I
116TH CONGRESS
2D SESSION H. R. 5842
To authorize the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency to
award grants to entities to enable such entities to participate in decisions
impacting the health and safety of their communities in connection with
the release of certain hazardous air pollutants and the permitting of
solid waste disposal facilities and hazardous waste facilities, and for
other purposes.
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
FEBRUARY 11, 2020
Mr. KENNEDY (for himself, Ms. BARRAGÁN, and Mr. RUIZ) introduced the
following bill; which was referred to the Committee on Energy and Commerce
A BILL
To authorize the Administrator of the Environmental Protec-
tion Agency to award grants to entities to enable such
entities to participate in decisions impacting the health
and safety of their communities in connection with the
release of certain hazardous air pollutants and the per-
mitting of solid waste disposal facilities and hazardous
waste facilities, and for other purposes.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-1
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 2
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•HR 5842 IH
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 1
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Voices for Environ-2
mental Justice Act’’. 3
SEC. 2. ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE COMMUNITY TECH-4
NICAL ASSISTANCE GRANTS. 5
Title III of the Clean Air Act (42 U.S.C. 7601 et 6
seq.) is amended by adding at the end the following new 7
section: 8
‘‘SEC. 330. ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE COMMUNITY TECH-9
NICAL ASSISTANCE GRANTS. 10
‘‘(a) IN GENERAL.—The Administrator may award 11
grants to eligible entities to enable such entities to partici-12
pate in decisions impacting the health and safety of their 13
communities in connection with an actual or potential re-14
lease of a covered hazardous air pollutant. 15
‘‘(b) TIMING.— 16
‘‘(1) GUIDANCE.—Not later than 12 months 17
after the date of enactment of this section, the Ad-18
ministrator shall publish guidance describing the 19
process for eligible entities to apply for a grant 20
under this section, including the required content 21
and form of applications, the manner in which appli-22
cations must be submitted, and any applicable dead-23
lines. 24
‘‘(2) FIRST GRANT.—Not later than 180 days 25
after the issuance of guidance under paragraph (1), 26
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•HR 5842 IH
the Administrator shall award the first grant under 1
this section. 2
‘‘(c) ELIGIBLE ENTITY.—To be eligible for a grant 3
under this section, an applicant shall be a group of individ-4
uals who reside in a community that— 5
‘‘(1) is a population of color, a community of 6
color, an indigenous community, or a low-income 7
community; and 8
‘‘(2) is in close proximity to the site of an ac-9
tual or potential release of a covered hazardous air 10
pollutant. 11
‘‘(d) USE OF FUNDS.—An eligible entity receiving a 12
grant under this section shall use the grant to participate 13
in decisions impacting the health and safety of the commu-14
nity involved in connection with an actual or potential re-15
lease of a covered hazardous air pollutant, including— 16
‘‘(1) interpreting information with regard to the 17
nature of the hazard, cumulative impacts studies, 18
health impacts studies, remedial investigation and 19
feasibility studies, agency decisions, remedial design, 20
and operation and maintenance of necessary mon-21
itors; and 22
‘‘(2) performing additional air pollution moni-23
toring. 24
‘‘(e) LIMITATIONS ON AMOUNT; RENEWAL.— 25
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•HR 5842 IH
‘‘(1) AMOUNT.— 1
‘‘(A) IN GENERAL.—The amount of a 2
grant under this section (excluding any renew-3
als of the grant) may not exceed $50,000 for 4
any grant recipient. 5
‘‘(B) EXCEPTION.—The Administrator 6
may waive the limitation in subparagraph (A) 7
with respect to an applicant in any case where 8
the Administrator determines that such waiver 9
is necessary for the community involved to ob-10
tain the necessary technical assistance. 11
‘‘(2) RENEWAL.—Grants may be renewed for 12
each step in the regulatory, removal, or remediation 13
process in connection with a facility with the poten-14
tial to release a covered hazardous air pollutant. 15
‘‘(f) DEFINITIONS.—In this section: 16
‘‘(1) The term ‘community of color’ means any 17
geographically distinct area the population of color 18
of which is higher than the average population of 19
color of the State in which the community is located. 20
‘‘(2) The term ‘covered hazardous air pollutant’ 21
means a hazardous air pollutant (as defined in sec-22
tion 112 of the Clean Air Act) that— 23
‘‘(A) is listed on the toxics release inven-24
tory under section 313(c) of the Emergency 25
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•HR 5842 IH
Planning and Community Right-To-Know Act 1
of 1986; or 2
‘‘(B) is identified as carcinogenic by an as-3
sessment under the Integrated Risk Informa-4
tion System (IRIS) of the Environmental Pro-5
tection Agency. 6
‘‘(3) The term ‘indigenous community’ means— 7
‘‘(A) a federally recognized Indian Tribe; 8
‘‘(B) a State-recognized Indian Tribe; 9
‘‘(C) an Alaska Native or Native Hawaiian 10
community or organization; and 11
‘‘(D) any other community of indigenous 12
people, including communities in other coun-13
tries. 14
‘‘(4) The term ‘low income’ means an annual 15
household income equal to, or less than, the greater 16
of— 17
