ultimately lead some projects not to be done. All that’s likely true. All that’s likely true. But the other side of the equation is what are the benefits of the slower process? And one question, you might ask, say, as to Sequa, the California Environmental Quality Act, and NEPA, right, is is are they answering the same question? If they are, why can’t we think about ways to to consolidate you know, the answers? But you also might think that, you know, one thing that in American politics has always been important, right, is that local concerns, get some have some weight. And so, you know, I, you and I have spoken in the past, and, you know, I don’t think anyone is is insensitive to the the cost implications of, of regulation. The question is whether the benefit, right, is whether warranted by the benefits that accrue. And here I’m not just talking about the actual physical benefits, I’m also talking about the the procedural and participatory benefits, because there is something about maintaining the health of the polity. That is the idea that we can still operate as a democratic decision making people there’s something that’s that that’s that we ought not short change when we think about about that. So I worry a little bit about that. But then, you know, you also recognize that that it has been used it as you pointed out as a NIMBY, not in my backyard, a true hole. But you’re you’re then developing, you know, interesting local responses to that. So what you have in California, and I suspect it will be legalized, I’m not sure is that the right word? But, you know, I the idea that you’re you can increase the density of the urban properties and not run afoul of authorities even if it’s not strictly legal. Right. And we’ve seen that happening. SDUs that they’re called, supplemental development units, you know, often called you know, a mother in law apartments, or, you know–
Michael Livermore 49:56
Oh yeah, these things, ya know, a little familiar with this. That’s interesting. Yeah, we’ll work around the law basically.
Gerald Torres 50:01
Work around law a little bit. And you know, we’ve seen that happening in California. And then you see what’s happening in the Twin Cities right in Minneapolis, where Minneapolis has basically eliminated the restriction on multi family units in single family residential areas. So they’ve essentially legitimize the the, the building of supplemental development units in in, you know, what were thought of as single family residence communities. Now, that was hard fought in Minneapolis, as you might imagine, but the community decided. Right? And and, you know, that issue is probably best decided at a local level, but it can’t be laid at the feet of kind of environmental protection as such, right? There are many things that that affect, you know, housing and housing costs. But let’s, let’s look at one other, which is interesting to me. Right, which is the you know, the net metering dispute.
Michael Livermore 51:17
It raises very interesting environmental justice issues.
Gerald Torres 51:21
Incredibly important environmental justice issues, because what you want to do is you want to the extent possible, right, encourage solarization, especially distributed solar, right? But you also have these incredibly significant sunk costs on the infrastructure. And typically, the way that was paid for right is by ratepayers paying down the the cost of maintaining the grid. Well, to the extent that you create incentives for people to defect, that is to, you know, to have solar and batteries and defects on the grid? Well, you know, that means the cost of paying for the infrastructure that led to the development of the economy that people are benefiting from, it’s gotta be borne by the people who can’t afford to solarize. That is an environmental justice issue. And it needs to be viewed that way. And is there an easy answer? Probably not. But it’s something that ought to be discussed not to be discussed in the open and talked about, in some ways, both about what we you know, what we promised when we built out our initial energy system, and how we’re going to transition to a non fossil fuel based just energy system.
Michael Livermore 52:48
Yeah, it’s, it’s, I mean, it’s a really interesting example of kind of something I was curious to your thoughts on, as well, as I remember the at least these days, I think it’s somewhat more broadly recognized that there’s some serious justice issues that we have to think, like address in policy. But in the early days of net metering, it was basically like, Please be quiet. We’re trying to, you know, we’re trying to fix the environment. And if you raise those kinds of issues, you were just seen as like, wall art, you’re just in bed with the industry, you’re just trying to protect, you know, incumbents.
Gerald Torres 53:18
You know, it’s it’s funny, because, you know, the environmental justice community, when they oppose cap and trade now, when they’re getting engaged in the net meter debate debate are, are tarred exactly the way you you’re you just frame it with just Oh, come on, you’re carrying the water for industry. And said, Well, you know, it might have might look like that. But there are also other issues at stake. And let’s look at those other issues as well.
