Civil rights law targets discrimination in Louisiana’s ‘cancer alley’

RESERVE, La. — Sprawling industrial complexes line the drive east along the Mississippi River to the majority-Black town of Reserve, Louisiana. In the last seven miles the road passes a massive, rust-colored aluminum-oxide refinery, then the Evonik chemical plant, then rows of white tanks at the Marathon oil refinery.

But it’s the Denka chemical plant that is under scrutiny from federal officials. Less than a half mile from an elementary school in Reserve, it makes synthetic rubber, emitting chloroprene, listed as a carcinogen in California, and a likely one by the Environmental Protection Agency.

Angelo Bernard is a grandfather whose family has lived in Reserve for generations. His three grandkids used to attend the school, Fifth Ward Elementary. Hurricane Ida forced them to move.

“I’m glad they’re away,” said Bernard. “I feel for the kids that have to go to school that close to the plant.”

The investigation is part of a push by the Biden administration to prioritize environmental enforcement in communities overburdened by pollution. On Saturday, that push ratcheted up a notch when EPA administrator Michael Regan announced the creation of a new office at EPA focused on environmental justice.

“We are embedding environmental justice and civil rights into the DNA of EPA,” Regan said.

Regan visited Reserve last year and said “we will do better.” Now the EPA is investigating whether Louisiana regulators are discriminating against Black residents by failing to control air pollution in parishes packed with refineries and petrochemical plants, a region some call “cancer alley.”

To do it, they are using an old tool in a new way. Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 forbids anyone who receives federal funds from discriminating based on race or national origin. It’s been used in housing and transportation, but rarely on environmental matters.

The Biden administration said that must change.

The U.S. Department of Justice last fall opened its first-ever environmental Title VI investigation into state and local officials in Alabama over chronic wastewater problems in majority-Black Lowndes County. Another is looking into illegal dumping in Houston. The EPA initiated its own investigation into Colorado’s air program, also a first. Activists are taking notice and filing more complaints. Experts say the EPA is addressing them more quickly than in the past.

Alexandra Dapolito Dunn, an environment attorney at the law firm Baker Botts, said the approach represents “a seismic shift.”

The EPA accepted three complaints from activists to investigate Louisiana’s regulation of air emissions. The agency could pull federal funds if they find a civil rights violation, but local governments more commonly agree to make changes.

A Denka spokesperson said advocates were describing a crisis that “simply does not exist.”