By: Publisher Updated 09 Feb 2022, 14: 54 pm EST
One week after taking office, President Biden signed the executive order 14008, establishing the Justice initiative 14.
This is a coordination tool so that federal agencies, in their work with states and local communities, dedicate at least 40% of the benefits of clean energy and climate investments to low-income communities and communities of color. To African-Americans and Latinos, who have systematically and disproportionately suffered from pollution for decades.
Justice 14 intends to fulfill a campaign promise with which the then presidential candidate Biden sought the support of our community.
14008
Seeks to benefit those most exposed to environmental contamination, those who live near sources of toxic materials, those populations whose health is most vulnerable and finally, those who live in poverty. Obviously, all these populations are juxtaposed into one.
It is a commitment to channel an unprecedented level of federal investment to communities damaged by many years of neglect. It includes hundreds of programs from dozens of federal and, with their funding, state and local agencies.
To fulfill the promise, the government must ensure that the resources reach agencies and groups that ensure their correct use, which effectively benefits the communities and not intermediaries, third parties and outsiders.
For this, the role of community organizations dedicated to our people, city by city, state by state, is crucial. These facilitate the direct participation of the people who are intended to benefit. They know the local needs. They have deep links with the population. And their presence will strengthen the confidence of the community.
When making decisions, their criteria will be to do what a community wants and needs, and not what someone behind a desk decides what will benefit them.
Moreover: the success in the implementation of the plan will be measured by the degree of participation of the communities in decision-making and the management of the various programs . There is no better pattern that indicates it.
A year has passed since then. The White House celebrated the anniversary attributing expenses already made for hundreds of millions of dollars. But it is not clear how many and which of them were already budgeted, or had been invested in any way, or directly have no relation to the objective of the initiative.
A statement from the White House ensures that the plans are being “reinvented and transformed to maximize benefits for disadvantaged communities.” Those who analyze these claims are waiting for more details to be able to corroborate it.
This is more difficult when instead of quantifying the program according to the real amounts invested, the administration is based on the vague concept of the “benefits” of the expense. That should change.
Justice 40, correctly implemented, is an extraordinary opportunity. We hope that its birth pangs will be fleeting and that it will prevail as a potential instrument of mutual recognition between the administration and the community and the catalyst for growth that has been postponed so many times.