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January 2004 | Volume 2, Number 4
Promoting
the Environmental Justice & Health Union mission, Catalyst
identifies training, research, policies, events, and funding
opportunities that foster partnerships to eliminate environmental
disease in low-income communities of color within the United
States. To do that, Catalyst depends on information submitted
by an advisory board of environmental health professionals
and environmental justice activists as well as our readers.
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TOOLBOX
Environmental justice technology
The Progressive Technology Project provides grants
and technology capacity-building
to environmental justice groups.
Fellowships
Peggy
Shepard, an environmental justice leader, and Julius
Richmond, a Harvard University pediatrician, are recipients
of the $250,000 Heinz
Award. Numerous fellowships (including in January the
Petra
Foundation, Echoing
Green, and Leadership
for a Changing World) are available to recognize outstanding
environmental health professionals and environmental justice
activists.
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OTHER
REPORTS OF INTEREST
Health disparities
The Association of State and Territorial Health Officials
and the National Association of City and County Health Officials
have collected case
studies and local
models for eliminating health disparities.
Public health infrastructure
The Public Health Foundation has established the Public
Health Infrastructure Resource Center to promote more
strategic development of public health workforce, information,
and organization needs.
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ADVISORY
BOARD
Lynn Battle
Executive Director, Citizen's
Lead Education & Poisoning Prevention (Birmingham, AL)
Michael
Green
Executive Director, Center
for Environmental Health (Oakland, CA)
Swati
Prakash
Environmental Health Director, West
Harlem Environmental Action (New York, NY)
Alejandra
Tres
Executive Director, Association
of Environmental Health Academic Programs (Portland,
OR)
The Environmental Justice and Health Union is an independent
project of the Center
for Environmental Health
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SUBSCRIBE and PROVIDE
The
Catalyst
is an online newsletter sent monthly to Environmental
Justice & Health Union members. Groups with annual
budgets of less than $200,000 receive free
EJHU membership. The EJHU website (www.ejhu.org) includes
information for activists and professionals about training,
research, and policies, EJHU membership, and past issues of
Catalyst.
If you want to provide information to be considered for inclusion in Catalyst, include a contact name, website, and e-mail address. Please forward the information to ejhu@ejhu.org
or the following address:
Max Weintraub - Director
Environmental Justice and Health Union
528 61st Street, Suite
A
Oakland, CA 94609
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The Next Step...
During 2004, the largest public health organization, the
American Public Health Association, is focusing on
environmental health and environmental justice. The theme
of the annual
APHA meeting that will attract more than 10,000 public
health professionals to Washington, DC within days after
the Presidential election in November is public health and
the environment. As this is the first time APHA has focused
on environment since the environmental justice movement
gained national prominence in the early 90's, a broad range
of APHA sections, special interest groups, and caucuses
seek submissions related to environmental health and environmental
justice for the more than 4,000 lectures and posters that
will be presented. Short presentation abstracts
are due by February 2.
The meeting will also be an opportunity for members of the
Environment Section of APHA to discuss efforts to implement
the Environmental
Health Competency guidelines developed two years ago
in response to the finding that most states do not require
environmental health specialists be certified as meeting
minimal expertise requirements. The Environmental Justice
and Health Union is involved in inviting public health students
interested in environmental justice to attend the APHA meeting.
Check future issues of Catalyst
for details.
Leading up to the November meeting, APHA is promoting environmental
health and environmental justice through advocacy and education.
For example, on April 5 - 11, APHA is coordinating National
Public Health Week. In response to this year's theme
of "Eliminating health disparities: Moving from statistics
to solutions", APHA is collecting information about community
solutions to health
disparities, developing a toolkit and planner's guide,
and identifying events that will take place during National
Public Health Week to increase awareness of health disparities.
APHA is also making health disparities an advocacy
priority for 2004 and applying recent lessons learned
in California
to legislative efforts to Washington, DC.
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PARTNERSHIPS
Community collaboration
The National Association of County and City Health Officials
has compiled lessons
learned from pilot tests of the Protocol for Assessing
Community Excellence in Environmental Health in order to
promote more effective community collaboration.
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ENVIRONMENTAL
HEALTH
Chemical accidents
University of Pennsylvania researchers found a strong
correlation between a high proportion of African- American
residents and a greater frequency of accidents at chemical
facilities. The response to such finding range from the
call to produce safer chemicals by the Safe
Hometowns Initiative to better coordination of chemical
accident reporting and response by the US
Chemical Safety Board.
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ENVIRONMENTAL
JUSTICE
Health disparities
The
report from the first federal meeting focused on the relationship
between health disparities and environmental justice includes
recommendations about how government agencies can promote
science, partnerships, and policy to promote healthy environments.
Legislation
The American Bar Association Environmental Justice Committee
newsletter
announced a 50
state survey of environmental justice legislation and
policy.
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Return to EJHU
or Catalyst
homepage
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CLOSING DATES
January 6
EPA
Environmental Education
Up to $125,000
- - - - - - - - - - - - -
January 13
Burdick
Program for Rural Interdisciplinary Training
Up to $750,000
- - - - - - - - - - - - -
January 15
Nina
Pulliam Charitable Trust - Arizona and Indiana
Up to $100,000
- - - - - - - - - - - - -
January 15
Cox
Charitable Trust - New England
Up to $60,000
- - - - - - - - - - - - -
January 15
New
England Grassroots Environment Fund
Up to $2,500
- - - - - - - - - - - - -
January 30
Grassroots
Intern Program
$5,000
- - - - - - - - - - - - -
February 1
Victoria
Foundation - New Jersey
$200,000
- - - - - - - - - - - - -
February 1
Community-partnered
interventions to reduce health disparities
$500,000
- - - - - - - - - - - - -
February 14
Riverside
Community Health Foundation - California
$200,000
- - - - - - - - - - - - -
February 15
Civil
Justice Foundation
$10,000
- - - - - - - - - - - - -
February 20
McKenzie
River Gathering Foundation - Oregon
$10,000
- - - - - - - - - - - - -
February 28
Community Health Foundation
- Ohio
$2,500
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EVENTS CALENDAR
January 18 - 19, New Haven CT
MLK
Jr. environmental justice celebration
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January 23, Houston TX
Institute
of Medicine environmental health roundtable
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January 23 - 25, Eugene OR
Conference
against environmental racism
- - - - - - - - - - - - -
January 27, Seattle WA
Toxic
chemicals and health
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February 19 - 21, Gainesville FL
Public
interest environmental conference
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February 23 - 24, Bethesda MD
Federal
environmental health science advisory committee
- - - - - - - - - - - - -
February 27, Chapel Hill NC
Minority
health and the built environment
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