Thanks, Nicole. I'm confused by this: " HIA augments the current planning
process" and this: " HIA - particularly when it is outside the regulatory
planning/environmental process." There seems to be a contradiction. Is HIA within or
outside the planning process? I also haven't observed this, " HIA may point out
mitigation measures for factors, design features," but I'm hoping you have some
examples of where HIAs have pointed out mitigation factors. Mitigation, of course, is a
concept that grows out of NEPA. A civil rights violation cannot be mitigated, but the
actions that caused the violation must be stopped, remedies crafted, and the adversely
affected parties made whole.
Here you make a good point: " EJ sometimes struggles when addressing spatially
diffuse issues." We call these environmental insults over time and place
"cumulative impacts." They are routinely ignored in NEPA analyses. Are you
saying that they are included in HIAs, and that such inclusion prevents the creation or
perpetuation of "sacrifice zones," neighborhoods that repeatedly are adversely
affected by big, stinky, and toxic projects? If so, I'd be curious to hear some HIA
success stories of this type. The HIAs that I've read have been of the advisory or
study type, with no compliance or enforcement power whatsoever. In other words, no power
to force change in a positive direction. This is a major difference between HIAs and legal
compliance work under Title VI and the Clean Air Act, for example. Again, I hope
you've got some counter-examples.
Marc
----- Original Message -----
From: "Nicole Iroz Elardo" <irozelardo(a)yahoo.com>
To: "marcomcast" <mbrenman001(a)comcast.net>et>, h+t--friends(a)chrispy.net
Sent: Wednesday, June 11, 2014 3:25:42 PM
Subject: Re: [H+T--Friends] HIA Webinar
Marc,
Sure. (And yes, exploited was an ironic choice given the civil rights angle, but not
particularly intentional word.) Although I will say it is unclear to me if you are asking
how *I* personally know or how the field knows. I'll assume it is the latter - that
you are asking "what does HIA add to a planning process that is not already there and
how do we know it helps vulnerable communities."
HIA is far from perfect and not appropriate for every situation, but it has a valid claim
that and HIA augments the current planning process to allow for more informed decisions.
Public health professionals generally view planning as inadequately addressing human
health or health equity even though disparities in human health are well-documented as are
both social and built-environment factors leading to those disparities. HIA uses this
population-based health evidence to identify intended and unintended health consequences
of proposed plans/projects/policies. It aims to maximize health overall and decrease
health disparities for vulnerable communities - a decision-making frame that planners do
not necessarily use as they are balancing all sorts of interests in addition to health.
But it is a useful frame, particularly in a social justice situation.
Transportation planners believe that they protect human health through NEPA, but the
reality is that NEPA has been institutionalized to identify exposure concentrations in the
physical environment and rarely makes it all the way to human health or to addressing some
of the more indirect health pathways. I believe that the humanizing factor is a pretty big
deal. Additionally, HIA - particularly when it is outside the regulatory
planning/environmental process - starts from a place of identifying ALL possible paths to
human health. All paths means even things outside of the defined alternatives - very
similar to some traditional EJ work. So an HIA may point out mitigation measures for
factors, design features, or the lack thereof that planners have dismissed as impractical
or too expensive, etc. In some cases, it might suggest that planners need to go back to
the alternatives definitions and rework.
One place where HIA may augment traditional EJ for advocating for justice is in its
ability to provide a stakeholder/decision-making framework to deliberate about competing
health concerns. An example from my dissertation is the Lake Merritt BART Station Area
plan. When planning for zoning for transit-oriented development, what health consideration
is the very-low-income Asian community most concerned about? affordable housing? losing
the park used for Tai Chi? air pollution? culturally specific food? culturally specific
public space? all of it? If the community has to choose, then what? Where to put advocacy
efforts? HIA, by tracing those pathways organizes and provides communities an
evidence-base by which to deliberate the various pathways and which has the most impact on
health. It can then guide/augment EJ efforts.
Finally, HIA has health equity as one of a handful of explicit values. This is completely
congruent with EJ values and efforts. What is different, however, is the ability of public
health professionals to articulate that value using professional/academic knowledge and
increasingly modeled information. I'd also argue that HIA, with its flexibility, may
be more useful than a traditional EJ approach to health equity in the policy arena because
EJ sometimes struggles when addressing spatially diffuse issues.
