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Strategic Objective
Promote Sustainable and Livable Communities
Strategic Objective
Overview
EPA supports the goals of urban, suburban, and rural communities to grow in ways that improve the environment, human health, and quality of life for their residents.[1] With the support of partners working hand in hand across all levels of government, communities can grow in ways that also strengthen the economy, help them adapt to a changing climate, improve their resiliency to disasters, use public resources more efficiently, revitalize neighborhoods, and improve access to jobs and amenities. By making sustainable infrastructure investments, communities can successfully build innovative and functional systems on neighborhood streets and sidewalks to deal with the runoff from stormwater and still provide easy access for pedestrians, bicyclists, on-street parking, and other beneficial uses. By adopting local planning and zoning codes that account for the environmental impacts of development, the private sector can more easily construct market-ready green buildings serving a range of housing needs. Communities also can benefit from tools, technology, and research that better engage citizens and inform local decision making to support smart and sustainable growth.
EPA recognizes environmental justice, children’s health, and sustainable development are all at the intersection of people and place. These goals are not mutually exclusive. Throughout all our work to achieve more livable communities, EPA is committed to ensuring we focus on children’s health and environmental justice.[2] Recognizing that minority or low-income communities may face disproportionate environmental risks, we work to protect these communities from adverse health and environmental effects and to ensure they are given the opportunity to participate meaningfully in environmental decisions and efforts to plan for future growth and development that directly affect residents.[3] EPA’s ability to optimize the benefits of sustainability requires making environmental justice a normal part of how EPA does business rather than an ad hoc activity.
Sustainable and livable communities balance their economic and natural assets so that the diverse needs of residents can be met with limited environmental impacts. EPA’s community-based programs help to accomplish these goals by working with communities, other federal agencies, state, tribal, and regional governments, private and nonprofit sectors, and national experts to encourage equitable development strategies that have better outcomes for air quality, water quality, and land preservation and revitalization. In particular, EPA’s smart growth program delivers technical assistance to communities through contract- and grant-based programs to help them base their growth and development decisions on strategies that are smart, sustainable, and supportive of improved environmental, public health, and economic outcomes.
For example, EPA has been working with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) since 2009 to align federal resources and improve the environmental outcomes from development. Through technical assistance, grants, and training, these three agencies have worked together to assist hundreds of communities to plan for and invest in growth that improves access to affordable housing, increases transportation options, and expands choices for all citizens.[4] All three agencies use a common set of “livability principles” to better coordinate their efforts and investments in a manner that will better protect the environment, promote equitable development, and help address the challenges of a changing climate.
EPA’s brownfields program emphasizes environmental and human health protection in a manner that stimulates economic development and job creation by awarding competitive grants to assess and clean up brownfield properties that are contaminated, or perceived to be contaminated, with hazardous substances and/or petroleum contamination and by providing job training opportunities, particularly in underserved communities.[5] A 2012 EPA program evaluation concluded that cleaning up brownfield properties leads to residential property value increases of 5.1 to 12.8 percent.[6] In addition, a 2011 study of five pilot projects revealed that cleaning up contaminated properties for neighborhood commercial use may contribute to a 32 to 57 percent reduction in vehicle miles traveled compared to alternative development scenarios.[7] This reduction results from increased accessibility of neighborhood-based services and goods, requiring less frequent trips by residents outside the immediate area.
The brownfields program also provides funding for state and tribal environmental response programs as well as outreach and technical assistance to communities. Area-wide planning approaches for brownfields work help to identify important local factors in a coordinated manner: viable end uses of individual or groups of brownfield properties; beneficial air and water infrastructure investments in these areas; and, added environmental improvements in the surrounding area to revitalize the community. Taken together, these efforts will enhance the livability and economic vitality of neighborhoods in and around brownfield properties.
In addition to the brownfields activities, EPA promotes livable communities though its efforts to prevent chemical accidents. EPA's risk management program requires facilities with one or more covered chemicals in a process to analyze the potential for accidental releases and possible consequences, develop an accident prevention program, and coordinate with the community to ensure that all are prepared for responding to a release. The facility must include this information in a Risk Management Plan (RMP) and submit this RMP electronically to EPA, which makes the information available to federal, state, and local officials (e.g., fire fighters) who work on chemical accident preparedness, prevention, and response. There are approximately 13,000 active RMPs currently on file.
External Factors and Emerging Issues
There are several external factors and emerging issues that may affect the overall success of the Agency’s brownfields, chemical risk management, and smart growth programs. These include:
- The continued challenges posed by foreclosures and vacant, blighted, and neglected properties. Increased attention may be required for the siting of new domestic manufacturing in formerly abandoned or blighted areas and the potential impacts on local communities.
