Environmental Justice, Racism, and Impact Assessment
View the Webinar HERE
Discrimination against Indigenous, African-Canadian, and other marginalized communities in Canada can take on many forms: one of them is the disproportionate placement and subsequent ways of managing hazardous sites, including landfills and polluting industries, where such communities predominantly live. This was recognized in a federal private member’s Bill (C-230), A National Strategy to Redress Environmental Racism Act, which passed second reading of the previous (43rd) Parliament of the House of Commons (before it was dissolved in August).
Whatever the fate of this issue in legislation in the 44th Parliament, there is a pressing need for the Impact Assessment community of scholars and practitioners to ask whether and how IAs, as they have been conducted and how they are conducted going forward, can contribute to the challenge of such desperately needed redress.
Relevant questions that will emerge in this webinar include:
Are there new capacities opened up within Impact Assessment Act (2019)?
Do cumulative effects assessment methods and practices serve in this regard?
Do we have the data we need to make good decisions going forward?
Does environmental justice serve as a lens through which to strengthen IAs?
As a form of environmental management, is IA already ‘too late’ to be effective?
This panel will feature the voices of two leaders in Canada working on the frontlines of environmental racism:
Dr. Ingrid Waldron, HOPE Chair in Peace and Health, Faculty of Humanities, McMaster University;
Sharilyn Johnston, Environment Coordinator, Aamjiwnaang First Nation (Sarnia, ON).
After their two presentations, there will be generous time for discussion.
Read our BLOG POST on this topic HERE
Background reading
Text of Bill C-230 (passed second reading in 43rd Parliament)
https://www.parl.ca/DocumentViewer/en/43-2/bill/C-230/second-reading
Youtube 2019 TIFF trailer to There’s Something in the Water:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nKhIYFDnCoY
https://globalnews.ca/news/8369470/ontario-first-nation-air-pollution-cancer-causing-chemicals-new-data/
https://globalnews.ca/news/8378312/ford-government-slammed-vital-air-pollution-data-aamjiwnaang-first-nation/
Link to Dr. Waldron's book: https://fernwoodpublishing.ca/book/there8217s-something-in-the-water& ENRICH website: www.enrichproject.org