That said, HIA is a process and product that is centered around information. HIA documents
advocate for human health but will not advocate for a specific outcome/alternative. That
is left up to the actual community to use the HIA information to advocate in an inherently
political planning process.
In sum, a good HIA will augment EJ efforts by outlining where intentional and
unintentional health effects and health disparities are likely to occur with a public
decision. This is a good thing and doesn't have to be an either/or. HIA should tell
you where the health problems are and identifies specific human health indicators that
might be useful arguing for and monitoring the legal aspects of civil rights and EJ.
Again, a win for vulnerable communities.
~Nicole
Nicole Iroz-Elardo, PhD
Portland State University
irozelardo(a)yahoo.com
From: mbrenman001(a)comcast.net [mailto:mbrenman001@comcast.net]
Sent: Wednesday, June 11, 2014 2:17 PM
To: TRB Health and Transportation; nicole.iroz-elardo(a)state.or.us
Subject: Re: [H+T--Friends] HIA Webinar
Thanks, Nicole, can you tell us more about this: "HIA processes and products engage
the notion of equity in ways that are currently not exploited in planning and EJ
circles"? How do you know what is "exploited" [an odd choice of words!] in
planning and EJ circles?
Marc Brenman
mbrenman001(a)comcast.net
----- Original Message -----
From: "Iroz-Elardo Nicole" < nicole.iroz-elardo(a)state.or.us >
To: " h+t--friends(a)chrispy.net " < h+t--friends(a)chrispy.net >
Sent: Wednesday, June 11, 2014 1:17:01 PM
Subject: Re: [H+T--Friends] HIA Webinar
Hi all. I am the presenter of the HIA webinar being discussed. It is hosted by IBPI which
is associated with OTREC and Portland State University - my doctoral institution. It is an
offshoot of lessons learned from both my doctoral research and time as an HIA
practitioner. My doctoral research takes a broad look at transportation planning, so the
webinar will not be bike/ped specific. The webinar was initiated because OTREC provided
some doctoral support for the research and this seemed like a good avenue to distribute
practice-related findings. This particular webinar will address the wide variation within
and between disciplines about meaning, definitions, and methods associated with concepts
such as health, equity, and engagement; this often result in conflicts between and within
professions mid-HIA due to inappropriate expectations of HIA.
Regarding the statements about social and environmental justice... While my doctoral
research does not address civil rights law directly, it is a critique of the extent to
which HIA proclaims itself participatory and thus protective of community. HIA assumes
that there is value in stakeholder/collaborative engagement; it is an offshoot of what is
currently termed "health in all policies" approach in public health which
suggests any time you can bring public health evidence in for public consideration,
decision-makers are more likely to make a more informed and thus healthier public
decision. But make no mistake, HIA is generally informed by a stakeholder process engaging
in an even broader stakeholder process. Because of that, all the caveats in the literature
about power and stakeholder/collaborative processes apply; stakeholder processes are
easily co-opted and are highly dependent on representation, timing, and good facilitation
to address power structures. HIA, while!
committed in theory to good process, is still in its infancy in defining and bounding
engagement. And community driven HIAs are relatively rare in the U.S.
My research shows that the social justice and community aspects of HIA practice are less a
result of stakeholder/participation formats and more a function of explicit HIA values
such as a commitment to health equity and broad determinants of health. Through these
values, public health professionals are able to identify and advocate for underserved or
unorganized communities - particularly in spatially-based plans. It is also important to
realize that public health professionals engage in HIAs because they do not see the
current NEPA regulatory and federal/state legal structures do not go far enough to protect
population health and health equity. And HIA processes and products engage the notion of
equity in ways that are currently not exploited in planning and EJ circles - a likely win
for vulnerable communities. So HIA may not explicitly address civil rights law (certainly
true in most U.S. HIAs), but it engages in the notion of health disparities and thus
health, socia!
l, and environmental equity.
