Breakthrough Communities -- Publications Overview

Edited by M. Paloma Pavel, PhD, Foreword by Carl Anthony
Published by MIT Press, August 2009

The emerging metropolitan regional equity movement promotes innovative policies to ensure that all communities in a metropolitan region share resources and opportunities equally. Too often, low-income communities and communities of color bear a disproportionate burden of pollution and lack access to basic infrastructure and job opportunities. The metropolitan regional equity movement -- sometimes referred to as a new civil rights movement -- works for solutions to these problems that take into account entire metropolitan regions: the inner city core, the suburbs, and exurban areas. This book describes current efforts to create sustainable communities with attention to the “triple bottom line”: economy, environment, and equity and argues that these three interests are mutually reinforcing. more info

Edited by Robert D. Bullard, Foreword by Carl Anthony
Published by MIT Press, February 2007

With contributions by Carl Anthony, Robert D. Bullard, Don Chen, Daniel J. Hutch, William A. Johnson, Jr., Kimberly Morland, Myron Orfield, David A. Padgett, Manuel Pastor Jr., john a. powell, Swati Prakash, Thomas W. Sanchez, Angel O. Torres, Maya Wiley, Steve Wing, James F. Wolf and Beverly Wright

The smart growth movement aims to combat urban and suburban sprawl by promoting livable communities based on pedestrian scale, diverse populations, and mixed land use. But, as this book documents, smart growth has largely failed to address issues of social equity and environmental justice. Smart growth sometimes results in gentrification and displacement of low- and moderate-income families in existing neighbor- hoods, or transportation policies that isolate low- income populations. Growing Smarter is one of the few books to view smart growth from an environmental justice perspective, examining the effect of the built environment on access to economic opportunity and quality of life in American cities and metropolitan regions.

The contributors to Growing Smarter--urban planners, sociologists, economists, educators, lawyers, health professionals, and environ- mentalists--all place equity at the center of their analyses of "place, space, and race." They consider such topics as the social and environmental effects of sprawl, the relationship between sprawl and concentrated poverty, and community-based regionalism that can link cities and suburbs. They examine specific cases that illustrate opportunities for integrating environmental justice concerns into smart growth efforts, including the dynamics of sprawl in a South Carolina county, the debate over the rebuilding of New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, and transportation-related pollution in Northern Manhattan. Growing Smarter illuminates the growing racial and class divisions in metropolitan areas today--and suggests workable strategies to address them.

Robert D. Bullard is Ware Professor of Sociology and Director of the Environmental Justice Resource Center at Clark Atlanta University.

Supported by the Russell Sage Foundation and co-authored
by Manuel Pastor, Robert Bullard, James Boyce, Alice Fothergill,
Rachel Morello-Frosch, and Beverly Wright) is now
available on the web in PDF format.

As the next hurricane season quickly approaches, beginning June 1, the Gulf Coast's low income communities of color, are still left behind. These communities "days of hurt and loss are likely to become years of grief, dislocation and displacement," says Manuel Pastor, co-director of the University of California/Santa Cruz Center of Justice, Tolerance and Community.

With the support of the Russell Sage Foundation, six colleagues from different disciplines and universities, came together to probe environmental inequality and public health disparities in the United States in a new report In the Wake of the Storm: Environment, Disaster, and Race After Katrina. Written by Manuel Pastor (UC/Santa Cruz), Robert Bullard (Clark Atlanta), James Boyce (UMA/Amherst), Alice Fothergill (U/Vt.), Rachel Morello-Frosh (Brown University) and Beverly Wright (Dillard University), the report will shatter any remaining illusions that disaster rescue in the U.S. is an equal opportunity affair, in which all citizens enjoy the same chances for relief.

"We hope to shed light on many in the U.S. who live their own slow-motion Katrinas--near toxics, suffering with or fearing chronic disease," pledge the six, all senior scholars of environmental justice from across the U.S--one of whom the hurricane displaced.

"The first step of a twelve-step program is to admit you have a problem," says sociologist Robert Bullard. "Our findings suggest we're hooked on hiding hazards among the most vulnerable and disenfranchised. It's time to face reality and offer new strategies."

The authors document the history of disparities evident before, during and after disasters, to put Katrina in a broader context. By tracking the slow recovery of low income people of color - due to less information, fewer loans, less government relief and racial bias in housing - they warn of disasters-in-the-making. Additionally, they offer specific recommendations to guarantee environmental quality and incorporate community voices in the Gulf Coast.

In the Wake of the Storm calls for enforcing environmental standards, strengthening public health resources, conducting independent environmental monitoring and balancing green building and equitable development to prevent "hazard shifting" or displacing long-time residents and developing new mechanisms for community participation.

Finally, the authors stress that it is not just poor and minority communities who are at risk: a hazardous facility can be sited in someone else's backyard, but research shows that the effects soon spill over into other neighborhoods. Establishing fairness as a guidepost for disaster and environmental planning, they argue, is not just the right thing to do – it may be the best thing for protecting the well-being of all Americans.

Advancing Regional Equity Conference Recordings
CD-ROM with Audio and Power Point Presentations

Over 1,200 people participated in Advancing Regional Equity: The Second National Summit on Equitable Development, Social Justice, and Smart Growth. Sponsored by PolicyLink and the Funders' Network for Smart Growth and Livable Communities, the summit was held at the Pennsylvania Convention Center in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, from May 23-25, 2005.

This CD-ROM contains audio and selected PowerPoint presentations of more than 60 panel sessions, plenary dialogues, and skills-building workshops. Summit participants—over half of whom were people of color—came from urban, suburban, and rural communities and shared the progress being forged in promoting quality affordable housing, better schools, living wage jobs, environmental justice, and accessible public transportation.

We are grateful to the numerous foundations that supported the summit. Thank you to everyone who attended—funders, speakers, and participants alike—for sharing knowledge and information that will help achieve a nation where everyone has the opportunity to participate and prosper.

ustainable Metropolitan Communities Books
is an imprint in the MIT Press Urban and Industrial environments Series, edited by Robert Gottlieb. To learn more about Sustainable metropolitan Books and/or if you are interested in submitting a manuscript, please visit our website or e-mail Robert Gottlieb at gottlieb@oxy.edu.

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