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♪ (music) ♪
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What do you think of when you hear
the words climate change?
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Chances are you might think
of sad nature somewhere far away,
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but climate change also affects
humans in every corner of the world,
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including the corner where you live
and where I live.
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It impacts the people
and places we see every day,
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and it will impact some of us
more than others.
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♪ (drum beat music) ♪
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The 2017 Atlantic hurricane season
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was one of the most active
seasons in history,
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with 17 named storms and 10 hurricanes.
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Six of those hurricanes had winds
of more than 110 miles per hour,
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and while it's hard to know
if any single weather event
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is due to climate change,
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we do know
that it will make conditions more extreme.
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We're seeing
what that future could look like
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in Cape Town, South Africa.
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There, a drought
has stressed local reservoirs,
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leading to water rationing
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as the city prepares for the day
when the taps run dry.
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And when you take a community
that's already facing these disparities
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and add in extreme weather
caused by climate change,
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it can make it even harder
for those communities to recover.
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Not every community
experiences these climate changes
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in the same way.
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Some communities have more resources,
better infrastructure
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or more political capital
than other communities.
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There's a concept
to deal with these inequalities.
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It's called environmental justice.
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And the idea is pretty simple.
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Communities shouldn't be forced to suffer
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disproportionate environmental effects,
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or deal with more pollution than others
because they belong to a certain race,
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national origin or income bracket.
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People in wealthy communities
often think these concerns are far away.
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But even in a place like the US,
where we tend to think
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we're ahead of the curve
on protecting all people,
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the execution has been spotty.
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We can still find lots of environmental
disparities right in our back yard.
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As Miami cleaned up after Hurricane Maria,
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officials dumped debris
next to a community
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with lots of low-income residents
and people of color.
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Definitely close enough
to see and smell it.
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And in Houston,
residents who couldn't afford
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or weren't physically able to evacuate
before hurricane Harvey,
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had no choice but to stay behind
as the city flooded.
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Puerto Rico has faced budget shortages
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and a lack of infrastructure for decades.
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And after a spate of hurricanes,
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residents there had trouble
finding clean drinking water,
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and large portions of the island
remained without electricity for months.
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It's more than extreme individual events.
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In many places, days that were
already hot, are getting even hotter,
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and there are more of them.
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This heat can be especially deadly
in homes without air-conditioning.
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For example,the heat index
inside public housing in Harlem
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stays dangerously elevated overnight,
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even when it cools off outside.
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And as climate change
brings the average temperature up,
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systemic inequalities like this
will become more obvious.
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It's not that the United States
hasn't tried to fix
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these problems before.
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The fight for environmental justice
in the US
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traces its roots to 1982
in Warren County, North Carolina,
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when residents mounted mass demonstrations
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against a plan to put contaminated soil
in a nearby landfill.
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The US Environmental Protection Agency,
or EPA,
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found that similar landfills
in Southern states
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were all located in black
or low-income neighborhoods.
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Several years later, a report found
this was a pattern around the country.
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Hazardous waste facilities
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were more likely to be located
in minority communities.
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The proof was undeniable,
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so in 1992, President George H. W. Bush
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founded the Office
of Environmental Justice inside the EPA.
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Two years later,
Bill Clinton signed an executive order
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that told federal agencies to consider
environmental justice in all policies,
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and effectively included
environmental protections
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under civil rights law.
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It sounds like things
were going pretty well, right?
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Well, environmental justice policies
stalled
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when George W. Bush shifted the focus
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of the Office of Environmental Justice
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from protecting low-income
and minority communities
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to protecting all people.
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That sounds good, but in practice,
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it meant those efforts no longer focused
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on protecting the people
who needed it most.
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At the same time,
many environmental civil rights claims
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were delayed for years
or downright rejected.
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After Barack Obama's election,
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his administration recommitted
to environmental justice.
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Democrats controlled
the House, the Senate,
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and White House for two years,
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but guess how many bills they filed
to strengthen
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environmental justice protections?
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Zero.
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Today, EPA funding itself is under threat,
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so these vulnerable communities remain
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at risk. It's easy to assume
that climate change
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will affect us all equally,
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but the truth is that communities
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all around us including the one you're in,
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may be forced to bear an unequal brunt
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of our changing world. If we want
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to change this, we have to recognize
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those disparities and engage
with those communities.
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That way, as we find solutions,
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everyone has a seat at the table.
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Thanks for watching Hot Mess.
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[Music]