The dissertation employs a case-study approach; two of the three cases are HIAs that are
centered around non-English EJ populations in the U.S. and thus might be of particular
interest to some commenters. It is a reasonably interesting read for a dissertation and
publically available through OTREC at
http://otrec.us/project/715 .
Fun to see this being discussed! Hope to have some of you on the webinar on July 16th.
http://otrec.us/events/entry/health_impact_assessment_hia_in_transportation…
~Nicole
Nicole Iroz-Elardo, PhD
Portland State University
irozelardo(a)yahoo.com
-----Original Message-----
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Of h+t--friends-request(a)chrispy.net
Sent: Wednesday, June 11, 2014 10:00 AM
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Subject: H+T--Friends Digest, Vol 38, Issue 5
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Today's Topics:
1. Re: H+T--Friends Digest, Vol 38, Issue 4 - HIA (Mindell, Jenny)
2. Re: H+T--Friends Digest, Vol 38, Issue 4 - HIA
( mbrenman001(a)comcast.net )
3. David Ragland Profiled for Robert Wood Johnson Foundation
Safe Routes to Schools work (Phyllis ORRICK)
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Message: 1
Date: Tue, 10 Jun 2014 08:58:44 +0000
From: "Mindell, Jenny" < j.mindell(a)ucl.ac.uk >
Subject: Re: [H+T--Friends] H+T--Friends Digest, Vol 38, Issue 4 - HIA
To: " h+t--friends(a)chrispy.net " < h+t--friends(a)chrispy.net >
Message-ID:
< 7354587cd221478c8333e68518d1a139(a)DB3PR01MB331.eurprd01.prod.exchangelabs.com >
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"
We may like the concept of evidence-based decision-making but being realistic, political
(including planning) decisions are based on a whole range of things.
So most people now aim for 'evidence-informed decision-making', for which HIA is
well-suited.
It would be daft to think that planners (or others in local, regional or national
government) consider only health when making their decisions.
But the more that the decision-makers are involved with the HIA process, the more likely
they are to engage with the recommendations produced.
And I am very surprised by the statement that public health professionals are unaware of
social equity or civil rights. Certainly not the case in the UK. And HIA, as accepted
across Europe and I thought worldwide, considers both the health impacts and their
distribution across the population.
Dr Jennifer Mindell
Clinical senior lecturer
Health and Social Surveys Research Group Research Department of Epidemiology and Public
Health UCL
1-19 Torrington Place
London WC1E 6BT
Tel. 020 7679 1269 (Internal x41269)
Survey doctor: 07770-537238
Fax 020 7813 0242
Email: j.mindell(a)ucl.ac.uk
Web: IRIS web page
Journal of Transport and Health:
www.elsevier.com/locate/jth
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Message: 1
Date: Sat, 7 Jun 2014 12:29:58 +0000 (UTC)
From: mbrenman001(a)comcast.net
Subject: Re: [H+T--Friends] webinar on Health Impact Assessment (HIA)
in Transportation Planning
To: TRB Health and Transportation < h+t--friends(a)chrispy.net >
Message-ID:
< 648017716.8220462.1402144198106.JavaMail.root(a)comcast.net >
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"
Who is putting on this webinar? It appears to be something called IBPI. "The
Initiative for Bicycle and Pedestrian Innovation is an exciting center for research and
learning that is focused on bicycle and pedestrian travel. IBPI?s aim is to advance
bicycling and walking as integral elements of the transportation system in Oregon?s
communities." Where's the neutrality and objectivity?
In regard to this statement, "Health impact assessment (HIA) has emerged in the U.S.
as a promising way to increase social and environmental justice by addressing health
equity within transportation planning," much HIA work does not adequately address
social equity and EJ issues. For example, HIA's rarely address Title VI of the Civil
Rights Act of 1964 or the environmental justice executive order. They rarely contain legal
concepts at all. HIA's are usually conducted by public health people, who have no
background in social equity or civil rights. They often perform with an environmentalist
bias (see "bicycle innovation" above), which often is in tension with the needs
of low income communities and communities of color.