Michael Livermore 53:46
Yeah, that’s actually an interesting. I mean, that would be an interesting study, in some ways, it just look at the ways that environmental justice organizations specifically had been had been, that has been leveled against them, but just maybe thinking of leaving that criticism has been leveled, because it has, as you say, it’s something that comes up periodically. But thinking kind of broadly, I would just be curious about your reflections on that interface between environmental organizations and environmental justice, the environmental justice movement, and maybe specifically environmental justice organizations. You know, it was there was a period of time where there was a pretty substantial amount of conflict and conflicts periodically flare up, but there’s, I think there’s a lot more working more closely together on these issues these days than in the past, although there are still sources of conflict. But I’d be curious what your thinking is on how that relationship has evolved. And what environmental groups did maybe the traditional environmental groups have done successfully and and where is there room for them to improve in their relationship to environmental justice, the movement to groups in particular or to environmental justice issues, we might say.
Gerald Torres 54:54
Well, you know, I guess I should say as a form of of confession and avoidance. I’m a trustee for NRDC. And so I’m most familiar with with NRDC and what it has done. I’m also, you know, on the board of earth day, the people who bring you the, what the largest non religious holiday in the world. So, but both those organizations, both earthday and NRDC have recognized that that what they got to do is to integrate environmental justice concerns in the way they think about the environment. And that a failure to do so means that they are going to both, perhaps make the wrong decisions in some cases, but certainly, they’ll minimize their capacity to build political support for the changes that need to happen. And because you know, it, I know, you when you think of NRDC, mainly think about the tremendously successful litigation practice they’ve had in the environmental context. But of course, you know, it’s, it’s not just litigation, it’s also policy formation, creation. And so be able to, to build a constituency for the kinds of environmental changes that have to occur, I think that has occurred to all of the big green organizations, when all of them are in one form or another attempting to to address it. NRDC got it on, say, almost 20 years ago, right, just just explicitly took on an environmental justice mandate, and have attempted to integrate it into their decision making. And, you know, it has both domestic and international components as well. So I think I think big green, if I can use that term, is not unaware. I know that “not un” is a terrible construction, but is not unaware of the of the importance of the justice aspects of environmental protection. And certainly, you know, when you hear you know, when you see the president of the united states, you know, basically standing up for environmental justice, you recognize that, yeah, this is gone, this has gone mainstream.
Michael Livermore 57:37
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And so, so maybe the, maybe the final question, I’ll ask you, we could talk, I think, for a very long time, but we have to wrap it up at some point. So. So the question is, you know, so I’m actually giving a part of a event in a few weeks that students are organizing on kind of, it’s an eco grief, kind of climate grief, like the feeling that a lot of young people have, I think, and others, not just young people, people all ages, that we’ve really failed on this big issue, and that we’ve gotten ourselves into a terrible hole. And they look at kind of progress, both domestically and globally. And they and they don’t see it, they don’t see it at the rate that they that they think is absolutely necessary. And I guess my question for you is, you know, how, you know, what gives you hope in this in this context? What what perspectives, you know, allows you to stay optimistic or to stay hopeful, in the face of, you know, the many serious challenges that we face on these issues?
Gerald Torres 58:38
Oh, you know, it depends what day you get me, I guess? You know, one of the things that Merlin’s hat does give me hope, is the the broad recognition that something you know, that we’ve got to do something, and I actually think, you know, it’s not paralysis, that’s inspiring, inspiring activism. So that’s one thing. Second, the commitment to environmental education. So, you know, many of our young students young, you know, are, come to us, more deeply educated about the environment than say, either you or I might have, you know, when we, you know, went to college or left college to go to law school, you know, so they come, you know, broadly informed and committed so they give me hope. I also think that they see the the interconnectedness of issues, and don’t put themselves to be paralyzed by the interconnectedness, but see, that there are many points at which they might intervene, to produce action. And they know that even though the issues are broad and global, that is that they have to act in ways that that have kind of local impact. So I think that that those are the kinds of things that give me hope working with environmental justice communities has given me a lot of hope, because these are communities that have suffered some of the the the worst of our, you know, pollution excesses and remain committed to producing the change that we need.
Michael Livermore 1:00:27
Great. Well, you know, that those are all good, good, solid reasons for hope, which is, which is always which is always nice to have these days. So it’s been a really fun conversation, Gerald, and thanks so much for joining me and for all your work over the the years on these issues.
Gerald Torres 1:00:43
Mike, you’ve been doing important work yourself and so I I thank you for hosting me and I look forward to interacting with you in person soon.
Michael Livermore 1:00:52
Me too.
Free Range Podcast 