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The letter from EPA’s Office of External Civil Rights (OECRC) announcing the decision to launch an investigation can be accessed here.
EPA will only accept complaints that “allege discriminatory acts that, if true, violate the EPA’s Title VI regulations." In accepting the MVC’s complaint, EPA has decided that the Coalition successfully plead plausible allegations of discrimination based on the actions of the Albuquerque City Council.
EPA’s acceptance letter states that “Accordingly, with respect to Complaint No. 06RNO-24-R6, OECRC will investigate the following issue: Whether the actions of the City Council surrounding the Air Board’s rulemaking proceeding and issuance of the HEEI Rule discriminated against persons in Albuquerque on the basis of race, color, and national origin, in violation of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 USC § 2000(d) et seq., and EPA’s nondiscrimination regulation, 40 C.F.R. Part 7.
The Mountain View Coalition and NMELC filed their Title VI Civil Rights Complaint on May 31, 2024; the following month, on June 28, 2024, they also filed a Request for EPA to conduct a Title VI Compliance of the Environmental Health Department (EHD). That request is still pending.
Specifically, the Complaint asked EPA to:
- Conduct an investigation into the City of Albuquerque and its City Council’s discriminatory conduct and interference in the HEEI Rulemaking Proceeding and associated rulemaking efforts;
- Hold a public listening session and an opportunity to submit public comments on the matter;
- If warranted, reduce or eliminate federal funding for the City of Albuquerque; and
- Take all other actions equitable and necessary, including an affirmative compliance review of the City of Albuquerque, to ensure the City of Albuquerque and its City Council come into and remain in compliance with Title VI and EPA’s implementing regulations.
Maslyn Locke, NMELC Senior Staff Attorney, said, "The decision by the EPA’s External Civil Rights Compliance Office (ECRCO) to investigate EHD and the Albuquerque City Council's acts from December 2023 shows that, even in the face of an incoming presidential administration that has explicitly stated it intends to dismantle both the EPA and their Civil Rights Office, civil rights still matter. It's encouraging to know that ECRCO is not going to abandon Albuquerque, and we look forward to working with EPA to finally, meaningfully address the city's decades-long practice of discriminating against Bernalillo County's communities of color."
Lauro Silva, Board Member, Mountain View Neighborhood Association, said, “The Albuquerque-Bernalillo County Environmental Health Department has allowed in a great number of these hazardous, toxic, and carcinogenic polluting industries by granting Special Use Permits despite opposition by community residents and the Neighborhood Association. The community’s most recent attempt to establish a regulation by the Air Quality Control Board has resulted in extreme environmental racism against the approximately 80 percent Mexican American/Chicano community by the Albuquerque City Council, which is why we filed our Civil Rights Complaint to the EPA.”
Kacey Hovden, NMELC Staff Attorney, said, “For too long, the City of Albuquerque has unabashedly engaged in intentional discrimination against and explicit disregard towards Albuquerque and Bernalillo County’s communities of color—subjecting these already overburdened communities to increasing pollution on all fronts, without any sort of meaningful and actual effort to regulate the disproportionate adverse health impacts thereof.”
Genevieve Chavez Mitchell, President, Mountain View Neighborhood Association, said, “The Mountain View Neighborhood Association is very pleased that this issue is being addressed. The Mountain View Community has two superfund sites, numerous brownfields, seven petroleum tank farms, and miles of salvage yards. We do not have a restaurant, grocery store, a public park, or green space. We worry about air quality, drinking water, and soil pollution from years of industrial discharges. We would like a plan for industrial pollution clean up, a plan for mixed-use development and no more dirty industry. We want a healthy, thriving, beautiful community!”
Nora Garcia, Board Member, Mountain View Neighborhood Association, said, “I have never before seen such discrimination displayed by City Council and Councilor Lewis toward a poor and underserved community that is constantly being discriminated against for trying to improve Albuquerque’s contaminating air pollution problems by heavy industrial systems.”
Marla Painter, President, Mountain View Community Action, said, “Councilor Dan Lewis bullied his way into a legitimate and legal public hearing on the HEEI hearing that was on a tight deadline, thereby upending the legal attempts of a community of color to legally establish rulemaking that would implement remedies for intolerable environmental assaults on our community. The Council passed resolutions to disband the City/County Air Board and delay the hearings until a new, industry-friendly Board could be seated. This political tactic violated our right to meaningfully participate in the rulemaking process. They have discriminated against Albuquerque’s communities of color based on race, color, and national origin, which is a violation of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. A pattern of discriminatory behavior by most of our City Council forced us to legally challenge their actions with a civil rights complaint.”
Alan Marks, Board member of Mountain View Community Action, said, “The cruel decision by industry-favoring City Council members to destroy the Air Quality Control Board and hijack a regulation meant to protect overburdened communities in Albuquerque deserves to be investigated and to hold the City Council accountable.”
Forest Graber, Board President, Friends of Valle de Oro National Wildlife Refuge, said, “The continued intentional discriminatory actions of Councilor Lewis and the majority of the Albuquerque City Council against its own low-income communities and communities of color is a violation of our Civil Rights.”
Dr. Virginia Necochea, Executive Director of NMELC, said, “We are pleased the EPA accepted and decided to act on our complaint. It’s our responsibility, especially as people of color, to stand up and demand justice for our children, for our families, and for our communities. NMELC will continue to focus our energy, efforts, and resources to work alongside our clients and frontline communities to ensure environmental justice continues to advance.”
Meanwhile, on January 1, 2025, EHD published its Overburdened Areas Map (OBA) on their website. According to their latest version of the map, Mountain View is not designated as an overburdened area, such that it will not be subject to extra protections from the harmful impacts of air pollution. The Mountain View Coalition views this as yet another example of blatant discrimination against their low-income community of color.
Because of this, on January 17, 2025, the MVC and NMELC filed a Supplement to the Request for EPA to conduct a Title VI Compliance Review informing EPA about the OBA map as additional evidence of intentional discrimination against Mountain View. (111 pages) 1/17/25
CALL TO ACTION
The Mountain View Coalition and NMELC invite community members to attend the next Air Quality Control Board meeting scheduled for Wednesday, February 12, 2025 at 5:30pm and to ask questions during public comment.
We invite you to ask the Air Board to urge EHD to share how they determined that the Mountain View neighborhood is not an overburdened area on the latest version of the OBA Map and to share their methodology as well.
The Air Board meeting will be held in hybrid format, in person as well as online, at:
Basement Hearing Room,
Plaza del Sol Building
600 Second Street NW
Albuquerque, NM 87102
The zoom link and the agenda will be posted 72 hours before the meeting on the Air Board's website.
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