As to this, "It also augments community and stakeholder engagement by providing a
forum - usually through an advisory committee - where stakeholders can identify and
deliberate about health interests related to the target plan. While HIA advisory
committees are diverse by design," much HIA work is conducted solely in English, and
the limited English proficiency needs of various demographic groups are not addressed.
Another concern with "advisory committees" is that fact that they only provide
"advice" which the "planning" entity is not obligated to pay any
attention to. A colleague who leads an immigration advocacy group told me a couple of
years ago, "I no longer serve on advisory committees because they don't make
policy or control anything."
Marc Brenman
mbrenman001(a)comcast.net
------------------------------
Message: 2
Date: Tue, 10 Jun 2014 18:08:33 +0000 (UTC)
From: mbrenman001(a)comcast.net
Subject: Re: [H+T--Friends] H+T--Friends Digest, Vol 38, Issue 4 - HIA
To: TRB Health and Transportation < h+t--friends(a)chrispy.net >
Cc: j.mindell(a)ucl.ac.uk
Message-ID:
< 1533380969.350750.1402423713482.JavaMail.root(a)comcast.net >
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"
Here's what I said: "HIA's rarely address Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of
1964 or the environmental justice executive order. They rarely contain legal concepts at
all. HIA's are usually conducted by public health people, who have no background in
social equity or civil rights. They often perform with an environmentalist bias...much HIA
work is conducted solely in English, and the limited English proficiency needs of various
demographic groups are not addressed." My comments were focused on the US, where the
webinar under discussion is occurring. But prove me wrong in the UK. Quote some HIAs in
the UK that discuss the Equality Act (which is under fire in the UK by the Conservative
Party) or the equivalent, and environmental justice, and use the languages preferred by
demographic groups. This is more than "awareness," since awareness doesn't
cure much of anything. I'll be happy to be proved wrong and would love to use those
good HIA examples.
In recent work with The City Project in Los Angeles, as funded by the California
Endowment, we observed that even those public health organizations and medical
professionals who work with minority health disparities rarely engage civil rights law to
help solve the challenges. Various professions just seem stuck in their silos. And
don't get me started on trying to use epidemiologists as witnesses in environmental
just cases. I've never found one who would testify that X environmental insult caused
Y adverse effect on a given minority or low income community. They insist upon a
scientific standard of proof, which is way higher than the administrative civil rights
standard of proof of a preponderance of the evidence.
Marc Brenman
mbrenman001(a)comcast.net
----- Original Message -----
From: "Jenny Mindell" < j.mindell(a)ucl.ac.uk >
To: h+t--friends(a)chrispy.net
Sent: Tuesday, June 10, 2014 1:58:44 AM
Subject: Re: [H+T--Friends] H+T--Friends Digest, Vol 38, Issue 4 - HIA
We may like the concept of evidence-based decision-making but being realistic, political
(including planning) decisions are based on a whole range of things.
So most people now aim for 'evidence-informed decision-making', for which HIA is
well-suited.
It would be daft to think that planners (or others in local, regional or national
government) consider only health when making their decisions.
But the more that the decision-makers are involved with the HIA process, the more likely
they are to engage with the recommendations produced.
And I am very surprised by the statement that public health professionals are unaware of
social equity or civil rights. Certainly not the case in the UK. And HIA, as accepted
across Europe and I thought worldwide, considers both the health impacts and their
distribution across the population.
Dr Jennifer Mindell
Clinical senior lecturer
Health and Social Surveys Research Group Research Department of Epidemiology and Public
Health UCL
1-19 Torrington Place
London WC1E 6BT
Tel. 020 7679 1269 (Internal x41269)
Survey doctor: 07770-537238
Fax 020 7813 0242
Email: j.mindell(a)ucl.ac.uk
Web: IRIS web page
Journal of Transport and Health:
www.elsevier.com/locate/jth
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Message: 1
Date: Sat, 7 Jun 2014 12:29:58 +0000 (UTC)
From: mbrenman001(a)comcast.net
Subject: Re: [H+T--Friends] webinar on Health Impact Assessment (HIA) in Transportation
Planning
To: TRB Health and Transportation < h+t--friends(a)chrispy.net >
Message-ID:
< 648017716.8220462.1402144198106.JavaMail.root(a)comcast.net >
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"
Who is putting on this webinar? It appears to be something called IBPI. "The
Initiative for Bicycle and Pedestrian Innovation is an exciting center for research and
learning that is focused on bicycle and pedestrian travel. IBPI?s aim is to advance
bicycling and walking as integral elements of the transportation system in Oregon?s
communities." Where's the neutrality and objectivity?
