The Biden administration has dropped an investigation into whether Louisiana officials put some Black residents at increased cancer risk despite initial evidence of racial discrimination, according to a federal court filing.
More than 300,000 customers in the southern U.S. are still without power following damaging storms that have left residents searching for relief in sweltering temperatures.
“It is a dangerous precedent,” said Patrice Simms, an attorney with Earthjustice, one of the environmental groups that asked the Environmental Protection Agency to investigate Louisiana. The EPA said it would analyze how residents — especially those who live near the Denka plant — are exposed to a variety of dangerous emissions. The study would aim to “characterize the current baseline cumulative health risks and burdens” in the community and provide recommendations. The EPA wants the community to participate in the process and they invited the state to take part as well, although it is not forced to.
Louisiana filed a federal lawsuit challenging those investigations in May. It accused the EPA of exceeding its authority under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 by improperly pressuring the state to make radical changes to the state’s air permitting regime, including implementing new practices that would consider how multiple chemical facilities in an area might cumulatively harm nearby majority-Black communities.
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