- The impacts of increased extremes of weather on a community’s redevelopment and revitalization plans, including whether these projects are resilient enough to withstand the threat of flooding or loss of power from natural or man-made disasters.
- The lack of capacity in many tribal, local, regional, and state governments to adequately identify the environmental outcomes associated with land use and infrastructure decisions, particularly given the demands on already tight budgets.
- The importance of engaging in efforts that involve stakeholders beyond federal agencies. These efforts include supporting local responders, advancing additional chemical plant safety measures, and standardizing the best practices of industry leaders.
The need to explore how EPA’s legal authorities and policies can be used to further improve coordination among federal agencies and stakeholders in our efforts to identify and address the potential hazards in chemical plant safety.
End Notes:
- For more information about the impact of the built environment on the natural environment and public health, see “Our Built and Natural Environments: A Technical Review of the Interactions Between Land Use, Transportation, and Environmental Quality (Second Edition, 2013)” at http://www.epa.gov/smartgrowth/built.htm.
- For more information about EPA’s focus on Environmental Justice, please see http://www.epa.gov/environmentaljustice/index.html.
- For more information about the connections between smart growth and environmental justice, see “Creating Equitable, Healthy, and Sustainable Communities: Strategies for Advancing Smart Growth, Environmental Justice, and Equitable Development” (EPA 231-K-10-005, 2013) at http://epa.gov/smartgrowth/equitable_development_report.htm.
- For more information about the HUD-DOT-EPA Partnership for Sustainable Communities, see http://www.sustainablecommunities.gov.
- For more information about EPA’s brownfields program, see http://www.epa.gov/brownfields.
- Kevin Haninger, Lala Ma, and Christopher Timmins. 2012. “Estimating the Impacts of Brownfields Remediation on Housing Property Values.” Duke Environmental Economics Working Paper Series. Working Paper EE12-08. The program evaluation is available at http://sites.nicholasinstitute.duke.edu/environmentaleconomics/files/2013/01/WP-EE-12-08.pdf.
- U.S. EPA, Office of Brownfields and Land Revitalization, Air and Water Impacts of Brownfields Redevelopment: A Study of Five Communities, April 2011, EPA-560-F-10-232.
Progress Update
Throughout 2014, EPA continued to make progress toward the strategic targets in its FY 2014–2018 Strategic Plan for the Brownfields and Risk Management Programs. Specifically, in FY 2014, the Agency continued funding for brownfields cleanup activities by providing grants and technical assistance to communities, states, and tribes for the assessment, cleanup, and redevelopment of formerly contaminated properties, as well as leveraging thousands of jobs. To date, Brownfields funding has resulted in 22,336 brownfields properties assessed, 102,740 jobs leveraged, and more than 47,000 acres made ready for anticipated reuse. EPA worked closely with both existing and new Brownfields Area-Wide Planning (AWP) grantees across the country to help them involve the community, prepare their plans, and leverage investments toward site cleanup and reuse. The initial 23 Brownfields AWP pilots have leveraged over $400 million in federal, state, and private investments.
In addition to the environmental and health benefits of Brownfields cleanups, remediation has also been shown to have a positive economic impact within communities. A 2012 assessment by the National Bureau of Economic Research[1] of the economic impact of brownfields remediation demonstrated that homes within one kilometer of a brownfield site that has been cleaned up using brownfields funding might experience a 5.8 to 12.3 percent increase in residential property values.
In addition to the brownfields activities, EPA promoted sustainable communities through its efforts to prevent chemical accidents. In FY 2014, EPA continued to achieve its risk management plan inspections target to prevent chemical releases at facilities in communities and took critical steps implementing Executive Order 13650, “Improving Chemical Facility Safety and Security.” bringing together federal regulatory representatives and stakeholders with a vested interest in reducing the risks associated with handling and storage of chemicals at stationary facilities within our communities. In May 2014, a multi-agency working group led by EPA, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) released the final report to the President highlighting progress and providing a plan to support and enable efforts by states, tribes, and local communities to improve chemical facility safety. Furthermore, EPA’s Region 2 developed standard operating procedures for a unified federal, state, and local approach for identifying and responding to risks at chemical facilities and a plan to improve operational coordination. These procedures are now being used as a model for other EPA Regions across the nation. EPA also published a request for information on the risk management program in July 2014, describing 19 potential modifications to help streamline the program and improve safety requirements, requesting stakeholder feedback.
[1] Haninger, Kevin, Lala Ma, and Christopher Timmins. 2014. “The Value of Brownfield Remediation.” NBER Working Paper 20296. http://www.nber.org/papers/w20296.
