Environmental JusticeSAFE is committed to addressing injustices relating to the city's history of industrial pollution. A January 2001 report by a Northeastern University professor Daniel Faber shows that communities of color and low-income communities are most likely to have polluting facilities-- incinerators, landfills, and toxic chemical plants-- in their neighborhoods. Such environmental problems pose health risks for these residents that are 3 to 9 times higher than other Massachusetts residents. Yet these communities have had the fewest resources to confront or prevent such threats. An environmental justice (EJ)neighborhood is one in which the annual median household inocme is equal to or less than 65 percent of the statewide median income or whosepopulation is made up of 25 percent minority people, foreign-born and lacking English language proficiency residents. Salem, Beverly, Lynn, andPeabody have environmental justice populations. In June 2004 SAFE, working in collaboration with Salem Harbor Community Development Corporation, Neighbor to Neighbor, North Shore Community Action Program, The Point Neighborhood Association, and Salem Sound Coast Watch,hosted an Environmental JusticeForum. Close to 75 concerned Salem residents, community leaders, and political officials sought to learn about EJ issues,identify the EJ issues in our city, and develop a strategy for passing EJ legislation that would help cities like Salem.
Beth Hogan, Executive Director North Shore Community Action Program, presents at the SAFE Environmental Justice Forum in June, 2004.
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