I 
110TH CONGRESS 
1ST SESSION H. R. 1602 
To ensure environmental justice in the areas affected by Hurricanes Katrina 
and Rita. 
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 
MARCH 20, 2007 
Mr. JEFFERSON introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Com-
mittee on Energy and Commerce, and in addition to the Committee on 
Natural Resources, for a period to be subsequently determined by the 
Speaker, in each case for consideration of such provisions as fall within 
the jurisdiction of the committee concerned 
A BILL 
To ensure environmental justice in the areas affected by 
Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. 
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Hurricanes Katrina 
and Rita Environmental Justice Act of 2007’’. 
SEC. 2. FINDINGS. 
Congress finds the following: 
(1) In June 2005, the Administration an-
nounced that it was removing race and class from 
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special consideration in its definition of environ-
mental justice, departing from President Clinton’s 
1994 Executive Order 12898 on Environmental Jus-
tice which mandated that all Federal agencies gen-
erate agency-specific strategies to address the dis-
proportionate pollution experienced by minority com-
munities. 
(2) Years before Hurricane Katrina, environ-
mental justice activists were anticipating the racially 
disproportionate effects of climate change, in terms 
of coastal flooding and the health effects of heat 
waves, through the Environmental Justice and Cli-
mate Change Initiative (EJCC). As their 2002 fact 
sheet stated: ‘‘People of color are concentrated in 
urban centers in the South, coastal regions, and 
areas with substandard air quality. New Orleans, 
which is 62 percent African-American and 2 feet 
below sea level, exemplifies the severe and dispropor-
tionate impacts of climate change in the United 
States. 
(3) Numerous studies have concluded that 
many diseases, including cancer, heart disease, asth-
ma, birth defects, behavioral disorders, infertility, 
and obesity, are caused or exacerbated by environ-
mental hazards. 
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(4) Of the chemicals produced in the United 
States annually in quantities greater than 10,000 
pounds, only 43 percent of such chemicals have been 
tested for their potential human toxicity and only 7 
percent have been studied to assess effects on 
human development. 
(5) Approximately 126,000,000 people in the 
United States live in areas of non-attainment for 
pollutants that have health-based standards. 
(6) In the United States, air pollution is esti-
mated to be associated with 50,000 premature 
deaths and with $50,000,000,000 in health-related 
costs annually. 
(7) In children, environmental toxins are esti-
mated to cause up to 35 percent of asthma cases, 
up to 10 percent of cancer cases, and up to 20 per-
cent of neurobehavioral disorders. 
(8) People of color are almost three times more 
likely than Caucasians to be hospitalized or die from 
asthma and other respiratory illnesses linked to air 
pollution. Asthma accounts for 10 million lost school 
days, 1.2 million emergency room visits, 15 million 
outpatient visits, and over 500,000 hospitalizations 
each year in the United States. 
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(9) Consequently, the people who live in these 
communities are inundated with significant environ-
mental and health hazards related to toxic waste 
sites, mining operations, incinerators, oil exploration, 
and other harmful developments. In the United 
States, approximately 60 percent of African Ameri-
cans live in communities with uncontrolled toxic 
waste sites. Three out of five of the largest haz-
ardous waste landfills in the United States are lo-
cated in predominantly African American or Latino 
communities. 
(10) Hurricane Katrina struck a region that is 
disproportionately African American and poor. Afri-
can Americans make up twelve percent of the United 
States population. Nearly 68 percent of the popu-
lation of New Orleans is African American. The Af-
rican American population in the Coastal Mississippi 
counties where Hurricane Katrina struck ranged 
from 25 percent to 87 percent. Twenty-eight percent 
of New Orleans residents live below the poverty level 
and more than 80 percent of those are African 
American. Fifty percent of all New Orleans children 
live in poverty. The poverty rate was 17.7 percent in 
Gulfport, Mississippi and 21.2 percent in Mobile, 
Alabama in 2000. Nationally, in 2000, 11.3 percent 
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of people in the United States and 22.1 percent of 
African Americans were living below the poverty 
line. 
(11) New Orleans is prototypical of environ-
mental justice issues in the Gulf Coast region. Be-
fore Hurricane Katrina, the City of New Orleans 
was struggling with a wide range of environmental 
justice issues and concerns. Its location along the 
Mississippi River Chemical Corridor increased its 
vulnerability to environmental threats. The City of 
New Orleans had an extremely high childhood envi-
ronmental lead poisoning problem. There were ongo-
ing air quality impacts and resulting high asthma 
and respiratory disease rates and frequent visits to 
emergency rooms for treatment by both children and 
adults. Environmental health problems and issues 
related to environmental exposure was a grave issue 
of concern for New Orleans residents. 
(12) New Orleans and outlying areas suffered 
severe environmental damage during Hurricane 
Katrina, the extent to which has yet to be deter-
mined. The post-Hurricane Katrina New Orleans 
has been described as a ‘‘cesspool’’ of toxic chemi-
cals, human waste, decomposing flesh, and surprises 
that remain to be uncovered in the sediments. Mas-
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