In regard to this statement, "Health impact assessment (HIA) has emerged in the U.S.
as a promising way to increase social and environmental justice by addressing health
equity within transportation planning," much HIA work does not adequately address
social equity and EJ issues. For example, HIA's rarely address Title VI of the Civil
Rights Act of 1964 or the environmental justice executive order. They rarely contain legal
concepts at all. HIA's are usually conducted by public health people, who have no
background in social equity or civil rights. They often perform with an environmentalist
bias (see "bicycle innovation" above), which often is in tension with the needs
of low income communities and communities of color.
As to this, "It also augments community and stakeholder engagement by providing a
forum - usually through an advisory committee - where stakeholders can identify and
deliberate about health interests related to the target plan. While HIA advisory
committees are diverse by design," much HIA work is conducted solely in English, and
the limited English proficiency needs of various demographic groups are not addressed.
Another concern with "advisory committees" is that fact that they only provide
"advice" which the "planning" entity is not obligated to pay any
attention to. A colleague who leads an immigration advocacy group told me a couple of
years ago, "I no longer serve on advisory committees because they don't make
policy or control anything."
Marc Brenman
mbrenman001(a)comcast.net
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Message: 3
Date: Tue, 10 Jun 2014 11:52:48 -0700
From: Phyllis ORRICK < phylliso(a)berkeley.edu >
Subject: [H+T--Friends] David Ragland Profiled for Robert Wood Johnson
Foundation Safe Routes to Schools work
To: sph_faculty_open(a)berkeley.edu , sph_staff_open(a)berkeley.edu ,
" safetrec_staff(a)lists.berkeley.edu "
< safetrec_staff(a)lists.berkeley.edu >,
safetrec_students(a)lists.berkeley.edu , faculty(a)its.berkeley.edu ,
students(a)its.berkeley.edu , staff(a)its.berkeley.edu ,
h+t--friends(a)chrispy.net , phaa(a)berkeley.edu
Message-ID:
< CALuXqV5Wo71QhhptTV_PG+u6FZohLp0oquAhT8c9vahVnE3YYg(a)mail.gmail.com >
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"
Hi all,
Here is an item with link to a lengthy profile of SafeTREC Director David
Ragland and our team research on health and safety effects of Safe Routes
to School.
Best,
Phyllis
http://safetrec.berkeley.edu/content/david-ragland-rwj-profile
SafeTREC's David Ragland Profiled by RWJ's Active Living Program
In an article titled "Safe Routes to School Examined: How Structural
Changes Around Schools Affect Children's Mobility and Safety: A Profile of
Active Living Research Investigator David R. Ragland, PhD, MPH," the Robert
Wood Johnson Foundation's Active Living Research program discusses the
origins of SafeTREC director and founder David Ragland's work in traffic
safety in general and his and SafeTREC researchers' series of studies
evaluating various effects of Safe Routes to School projects, including:
- Safe Routes to School Safety & Mobility Analysis
<
http://www.escholarship.org/uc/item/5455454c >
- Ten Years Later: Examining the Long-Term Impact of the California Safe
Routes to School Program
<
http://www.escholarship.org/uc/item/8m59g6vx > (presented
at TRB 2014 Annual Meeting)
Links
Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Profiles David Ragland for Safe Routes to
School
<
http://www.rwjf.org/en/about-rwjf/newsroom/newsroom-content/2014/06/safe-ro…
>
--
Phyllis Orrick
Communications Director
Safe Transportation Research and Education Center
<
http://www.safetrec.berkeley.edu/ > (SafeTREC)
2614 Dwight Way
UC Berkeley
Berkeley CA 94720-7374
510-643-1779
@transsafe <
https://twitter.com/#%21/transsafe >
@trbhealth <
https://twitter.com/#%21/trbhealth >
Skype: pmorrick
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