‘‘(A) an amount equal to 80 percent of the 18
median income of the area in which the house-19
hold is located, as reported by the Department 20
of Housing and Urban Development; and 21
‘‘(B) 200 percent of the Federal poverty 22
line. 23
‘‘(5) The term ‘population of color’ means a 24
population of individuals who identify as— 25
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•HR 5842 IH
‘‘(A) Black; 1
‘‘(B) African American; 2
‘‘(C) Asian; 3
‘‘(D) Pacific Islander; 4
‘‘(E) another non-White race; 5
‘‘(F) Hispanic; 6
‘‘(G) Latino; or 7
‘‘(H) linguistically isolated.’’. 8
SEC. 3. ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE COMMUNITY SOLID 9
WASTE DISPOSAL TECHNICAL ASSISTANCE 10
GRANTS. 11
(a) GRANTS.—Subtitle D of the Solid Waste Disposal 12
Act (42 U.S.C. 6941 et seq.) is amended by adding at 13
the end the following new section: 14
‘‘SEC. 4011. ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE COMMUNITY TECH-15
NICAL ASSISTANCE GRANTS. 16
‘‘(a) IN GENERAL.—The Administrator may award 17
grants to eligible entities to enable such entities to partici-18
pate in decisions impacting the health and safety of their 19
communities relating to the permitting or permit renewal 20
of a solid waste disposal facility or hazardous waste facil-21
ity. 22
‘‘(b) TIMING.— 23
‘‘(1) GUIDANCE.—Not later than 12 months 24
after the date of enactment of this section, the Ad-25
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•HR 5842 IH
ministrator shall publish guidance describing the 1
process for eligible entities to apply for a grant 2
under this section, including the required content 3
and form of applications, the manner in which appli-4
cations must be submitted, and any applicable dead-5
lines. 6
‘‘(2) FIRST GRANT.—Not later than 180 days 7
after the issuance of guidance under paragraph (1), 8
the Administrator shall award the first grant under 9
this section. 10
‘‘(c) ELIGIBLE ENTITY.—To be eligible for a grant 11
under this section, an applicant shall be a group of individ-12
uals who reside in a community that— 13
‘‘(1) is a population of color, a community of 14
color, an indigenous community, or a low-income 15
community; and 16
‘‘(2) is in close proximity to a facility described 17
in subsection (a) for which a decision relating to a 18
permit or permit renewal for such facility is re-19
quired. 20
‘‘(d) USE OF FUNDS.—An eligible entity receiving a 21
grant under this section shall use the grant to participate 22
in decisions impacting the health and safety of the commu-23
nity involved that are related to the permitting or permit 24
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•HR 5842 IH
renewal of a solid waste disposal facility or hazardous 1
waste facility, including— 2
‘‘(1) interpreting information with regard to— 3
‘‘(A) cumulative impacts studies; 4
‘‘(B) health impacts studies; 5
‘‘(C) relevant agency decisions; and 6
‘‘(D) operation and maintenance of nec-7
essary monitors; and 8
‘‘(2) performing environmental monitoring. 9
‘‘(e) LIMITATIONS ON AMOUNT; RENEWAL.— 10
‘‘(1) AMOUNT.— 11
‘‘(A) IN GENERAL.—The amount of a 12
grant under this section (excluding any renew-13
als of the grant) may not exceed $50,000 for 14
any grant recipient. 15
‘‘(B) EXCEPTION.—The Administrator 16
may waive the limitation in subparagraph (A) 17
with respect to an applicant in any case where 18
the Administrator determines that such waiver 19
is necessary for the community involved to ob-20
tain the necessary technical assistance. 21
‘‘(2) RENEWAL.—Grants may be renewed for 22
each step in the process for the permitting or permit 23
renewal of a solid waste disposal facility or haz-24
ardous waste facility. 25
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•HR 5842 IH
‘‘(f) DEFINITIONS.—In this section: 1
‘‘(1) The term ‘community of color’ means any 2
geographically distinct area the population of color 3
of which is higher than the average population of 4
color of the State in which the community is located. 5
‘‘(2) The term ‘indigenous community’ means— 6
‘‘(A) a federally recognized Indian Tribe; 7
‘‘(B) a State-recognized Indian Tribe; 8
‘‘(C) an Alaska Native or Native Hawaiian 9
community or organization; and 10
‘‘(D) any other community of indigenous 11
people, including communities in other coun-12
tries. 13
‘‘(3) The term ‘low income’ means an annual 14
household income equal to, or less than, the greater 15
of— 16
‘‘(A) an amount equal to 80 percent of the 17
median income of the area in which the house-18
hold is located, as reported by the Department 19
of Housing and Urban Development; and 20
‘‘(B) 200 percent of the Federal poverty 21
line. 22
‘‘(4) The term ‘population of color’ means a 23
population of individuals who identify as— 24
‘‘(A) Black; 25
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•HR 5842 IH
‘‘(B) African American; 1
‘‘(C) Asian; 2
‘‘(D) Pacific Islander; 3
‘‘(E) another non-White race; 4
‘‘(F) Hispanic; 5
‘‘(G) Latino; or 6
‘‘(H) linguistically isolated.’’. 7
(b) CLERICAL AMENDMENT.—The table of contents 8
for the Solid Waste Disposal Act is amended by adding 9
after the item relating to section 4010 the following: 10
‘‘Sec. 4011. Environmental justice community technical assistance grants.’’.
SEC. 4. AUTHORIZATION OF APPROPRIATIONS. 11
There is authorized to be appropriated to carry out 12
section 330 of the Clean Air Act (as added by section 2 13
of this Act) and section 4011 of the Solid Waste Disposal 14
Act (as added by section 3 of this Act) $5,000,000 for 15
each of fiscal years 2021 through 2025. 16
Æ
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